Baltimore Pit Beef

Some more lerve for Cooks Illustrated/America's Test Kitchen/Chris Kimball.  If ever I could be persuaded to move full-time to the snow-barren Northeast, it would be to work for these folks. 

If I am ever going to make a beef roast for sandwiches, this will be my recipe.  

Now, it does call for (authentically) charring on the grill, but since my personal comfort range for cooking outdoors ranges from about 60F to 75F ambient temperature, this will only fly for about 3 weeks out of the year.  

On the recent Superbow...er, Big Game... weekend (during which the Baltimore Rave...er, East Coast Team...prevailed), I used a combination of oven-roasting and stovetop cast iron grilling to make this to very good reviews.

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Grilled Spice-Rubbed Bologna

How retro grill-chic, right?  This is like fried bologna, but classy LOL 

When you go to the deli counter to get a slab o' bologna, ask them to cut you a chunk about 3" or 4" thick.  Adapted from a cookbook I found at our beach rental this summer.  Be sure to build a nice hot, smoky fire in your grill...more smoky flavor is better here.

The spice rub will keep for some time in your spice cabinet.  You could apply the rub to the bologna and wrap it in plastic wrap a couple of days in advance of cooking, or freeze the whole slab.  Leftovers of this recipe make OUTSTANDING lunchbox sandwiches.

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Salmon Pastrami: Condiments



Salmon pastrami on a cracker with
crême fraîche and raw capers

My preferred combination of toppings for Salmon Pastrami rolls is sour cream, caramelized capers and blanched onions.  Crême fraîche, pickled onions, caramelized onions, raw capers and chopped chives are also good choices. 

Blanching onions takes the raw, heartburn-y bite out of them, but leaves their flavor and crunch.  While briny, raw capers cut the richness of salmon, caramelizing capers transforms them into a sweet-but-tart condiment with a caviar-like pop in the mouth.  Crême fraîche is a milder cousin to sour cream, but is often hard to find (and expensive when you do).  Making it at home is a snap with buttermilk powder.

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Salmon Pastrami

This is desert island food for me.  As in, if I were stuck on a desert island and could only have one thing to eat, this would seriously be it.  The recipe is adapted from the cookbook from the world-famous, but currently-defunct, NYC restaurant Tavern on the Green.

This is technically a kind of ceviche, as the salmon is cured by the acid from the vegetable-lime juice mixture.  The "pastrami" part of it is the peppery crust you build on top with layers of molasses and coarsely crushed spices.  It's a process that takes days to finish, but is so worth it.  You can freeze it at just about any point once the curing is done: you can freeze the cured, uncrusted fish and apply the spice crust later, you can apply the spices and freeze it whole, or you can freeze it sliced.

Which piece to use

You'll need a fairly large piece of salmon (fussing with pre-cut "fillets" makes slicing it later a pain in the patoot).  You can do a whole side of salmon, but that does make a LOT of pastrami.  If you want to use a smaller piece, I suggest cutting (or have the guy at the fish counter do this) the piece outlined on the picture at right.  The "tail" piece behind it is too thin to slice nicely, and the rest of the fillet ahead of it tends to be wider than a standard knife, which makes carving the finished pastrami difficult. 

It's also best to use fish that's not been previously frozen.  Fish, like fruit, is very delicate at the cellular level and a freeze-thaw cycle makes the flesh mushy.  When you carve the finished pastrami, the firmer it is the better. 

How to slice finished pastrami

It's hard to write instructions for proper slicing of the finished pastrami (at least for me it is).  You want to slice thin slices on the diagonal, kind of like cutting a beef brisket, without cutting through the salmon skin.  Use a knife that's at least 2" wider than the fish.  Hold the knife parallel to the front edge of the fish and angle it diagonally in the vertical plane (like a forward slash if you're looking at it from the side, and you're right-handed).  Saw the knife gently toward the skin following the diagonal line, and then lift at the last millimeter to cut the flesh away from the skin. This -->     picture illustrates the angle of the cut pretty well.

