And the answer is........!!!

SUCCESS!  Canned corned beef does NOT have to smell or taste like dog food!!!  I opened a jar for lunch yesterday to make one of my favorite dishes, corned beef hash.  Just to make the judging fair I invited my mom and my niece to help guinea pig this idea.

Remember, this is by far the UGLIEST end product I've ever experienced in 25+ years canning.  And that includes the great corn fiasco of 1993.  Just to prove it's ugliness I will show you the picture again....

And let me tell you, it didn't get any prettier by opening the jar......

That big hunk of fat dangling in the top of the jar....not to mention the hunk stuck to the rim.  YUMNOT.

But the smell.  Oh my....it will make you forget all about the ugliness of it.  The smell is fresh, it is of fresh cured beef with that lovely hint of clove, mustard, bay......all in a briney mix that makes you drool in anticipation.  So I did the honorable thing.....I grabbed an onion and a couple potatoes.....and started chopping.  Olive oil into the skillet....some butter (because I am an American)... and started the process of making the most experimental corned beef hash I've ever attempted.

Once the onion and taters had some nice brown color on them......I carefully scooped out the pink globules of fat from the jars; usually difficult for me to do because I think fat is what makes the world run smoothly.....poured out half the packing juice.....and dumped the globs into the pan.  Using a big spatula I broke up the chunks of corned beef.  I used part of the packing juice so that I could put the lid on the pan and steam the potatoes until fully cooked (plus the salt from the juice would salt the onions and potatoes). 

Then I removed the lid and browned everything thoroughly.......

It is BEAUTIFUL!  We all agreed that it was FANTASTIC!  It was every bit as good...or better....than any corned beef hash we'd ever had.  An HANDS DOWN better than any corned beef hash from a can.

So there ya have it.  You can bet more corned beef will be stuffed into jars in my future.