'I found the recipe in my grandfather’s old recipe book': Master butcher George McCartney leaves lasting legacy with award-winning corned beef
A revival in the UK and Ireland in corned beef sales owes much to the skills and enterprise of George McCartney, a Master Butcher from NI, and then owner of the famed McCartney’s Butchers and Deli in Moira.
George, who passed away on August 21 aged 76, was also the first food business owner in NI to win the Supreme Title in the prestigious Great Taste Awards in London.
He created a new variety of corned beef that was hand made using a traditional meat press. It was based on a recipe from his grandfather, also a master butcher.
George’s corned beef was different and used the finest dry-aged silverside meat, which was then cured before being hand shredded and pressed in natural gelatine. This process gave it a rich and distinctive flavour, a revolution in traditional corned beef.
You only have to set the McCartney’s version of corned beef beside the tinned types to notice the difference in colour and texture.
McCartney’s, a business that’s been going for 150 years, also has a full, rich, meaty flavour without the greasiness of the mass-produced types. It is gluten-free and when tested for fat content it was 96% lean meat.
“It all started in 2007 when I found myself with a surplus of silverside – a cut of beef from the hindquarter, just above the leg – and I wondered how to use it up.
“I found a corned beef recipe in my grandfather’s old recipe book so I set to work producing the finest corned beef I could possibly make,” George told me many years ago.
In 2011, McCartney’s won Great Taste Award Supreme Title – the first for NI - for the silverside corned beef. In the 11 months after winning McCartney’s hand-produced 3.7 tonnes of it, responding to inquiries from all over the world.
The delicious corned beef, which has graced the chilled cabinets of Selfridges up-market store in London, remains a popular choice for shoppers from Moira and elsewhere.
For years the shop in Moira was famous for sausages. George’s grandfather started making them more than 80 years ago. McCartney’s now has 40 different varieties.