And then there's serving the finished pastrami.  You can put a single slice on a cracker with a pinch of sour cream for an appetizer, or serve it rolled in a flatbread with capers, blanched onions and sour cream (my favorite) or put it on rye toast for a faux Reuben.  You can put a little or a lot of work into preparing the extras for a salmon pastrami sandwich, so I'll have a separate post regarding my preferred condiments.

And now...the recipe:

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Mushrooms on sale!

What to do with several pounds of mushrooms purchased on sale?  Slice them in the food processor and prep for roasted mushroom sandwiches and freeze mushroom casseroles, of course!

(By the by, I haven't gotten around to doing my mushroom cleaning science experiment because a) I'm easily distracted and b) my mushroom slicer broke.  Eventually...  So I'm still working with the assumption that a quick rinse and pat dry will be sufficient for cleaning and allowing prepped, sliced mushrooms to stand for a day or two in the fridge awaiting cooking.)

You'll need about 2 lbs of mushrooms for 4 sandwiches and 1 1/2 lbs. for each casserole.  I'm making one recipe of sandwiches and 2 casseroles, so I have 5 pounds of mushrooms.  All button-type mushrooms, cremini and white button.  Shitake, oyster, and any other fancy mushroom should be sliced by hand as the food processor will just tear them up rather than slicing them.  Use the slicing plate in your food processor, and you'll be done in no time flat.

For the mushroom casserole, you need to make a thick white sauce for the base of the dish.  I have recently discovered that this can be accomplished in the microwave!  Huzzah!  So fast, so easy and no extra heat in the kitchen.  You will need to use a container that is much larger than seems necessary because the mixture will foam up quite a bit.
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Make-ahead Bacon-wrapped Meatloaf Sandwiches

[A moment of reflection for the greatness that is this dish]

No, this is not health food, but this is one of the best things I have EVER eaten.  Ever.  There are no words to convey how serious I am about this fact.  Best. Ever. Period.  And you get versatility in preparation, storage and serving methods.  I don't know that there is anything more perfect anywhere in any category of being.  I cannot claim responsibility for originating this masterpiece, though I have naturally tweaked, simplified and Dinner Done Yesterday-ed it.

There are two main prep-ahead/serving options: 1) mix the meatloaf to store (fridge or freeze), bake later and serve as meatloaf, 2) bake the meatloaf to store to slice and fry later for sandwiches.  And there's the planned leftover option...serve as meatloaf for dinner #1 and slice and fry for sandwiches for dinner #2. If you want to go for complete gastronomic orgasm, fry the meatloaf slices in mojo de ajo.

The meatloaf mix lends itself well to either ground pork or beef, accomodates whatever herbs you have on hand, and did I mention that it's wrapped in bacon and made with bacon fat?  Oh jah, good stuff. 

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Waste Not: Bacon

  

Gratuitious bacon shot

More specifically, bacon grease.  My mom kept a coffee can by the stove to collect bacon grease so that it didn't clog up the disposal.  She threw it out when it got full.  I don't know for sure that my grandmothers or great-grandmothers kept a can by the stove the collect bacon grease, but if they many housewives of their generation did and it was to use for cooking.  Most cookbooks written before the 1960's don't specify what kind of fat to use in a recipe...because the cook might have been using rendered bacon fat just as often as oil or butter.

But it's so high in fat!!  So are butter and olive oil, actually.  It's all fat, and you shouldn't go bonkers with any of it really.  Bacon grease is immensely flavorful (like butter) with a high smoke point (like canola oil).  You don't have to drown all your cookery in bacon fat, but a tablespoon added to other fats will help correct their deficiencies.  Just don't add any extra salt to the recipe.

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Cubans

Sandwiches, not cigars.  They're a great way to use up leftover pork roast, which is one leftover that tends to hang around drying out in our fridge.  It's much easier to get thin sandwiches slices if you slice the roast after it's chilled. 

You can put the sandwiches together ahead of time, as long as you put the pickles in between layers of meat and cheese rather than against the bread.  Then you can grill them when you're ready.  We use the George Foreman for this purpose, but a griddle and a brick (or an actual panini press) will get the job done, too.

