It also shows how terribly inefficient cooking can be
Lets say we cook that corned beef to 160F, corned beef has to have a lower thermal capacity than water which is 1 BTU/lb * F
so roughly we need to raise the temperature of the corned beef 100 F, for 2 lbs this is 200 BTU or roughly 60W, less than 2 cents of energy at $0.34/kWHr. An insulated crock pot would waste less energy.
Jeff