Written by: Roscoe |  Print this post and share it with your buddies!

You’ve heard of the Reuben. Well, this is the Roscoe. You’ll probably see it on menus across the country from now on.

Ingredients:

Corned Beef – it all starts here. Get a medium hunk of meat – 3-4 lbs. – from your butcher or grocer.
Roscoe’s Red Cabbage – see Roscoe’s Polish Burger for the recipe – this is the secret. Once you try it, you’ll be hooked.
Swiss cheese – 2 slices per sandwich
Pumpernickel bread – sliced thin if you can get it. If not, regular is fine.
Mustard – pick your two favorites

For Rub:
Your favorite pepper
bacon salt
paprika
your favorite meat seasonings

For Marinade:
olive oil
Worcestershire
Cholula
Beer – 1/2 bottle of your favorite; drink the other half
1 gallon resealable kitchen storage bag

Here’s What You Do:

Pat dry and pour your favorite seasonings over the corned beef, then rub in all over: both sides, all edges. Then put it in the gallon bag and add the marinade stuff – a few shakes of each. Seal it up and shake the meat around, massage the juices into the meat, then put it in the fridge for as long as you can, preferably over night.

Preheat your oven to 400, take your corned beef out of the bag – you can dump it right onto the grate in your roasting pan, with the marinade juices covering and flowing off. Pour half bottle of your favorite beer into the pan, and put the whole thing into the oven. Once it’s in, drop the temp to 250, take that half beer that’s left, and walk away. Let it go for 5 hours or so. Depending on the size, it may take a little longer. When the temp is between 140 and 150, it’s ready. You may have to have a few more of those beers while you’re waiting. That’s okay, it only enhances the experience.

The St. Patrick’s Day/Corned Beef Legend

Let’s get right to the point: it was an Elf. Searching for that legendary pot of gold at the end of the rainbow (aren’t we all?), this particular elf chased it right to a butcher shop. Let’s face it, we don’t really know too much about Elves. But there’s an old Irish professor at the University of Dublin who, after sharing a few whiskeys with Roscoe one cold night, told him this:

Never Trust An Elf

This particular elf, carrying his own pot (this was before the pot ‘o gold legend began, before this it was just gold at the end of the rainbow, no pot), was pretty hungry after a futile search, so he distracted the butcher (told him the rainbow had led to this particular shop, there must be gold buried here somewhere), and while the butcher was searching for the gold, the elf grabbed a brisket, stuck it in his pot, and split. But on his way out, the elf tipped a barrel of brine right onto the remaining briskets (even then, brisket was big in Ireland, the shop was full of them). By the time the butcher finally figured out he’d been conned, the brine had soaked all his briskets. Well, not being wasteful by nature (and just as greedy as that elf), the butcher sold the briskets as they were (without telling anyone), and the rest is history. People kept asking for their briskets the same way they’d gotten them the previous time, so the butcher soaked them all in brine (butchers in Ireland always had a barrel of brine on hand, no one really knows why) and kept selling them that way. The elf never came back, and neither of them ever found any gold. But at least we got corned beef out of it.

Back To Our Sandwich

If you want, you can throw some potatoes and carrots and cabbage in the roaster for the last three hours or so and have corned beef and cabbage (they never mention the carrots and potatoes with this, must be frustrating to carrot and potato farmers), but here at Club Roscoe we prefer to just make the best sandwich you’ll ever have.

Let It Rest

Or not. You probably won’t be able to anyway. So just slice it up as thinly as you can – a sharp knife helps here.

Assemble

Put some mustard on one slice of bread, then layer on some of the corned beef. Put the other mustard on, then some more corned beef. A couple slices of Swiss cheese, then a couple spoonfuls of the red cabbage (warm). Top it with the other slice of pumpernickel (hey, if you like rye better, go for it). Cut it in half and serve with a crisp pickle.

It’s corned beef and cabbage on a sandwich, Cookin’ With Roscoe all the way.