Table of Contents
French Dip Sandwich with Rootbeer Au Jus
Speed - 92%
Simplicity - 93%
Tastiness - 100%
95%
Amazing!
If you ever thought that making a sandwich in the slow cooker wouldn't happen, then you're wrong! This delicious French Dip sandwich is made by roasting and slow cooking pork and adding caramelized onions.
Ingredients
French Dip Sandwiches
- 1.5 Kilos Ribeye Roast
- Prepared Mustard for brushing
- Salt to taste
- Black Pepper, ground to taste
- 1.5 Cups Rootbeer
- 1 Cup Brown Beef Stock
- 2 Tablespoons Worcestershire Sauce
- 10 Portions French Baguette
- 200 Grams Gruyere Cheese shaved
- 1 Piece White Onion cut into 1 inch cubes
- 1 Pieces Carrot cut into 1 inch cubes
Onion Marmalade
- 6 Pieces White Onions thinly sliced
- 1 Tablespoon olive oil
- 1 Tablespoon Balsamic Vinegar
- 1 Teaspoons Salt
Instructions
- Truss your meat.
- Brush with prepared mustard and season liberally with salt and pepper.
- Sear on all sides in a hot pan then set aside.
- In the same pan, roast flavoring vegetables.
- Deglaze pan with about a half cup of rootbeer.
- Transfer all contents of pan into the slow cooker.
- Set meat on top of the flavoring vegetables.
- Add remaining rootbeer, beef stock, and worcestershire sauce.
- Cook on high for 2 hours.
- When done, remove from stock, tent with foil, and allow to rest.
- Strain cooking liquid into a saucepan and reduce by half.
- Carve meat thinly across the grain.
- Slice french baguette into portions and into top and bottom halves.
- Lay slices of beef on bottom half of bread. Top with cheese and gratinate.
- Top with caramelized onions and assemble sandwiches.
- Serve with dipping sauce.
For the Caramelized Onions
- Slice onions thinly.
- Roast in a slightly oiled pan over high heat. Add a pinch of salt.
- When onions start to caramelize turn heat down and continue stirring.
- Add balsamic vinegar, and continue roasting until dark brown in color.
- Set aside.
Growing fond of my slow cooker lately having used it for a few stews, soups, and braised dishes turning out excellent results. These were expected though as I knew I could use the cooker for pretty much any dish that involved a cooking liquid of some sort. I had to put it through a challenge of a cooking method of which honestly, I had no certainty of success. I wanted to see if it was capable of roasting meat, given the method's rather dry cooking nature.
I've done this recipe a few times with success in a conventional oven. Though I knew it would taste equally fantastic out of a slow cooker, I'm uncertain if I could nail cooking the meat to my desired temperature, which is medium-rare, and if ever possible, how long do I cook it for? To take out the guess work, I took out my trusty meat thermometer.
Was my attempt successful? Let me talk you through.
When roasting any piece of meat, I always start by trimming it of any excess fat or tissue. Then I give it a good truss with some twine to give the final roast a shapely structure. A reminder though, always allow your meat to fully come to room temperature beforehand. This would mean taking it out of the chiller about an hour before cooking.
After trussing, it's time to give it some flavor. If you haven't marinated your meat, which I seldom do with beef to preserve its natural flavor, a simple dry rub would be ideal. For this recipe, I brushed mine with prepared mustard for the tang, and finished it off with a generous seasoning of salt and black pepper.
Time to heat the pan. This for me is the most important step in roasting. For one, searing seals in the meat's natural juices. It also makes a very flavorful crust out of all those spices and aromatics that you have rubbed in. And of course, it gives the meat a rich brown color which is impossible to achieve in the slow cooker alone.
After the meat is seared all around, the flavoring vegetables are next. Carrots, onion, and celery make-up the classic French trinity which they natively call mirepoix. Roasting them releases a distinct sweet flavor compared to putting them directly into a stew or a sauce.
When the vegetables are beautifully caramelized, deglaze the pan with a flavored liquid. This is to release all those flavors from the pan drippings. Typically done with wine, I deglazed with some rootbeer for this particular recipe.
