Ask George: Where can I find the best corned beef and pastrami in St. Louis?

It’s a timely question, especially as St. Patrick’s Day quickly approaches. Pastrami and corned beef are both cured beef products, but they differ mainly in their seasoning and cooking methods.

Traditionally, corned beef is the brisket cut that has been salt-cured, most often using the leaner, evenly shaped flat cut. The term “corned” refers to the large grains (corns) of salt traditionally used in the curing process. The brine typically includes pickling spices, which help preserve the meat and give it a mild, salty flavor. After curing, corned beef is usually boiled, simmered, or steamed until tender.

Pastrami, often considered corned beef’s more intensely flavored cousin, begins with a similar brining process but is frequently made from the brisket’s fattier point cut, sometimes called the deckle. After curing, the meat is coated in a spice rub that may include black pepper, coriander, onion, garlic, paprika, mustard powder, and other seasonings. It’s then smoked and often steamed, producing a dark, flavorful crust (known as the bark), a smoky aroma, and a more complex, peppery taste. Because of the added seasoning and smoking, pastrami generally has a richer, more robust flavor than corned beef.

Several local butcher shops and grocers sell corned beef, especially this time of year:

• Kenrick’s Meats & Catering offers both cooked corned beef (top round and flats) and fresh corned beef (eye of round, top round, and trimmed flats) to cook at home.
• Paul’s Market sells uncooked corned beef (top round and flats) from a Chicago distributor and will offer it in the hot case on Tuesday.
• The Quarter Butcher in Dardenne Prairie sells a ready-to-cook flat brisket with a two-week brine.
• Straub’s sells Kobe corned beef, a premium, slow‑cooked brisket made from high‑quality beef.

Corned beef is the main component of the reuben sandwich, which is how most consumers eat the cured meat. Calling out one version as ‘the best in town’ is grounds for a long debate, so we’ll throw out a few favorites:

• Protzel’s Deli offers three sizes and cooks them on a decades-old panini grill.
• Cafe Provencal’s iteration uses Gruyere cheese, braised sauerkraut, and comes with a mess of matchstick pommes frites.
• The properly portioned reuben at the recently relocated The Posh Nosh Deli & Grill has remained the deli’s top-selling sandwich for decades.
• Just up the street, one of the best corned beef sandwiches in the city can be found at Nate’s Kosher Deli, the quirky, mysterious, order online/pick-up only joint on Forsyth in Clayton, where a dining room is forthcoming.
• The reubens at Llywelyn’s, Lester’s, Deli Divine, and Crown Candy Kitchen are worthy of consideration.
• Blurring the corned beef/pastrami line, Heavy Riff Brewing offers a smoked corned beef reuben, as does The Stellar Hog, which calls its the “Smokey Reubenson.”
• On and around St. Patrick’s Day, Hogtown Smokehouse in Dogtown offers its take on a reuben featuring thick cut house cured corned beef, Swiss cheese, sweet pepper slaw, and Russian dressing on marble rye from Pete’s Italian Bakery. 
• The renowned Carnegie Deli supplies the corned beef and pastrami to The Pitch at Union Station.
• Lefty’s Bagels doesn’t offer a reuben sandwich, per se, but it does source its corned beef and pastrami from Detroit-based Sy Ginsberg’s Meat & Deli, which Lefty’s partners consider to be the best in the country.

Pastrami sandwiches are almost as prolific in St. Louis. Respectable versions can be found at some of the aforementioned sandwich spots, as well as some unexpected restaurants. Both are listed below.

• Protzel’s Deli
• Deli Divine
• Lester’s
• Carl’s Deli
• Blues City Deli
• The Gramophone
• Capriotti’s
• hatch’d serves a house smoked version.
• Dalie’s Smokehouse makes its “Ultimate Reuben” with beef and pork belly pastrami.
• Pierce Creek, in the former Kohn’s Kosher Deli, is where Lenny Kohn still produces his legendary pastrami.

Photography by Kevin A. Roberts

Photography by Kevin A. Roberts

For the best of both worlds, go to Protzel’s for a combination corned beef and pastrami reuben, which remains one of the best sandwiches in town.

Follow dining editor George Mahe on X and Instagram, or send him an “Ask George” email at [email protected]. For more from St. Louis Magazine, subscribe or follow us on Facebook, X , and Instagram.