This brisket is too salty. Keep that in mind. If you use this recipe - and you should, because it came out really good except for the too-salty part, use a bit less salt.

Cooking awkwardness has reached a peak point in the past week - a lot of casual, workmanlike meals designed to convert farm-box items into edible biomass. The chicken curry from Saturday (designed to use last week's cauliflower) generated enough leftovers to get me through an entire week of lunches.

But Monday was gaming night at my place, and I had a desire. A plan. I wanted to make "barbecue" brisket sandwiches. I use ironic quotes because it was dry-rubbed and oven-braised brisket, which I know isn't true barbecue, but until I'm a homeowner, I'm not doing any smoking.

Anyway, apart from being too salty, which I compensated for by underseasoning the red cabbage slaw with jalapeno-garlic dressing I made to top the sandwiches with, and which you can compensate for but cutting about 25% of the salt from the rub recipe, this was a huge hit and tastes pretty awesome even with the extra salt. I totally stole the idea from an episode of Unique Eats on the Cooking Channel where a barbecue place used espresso and cumin in a dry rub. You'll need:

• 4.5-5 poiunds beef brisket
• Less than 1/2 cup kosher salt
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 tbsp garlic powder
• 1 tbsp onion powder
• 1 tbsp ancho chile powder
• 1 tbsp espresso/italian roast coffee, finely ground
• 1 tbsp ground cumin
• 1 tsp dry thyme
• About 1 cup white wine

PREP: Combine everything except the brisket and the wine into a dry rub. Cut the brisket into pieces so that it all fits in one layer insde a large roasting pan. Coat the brisket evenly with the rub on both sides - you'll use about 2/3 of what you make, depending on how much brisket you end up buying - and lay it in the roasting pan. Cover the roasting pan with foil and stash in the fridge overnight.

COOKING: Pop the foil off a corner of the roasting pan and add white wine to whatever liquid has come out of the brisket overnight until the liquid comes about 1/3 of the way up the side of the brisket. Replace the foil and put in a 275 degree oven for at least four hours.

When the four hours are up, test for doneness by sticking a fork into the center of the biggest piece of brisket and twisting. If the fork twists easily and the fibers separate, it's done enough. Let it cool. This step is easier if you don't throw your back out the day of cooking. If you -do- throw your back out, you won't be able to accurately gauge how long to cool the brisket, because you'll barely manage to shut off the oven and wait for someone to help you get it out several hours later.

At this point, you want to pull the brisket out and chop or shred it as you see fit. I shredded mine with two forks, but you might want shorter strings of brisket or chunks. Pour the braising liquid into a saucepan and reduce it by at least half. I say "at least" because at this point, I added the braising liquid to the beef and saved it for the next day, when I reheated everything in a pan and that pretty much finished glazing the beef. If you're doing this step prior to serving, you might want to take it down a bit farther than half.

Serve on large buns with a nice, bright, vinegary slaw. Barbecue sauce is optional, but if my audience is any indication, completely unnecessary.