Here's where this roast takes on a different route. This would conventionally head into the oven, but to satisfy my curiosity, I put at stake this prime cut of beef and decided to finish it in a slow cooker. As with typical roasting, arrange the mirepoix at the bottom of the pan, or in this case the bottom of the crockpot, serving as a bed to lay the meat on. Then add in a bit of cooking liquid just to keep things from totally drying up. I used about a cup of rootbeer and a cup of brown beef stock.
While waiting in tension, I started caramelizing my onions. Lots of them. Here are some tips for caramelizing onions :
– Add a pinch of salt in the beginning. This will release the water from the onions and allow them to dry-up and eventually caramelize faster.
– You can start this process over high heat. At this stage the moisture content is still high, so there would be less probability of the onions burning.
– As the onions start to caramelize, they begin to change to a light amber color and their volume reduces to about half. This is when you pay close attention, stirring them constantly to avoid burning. It would also be good to reduce your flame.
When the onions are about done (deep brown color), add in a bit of balsamic vinegar and allow it to reduce completely. Save it for later.
My meat is done. At least that's what my trusty thermometer says. An internal temperature reading of 145F should yield a perfect medium rare. Up to this point I really had no clue if I've done the roast properly, and was very tempted to cut through it to check the doneness. I knew the meat had to rest or I'll end up with a dry roast with all those juices running out. So as I usually do, this ribeye had to rest on my countertop tented with a sheet of aluminum foil.
This is it! After a good 15-minute rest, it's time to carve the meat. The crust looks good. And to my surprise, the meat too – a perfect medium-rare, pink and amazingly juicy!
Now for the sandwiches. A good topping of gruyere adds richness and a bit of saltiness to the beef.
Don't they look mouthwatering?
Time to dunk it in to that rich au jus. Which by the way, I strained into a saucepan to reduce by about half to further concentrate all those flavors. The rootbeer added a very distinct essence to elevate the flavors of this classic French Dip.
So yes, I've roasted perfectly in my slow cooker. And honestly, for all its convenience, I don't see myself having another roast out of my oven.
One of our favorite slow cookers from 2016 was the Crock-Pot 6.5 quart touchscreen slow cooker in chrome. They call it “silver”, but the shiny mirrored outside clearly screams chrome. It's a very cool looking slow cooker with a touchscreen for the settings. Although it doesn't do anything especially “fancy”, it performs the standard slow cooker functions with style, and costs about the same.
Ingredients
French Dip Sandwiches
- 1.5 Kilos Ribeye Roast
- Prepared Mustard for brushing
- Salt to taste
- Black Pepper, ground to taste
- 1.5 Cups Rootbeer
- 1 Cup Brown Beef Stock
- 2 Tablespoons Worcestershire Sauce
- 10 Portions French Baguette
- 200 Grams Gruyere Cheese shaved
- 1 Piece White Onion cut into 1 inch cubes
- 1 Pieces Carrot cut into 1 inch cubes
Onion Marmalade
- 6 Pieces White Onions thinly sliced
- 1 Tablespoon olive oil
- 1 Tablespoon Balsamic Vinegar
- 1 Teaspoons Salt
Instructions
- Truss your meat.
- Brush with prepared mustard and season liberally with salt and pepper.
- Sear on all sides in a hot pan then set aside.
- In the same pan, roast flavoring vegetables.
- Deglaze pan with about a half cup of rootbeer.
- Transfer all contents of pan into the slow cooker.
- Set meat on top of the flavoring vegetables.
- Add remaining rootbeer, beef stock, and worcestershire sauce.
- Cook on high for 2 hours.
- When done, remove from stock, tent with foil, and allow to rest.
- Strain cooking liquid into a saucepan and reduce by half.
- Carve meat thinly across the grain.
- Slice french baguette into portions and into top and bottom halves.
- Lay slices of beef on bottom half of bread. Top with cheese and gratinate.
- Top with caramelized onions and assemble sandwiches.
- Serve with dipping sauce.
For the Caramelized Onions
- Slice onions thinly.
- Roast in a slightly oiled pan over high heat. Add a pinch of salt.
- When onions start to caramelize turn heat down and continue stirring.
- Add balsamic vinegar, and continue roasting until dark brown in color.
- Set aside.
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