Sasha's Kitchen: Rib Eye Cheesesteaks

I know I have written about cheesesteak before, but I could not help myself. I made this a couple of weeks ago and it was just too good not to share on A Kitchen In Brooklyn. Sure, I love the Philly style cheesesteak with thinly slice steak, onions and liquid cheese, but this at home "dressed up" style cheese steak made with rib eye is pretty good as well. There's plenty of ways to make a great cheesesteak or steak sandwich, but this one incorporates my preferences - grass fed rib eye, caramelized onions, provolone cheese and roasted red pepper, on a delicious long sandwich roll. My love for this sandwich comes from my college days at Haverford College and some great steaks at Genos and Pats.


Sasha's Rib Eye Cheesesteak

3/4 lb rib eye, thinly sliced

two onions, sliced

2 T of sugar

canola oil  or olive oil

2 long Italian rolls or hoagie rolls

1 roasted red pepper, sliced

provolone cheese (1/4 lb)

To prepare the meat, we chose to season and cook the steak on a grill pan, about medium. A the end of the grilling process, my husband sliced the rib eye thinly using an electric meat knife. It is worth noting that I used grass fed rib eye for this recipe, which is the healthiest type of red meat to be eating if, like me, you care about your body and your planet. You could also slice the meat before cooking if you prefer and it might cook much faster. But I found my method to work just fine.

Then I prepared the onions by sautéing them with the sugar and canola oil to caramelize the onions. I prepared the sandwiches with the hoagie rolls, onions, roasted red pepper slices and cheese and put both sandwiches in the oven to toast until the cheese was fully melted.  The result was mouthwateringly good! I like mine plain, but feel free to douse with hot sauce or steak sauce if you prefer.

Sasha's Kitchen: Rib Eye Cheesesteaks

Eric's Kitchen in Jersey City: Bacon Cheesesteak

I've spent the last week or so working and staying in Philly, so I figured what better way to celebrate than by making a cheesesteak. Sasha and I started discussing our fond memories of cheesesteaks from college in Philly and both wanted to try our hands at recreating the experience at home (hers is here). The 'best cheesesteak' in Philly is always a hot topic for locals. The most visited are probably Pat's and Geno's in South Philly, which face-off across the street from each other and honestly taste pretty similar. Then you've got Tony Luke's where his steaks are a little thicker and he now has a location in Citizen's Bank park. At any of these you'll find late night drinkers lining up by the dozen ordering 'whiz-with' (your cheese choice, cheese-whiz, american, or provolone, and then whether or not you want fried onions). I personally always went with American cheese and onions. Another place I loved getting cheesesteaks is actually on Princeton's campus near my Mom's house in central NJ and is called Hoagie Haven. 'Haven' definitely isn't a typical cheesesteak but they offer things like a cheesesteak with bacon or another one of my favorites, the buffalo chicken cheesesteak (I may have to tackle this one soon as well).

So in making my own at home, I decided to go with the bacon cheesesteak.

Ingredients:

2 large italian hoagie rolls

.9 lbs of thinly sliced top round

half a vidalia onion, sliced

half a box of sliced baby bella mushrooms

1/5 lb. of deli-sliced white american cheese

1/4 lb. of bacon

One of the reasons the cheesesteaks in Philly are so good, in my humble opinion, is that they use the Amoroso bakery's rolls. I thought about doing this while staying at my friend's in Philly just so I could use these rolls as well but found some decent rolls in Jersey City and went with them. I did hollow out the inside to remove some of the 'fluff' and lose some of the extra carbs because you know I've gotta watch all those calories while making a sandwich with bacon, steak and cheese... Anyway, first I cooked the bacon until crispy and set it aside. I removed the bacon grease and sauteed the mushrooms and onions in olive oil with a little black pepper and garlic.

I was a little disappointed that A&P's meat section wouldn't slice some rib-eye for me and told me there was thinly sliced top round on the shelf which is what we ended up going with. This was a big mistake in my opinion. The meat was fine but I should have either sliced it even more thinly, or pounded it thin. Normally when I make cheesesteaks at home I use steak 'um's or something similar and actually preferred that but I think I would have preferred the top round or rib eye IF it were thinner. The meat tasted good but was kind of overpowering because the chunks were so big and made it tough to taste the bacon and cheese. I guess I had hoped it would turn out more like Tony Luke's with the thicker meat.