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Muffaletta, or Really? You don't have time to make a sandwich?

If I think back 2 1/2 years, I know that's the question I would have asked after reading what I am about to write.  How can you possibly be so tired, so disorganized, so worn-out that you can't make one little sandwich?  Any soon-to-be first-time parents who are reading and wondering the same thing, please take note of the response I have for my pre-baby self...HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!  Call me back in 3 months and let me know how that "sleeping through the night" thing is going.

Anyway...freezing sandwich fixings is mostly about having something in the freezer so that you don't have to go grocery shopping and possibly snagging a good sale on deli meat.  But deli meat, sliced cheese and rolls do freeze really well (provided you've packaged them airtight), so put an easy-peasy dinner in your back pocket for those days when even take-out is too hard. 

Hummus is a good veggie sandwich option that freezes nicely, too.  You can even assemble some cheese sandwiches for grilling (go ahead and butter the bread) and wrap them invidually in plastic wrap to freeze.  Total lifesaver when there's a screaming baby, a hungry toddler and no lunch plan.

For something a little more interesting than a plain ol' bologna sandwich, I love muffaletta.  Love the New Orleans Central Grocery muffaletta, love this one too.  It's adapted from Emeril Lagasse's muffaletta recipe.  I double the amount of olive relish since the giardiniera called for only comes in containers twice the size required by the recipe at my local stores.  Work once, eat twice.  I also hate standing in line at the deli counter -- Publix...Boca Raton...Parkinsonian retiree with half a loaf of bread stashed in her purse wanting "samples"...'nuff said -- so I'd rather buy twice as much deli meat and freeze it so that I've got all the making for TWO of these delectable sandwiches on deck.  You can make this ahead the night before even, so it's a shop-ahead, prep-ahead and make-ahead meal...fabulous for parties, too.

Emeril calls for some authentic Italian-type deli meats that we just don't get in my neck of the woods, so I sub out a spicy ham for capicolla and P&P loaf for mortadella.

Muffaletta (makes 2 sandwiches, each serves 8)

Olive Relish:
2 cups pimento-stuffed olives, plus 1/4 cup of liquid from the jar
2 cups giardiniera (pickled Italian vegetables), plus 2 tablespoons of liquid from the jar (a 16-oz jar is about 2 cups)
1/4 cup drained capers, plus 4 teaspoons of liquid from the jar
1 cup pitted black olives
4 cloves garlic
1 small minced shallot
2 teaspoons dried oregano
2 teaspoons dried parsley
Pinch of dried thyme
Pinch of crushed red pepper
3/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

Pulse the garlic cloves and shallots in a food processor until finely chopped.  Add the olives, giardiniera, capers in the processor and pulse several times until coarsely chopped.  It's ok if there are some big chunks left. 

Combine the brines, olive oil and herbs and spices in a medium bowl.  Add the chopped vegetables and stir well.  Divide into two zip-top bags.

Deli Meats/Cheeses:
1/2 pound sliced fresh mozzarella
1/2 pound sliced capicollo or prosciutto (or spicy ham)
1/2 pound sliced Genoa salami
1/2 pound sliced mortadella (or P&P or bologna)
1/2 pound sliced mild provolone cheese

Divide each type of meat and cheese in half and put them in zip-top bags.

To serve:
for each sandwich, one large round loaf (10"-12") of sourdough or Italian bread, split lengthwise

When you're ready to make the sandwich, thaw all your fixings.  Cut the bread in half and scoop out some of the crumb from the top and bottom halves of the bread. 

Fill the scooped out part with olive relish. 

Cover each half with slices of cheese.  Arrange each type of meat in a layer over the cheese.  CAREFULLY close the halves together.  Wrap in plastic wrap and put this in the fridge for at least a couple of hours, if you have time.  To serve, cut into wedges.

FYI...if you want to make your own bread for this sandwich, I made a half recipe of the Pain Ordinaire Carême from Bernard Clayton's New Complete Book of Breads. Pin It