I like food that can be kept in the refrigerator for weeks and then when you suddenly realize you want to make dinner at home, it can be prepared in under twenty minutes. I look for that kind of meal and a few years ago, I found a great one which I told you about here — Jennie-O brand Turkey Pot Roast. They come fully-cooked and one of 'em microwaves up in twelve minutes, tastes good, resembles real cooking…and saves my life at that moment when I dearly need a sudden supper.
For a time, I had trouble finding stores that sold them but happily, the Ralphs chain began stocking them so I always have two or three in the fridge. (One caution if you try them: Check the expiration dates and subtract two weeks. If it says to use by May 14, use it by May 1. I've had to toss out a few that I prepared closer to the expiration date…and the Ralphs Markets I go to sometimes keep them on sale longer than they should. But they're great if you adhere to the two week rule.)
If I know for certain I'll be dining home the next night or two, I occasionally make a Bill Bailey's Corned Beef in my crockpot. Very simple: Take it out of the wrapper, put it in, cover it with water and cook 10 hours on "low." Even I can do that and I usually do it overnight. I start it at Midnight and then at 10 AM the next morn, I take it out, slice off the fat, let it cool an hour or two, then slice. They're a bit saltier than I'd like but still quite good. They also have the advantage of making your house smell like a real good delicatessen. If I could get Jackie Mason to drop by when I cook one and also hire some waiters who don't give a crap, I'd be indistinguishable from the Carnegie. Oh, yeah. I'd have to overcharge, too.
The trouble with making one of these, of course, is that I can't decide at 6 PM to make one and be eating corned beef by 6:20. That was why I was guardedly thrilled one day in Costco when I spotted the Bill Bailey's fully-cooked, heat-in-your-microwave version. I raced home with it and didn't make it that night because, of course, I also bought a Costco rotisserie chicken while I was there. But a few nights later, I prepared my microwave corned beef.
How was it? On a scale of ten — ten denoting fine corned beef made fresh at a great deli — I'd peg the ones I make in my slow-cooker at a 9 and the microwave version at an 8. Given the convenience, that's more than a passing grade for me. They also carve much neater than the corned beefs I cook overnight so I might give them a half-a-point for that.
So from all this, you'd expect that my refrigerator would at this moment be filled with Bill Bailey's Fully-Cooked Irish Brand Corned Beef Brisket. Yeah, you'd think that, wouldn't you? Well, it would be if I could find them again.
A few days later, I was near a different Costco so I went in and they didn't have them. They had what I now call the "Cook-it-yourself, Pal" version but not the microwave kind. Not long after that, I went back to the same Costco where I bought the first one…and they now only had the "Cook-it-yourself, Pal" kind. I asked the Costco person who is in charge of product information and got a "We don't know if we're going to be getting the other kind again and if so, when."
Naturally, I then phoned the Bill Bailey's company and asked to speak to their Customer Service Department. The person who answered the phone seemed a little unsure if they even had a Customer Service Department but after I explained that I wanted to know where to purchase their product, she put me through to someone who was supposed to know this. It was a woman who told me they're only available at Costco. Nowhere else. Well, not the two Costcos nearest to me, they aren't.
I'm going to keep hunting. I went through this with the Turkey Pot Roasts and eventually, they turned up in other stores. In the meantime, if a Costco near you carries them, you might want to give it a try. Don't bother writing to tell me you found them at your local Costco unless it's near Los Angeles. I'm not going to drive 50 miles for one of these. They're good but not that good.
