Corned Beef Without The Corn...

For some reason, all of a sudden, while I was at the parking lot and getting ready to go home, this question suddenly popped-up out of my curious and ever questioning mind. Why do we call corned beef "corned" wherein is has no corn at all? Is it some kind of an oxymoron? So I went over the internet and do a little research over the word "corned beef". To summarize it all, this is what I got...

“Corned beef” is defined as a beef cured or pickled in brine. Brine is a salt water. Way back to the days before refrigeration, faced with the challenge of preserving fresh meat for the winter season, meat was dry-cured in coarse of “corns” of salt. Chunks of salts were rubbed into beef to keep it from spoiling and to preserve it. The word corn referred to the grains of coarse of salts packed around the beef brisket. Thus the meat was called “corned” beef in reference to the corns of salt (1620s).

It feels like, another mystery solved. Isn't always fun to know???
=)