French Dip Sandwich with Au Jus

I love french dip sandwiches and so does my family. When I don't feel like cooking, its such an easy meal to make and healthier than eating at our local restaurant chain with all its processed food. Previously (before our switch to unprocessed foods and meals), I would just buy a condensed can of beef consomme and use that as our Au Jus sauce. But after reading the label of ingredients on the back of the can of soup and not understanding half the ingredients' list, I decided a change needed to take place in order to make the meal more healthy and less processed for my family. I searched online for homemade versions of beef consomme and from my research (Let me remind you, I am only a hobby cook) the soup takes a long time to make and ends up as a clear liquid (really!? how is that possible)...sounds like too much work to me. So I found a base for my own version of Au Jus and adapted it with some minor changes. Thanks to Katie over at Chaos in the Kitchen for the inspiration to my own unprocessed version of Au Jus with some consomme' characteristics. The whole point of this meal is to be easy and use as little processed ingredients as possible. Roasted garlic mayonnaise (condiment of choice for this sandwich) is very simple to make for yourself, see step 4 below.

Ingredients:

• 4 cups beef broth, organic or natural
• 1 small onion, sliced into rings
• 1 carrot diced
• 1-2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1-2 TBSP organic ketchup (or to minimize sugars use tomato paste)
• 2 bay leaves
• salt and pepper for taste
• 4 hoagie rolls
• 1lb lean, deli roast beef, thinly sliced
• roasted garlic
• 1/4 cup mayonnaise (I prefer the olive oil all natural version)

In a medium sauce pan, add beef broth, onion, carrot, garlic, ketchup (tomato paste) and seasonings to a boil.

 

Boil vigorously until reduced by half. You should be able to measure out 2-3 cups of au jus.

Mix the roasted garlic (just place a garlic head in a small crock or aluminum foil, drizzle with olive oil, and place in the oven under the broiler until mushy) and mayonnaise to make the tangy mayo condiment. 

Heat the sliced roast beef directly in the sauce pan with the au jus. Slice hoagie rolls and open, butter the insides and place under broiler in your oven until slightly crisp. Watch the rolls! Just like my roasted pepper post, I tend to multitask while cooking and several times caught the rolls, or any food product for that matter, on fire because I walked away too long.

Once the rolls are crunchy, spread the garlic mayo on one side of each roll, loosely pile 3-4 ounces of roast beef on top of the mayo. Serve sandwiches with au jus on the side.

The side dish is my Garlic Baked Potato Wedges.

Meatballs with CranApple Sauce

• 1 to 1 1/2 cups corn chex cereal
• 1/2-3/4 cup chicken stock
• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil (EVOO)
• 2 pounds ground beef
• 2 egg
• 3 tablespoons onion, grated
• 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped

For the Cran-Apple Sauce:

• 1 cup whole berry cranberry sauce
• 1 cup no-sugar-added organic applesauce
• 2 tablespoons honey

For the Walnut Parsley Couscous (if serving as a meal):

• 1 1/4 cups chicken stock
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 1/4 cups couscous
• Salt and pepper
• 1 cup flat leaf parsley or 2 TBsp dried parsley flakes
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts, toasted

Serves 8-10 as an appetizer, 4 as an entrée

Pre-heat the oven to 425°F. Place a rack on a large baking sheet. Using a food processor, grind the Chex Cereal into crumbs, then transfer them to a small bowl. Douse the crumbs with the stock to soften. (Don’t clean out the food processor; set aside.) Drizzle the EVOO into a large bowl. Add the beef; season with salt and pepper. Mix in the moist crumbs and the egg, onion, garlic. Roll the meat into 1 1/2-inch-2-inch balls. Arrange on the prepared baking sheet and roast until golden brown, about 15 minutes.

In a small bowl, combine all of the dipping sauce ingredients. Serve with meatballs.

For the couscous: In a medium size saucepan, bring the stock and butter to a boil. Stir in the couscous; season with salt and pepper. Cover the pan, turn off the heat and let stand for 5 minutes. Using the reserved food processor, chop the parsley. Fluff the couscous and stir in the parsley and walnuts.

Meatloaf Minis

Another freezer meal recipe that I am trying today, of course with some modifications. I know my family will like this one, everyone loves meatloaf! This time inspired by Fabuless Freezer Cooking at FabulesslyFrugal.com.

INGREDIENTS:

1 cup ketchup(I use the organic without High Fructose Corn Syrup)

1 tsp ground mustard

2 eggs beaten

4 tsp Worcestershire sauce

3 cups Crispix cereal, crushed (can substitute with corn and rice chex)

3 TBsp diced onions (very small pieces so the kids can't find them)

1 tsp season sea salt

1 to 2 cloves minced garlic

1/2 tsp pepper

3 pounds lean ground beef

TO FREEZE

In a large bowl, combine ketchup and mustard. Add eggs, Worcestershire sauce, onions, garlic salt and pepper to ketchup mixture; mix well. Let stand 5 minutes. Crumble beef over sauce mixture, add crushed cereal, and mix well. FabulesslyFrugal.com suggests pressing meat mixture into 18 muffin cups (about 1/3 cup each). Bake at 375 for 18-20 minutes. Drizzle with reserved ketchup mixture (your choice, mix ketchup and brown sugar); bake 10 minutes longer or until meat is no longer pink. Freeze for up to 3 months. I, instead, prepared 9 mini meatloaf muffins and cooked as directed above for the kids and hubby to enjoy when they get home from church. The remaining meat mixture I molded into a loaf, wrapped in Aluminum Foil and placed in a Ziplock Freezer bag. I will prepare as directed below and probably pull the meatloaf out of the freezer the day before our family plans to eat it, so it can thaw.

TO PREPARE

Completely thaw. Bake at 350 for 40 minutes, or until thoroughly heated. If you want more sauce, Sweet Baby Ray’s BBQ goes good with this. You can also cook from frozen, just increase the cook time.