Any time I cook meat in a pan (or a grill for that matter), I only cook each side once. Otherwise it can get overcooked and tough. You just want to sear each side and look in the juices and keep it tender. I also seasoned it with garlic powder and cracked black pepper. Once the meat was ready to flip, I added the onions, mushrooms and bacon and lined it up so it would fit nicely in the roll. Then I added the cheese on top and covered it with the sliced roll to help the cheese melt underneath. This is definitely the method of choice at most cheesesteak places I've been to while sober enough to watch and learn...

Now at most places that serve cheesesteaks, then have a giant grill area and large spatulas where they can just flip over the entire sandwich in one move and have the nicely layered sandwich. This is a lot tougher with a frying pan and normal sized spatula. Mine kind of fell apart when attempting to do this at home but eventually all the pieces made their way into the sandwich. I ended up adding a bunch of sliced jalapeno peppers and ketchup. Jenn just wanted Mayo... In the end it was a very tasty sandwich although I think I would have liked it much better with more thinly sliced meat.

Eric's Kitchen in Jersey City: Bacon Cheesesteak

Sasha's Kitchen: Philly Cheesesteak (North of Philly Version)

I spent four years living outside of Philadelphia during college, when I was an undergrad at Haverford College.  Most of my memories of food during college involve the mediocre typical college dining hall meals.  I certainly wasn't doing much cooking in those days because I loved in the dorms rather than the apartments that were a trek from the center of campus.  However, whenever I did take the less-than-reliable SEPTA commuter rail into Philly, I couldn't resist a cheesesteak from Pat's or Geno's.  Eric, my fellow guest blogger, and I both went to Philly-area schools and have a similar fondness for the cheesesteak as one of our favorite Philly cuisines.  Thus, we decided to have a friendly challenge where we would each make a cheesesteak that reminds us of our Philly college days and cheesesteak nostalgia, and write about it here on A Kitchen In Brooklyn.

In fairness, most of my cheesesteaks were inhaled in minutes, usually after drinking, so I wasn't paying much attention to the finer culinary points of the cheesesteaks during my college visits to Pats and Genos.   What I remember, is the melted cheese and the thin, delicious steak, and also that I loved cheesesteaks with sauteed mushrooms and onions.  When attempting to create this recipe, some years removed from college, I had the urge to caramelize the onions before adding them to the steak.

I purchased some quality Italian rolls from my local Italian market and butcher, M&S Prime Meats.  In addition, I decided that a thinly sliced rib eye was the way to go with the steak, since it isn't quite as lean as a cut of filet or sirloin would be.   The rib eye wasn't as thinly sliced as a Pat's cheesesteak, but it was cut into nice thing slices that my grill pan could easily handle.

To prepare the cheesesteaks, I seared the meat and cooked it through with a bit of canola oil in my grill pan.  I caramelized the onions with a bit of sugar (sliced one onion and added two tablespoons of sugar and a tablespoon of canola oil to the pan).  I sauteed the mushrooms in olive oil.  I used sliced baby bella mushrooms.  In addition, I bought a large roasted red pepper at the Italian market that I felt would be a perfect fit with this cheesesteak, so on it went.

Finally, it wouldn't be a cheesesteak without the cheese.  Some of the recipes from Philly that I looked at actually use cheeze wiz, but I certainly wasn't about to do that!  I decided that a sliced deli cheese was best and went with provolone.  The proper way to make a cheesesteak likely involves drizzling melted cheese, but I toasted the buns, assembled the sandwich and put it in the oven with the cheese at 350 for about five minutes until the cheese was melted.

In summary, here are the ingredients you will need to prepare my version of the cheesesteak.

Sasha's North-of-Philly (Brooklyn) Cheesesteak (makes two large sandwiches)

3/4 lb rib eye, thinly sliced

one onion, sliced

2 T of sugar

sliced baby bella mushrooms

canola oil  or olive oil

2 long Italian rolls

1 roasted red pepper

The end result was delicious.  Those Pat's and Geno's cheesesteaks had a special place in my heart from my college years, but my new cheesesteak is great for a new decade, although it was so big that I only ate half during dinner.  The flavors of the caramelized onions, roasted red peppers, sauteed mushrooms and provolone all combined nicely with the succulent, juicy rib eye.  The quality of the meat that I used is surely much better than a standard Philly cheesesteak, but keep in mind that this sandwich's main competition is my memories of Philly as a 19 year old college student.  Regardless, I was happy and nostalgic about this rendition.  This might just be the best Brooklyn cheesesteak out there!

Sasha's Kitchen: Philly Cheesesteak (North of Philly Version)