Recipe: Dutch Brisket Sandwich
A brisket is a fantastic piece of meat with one - quite literally - big advantage and one disadvantage. The big advantage: it's a hefty piece of meat. That's because brisket is the chest part of the cow, and such an animal naturally has an impressive chest between its front legs. The downside: it's not a cheap piece of meat.
These two factors mean that a. sometimes you can't finish a whole brisket in one go (yes, really, there are people who can't manage that...) and b. you definitely don't want to waste this beautiful meat.
Surely, you can warm up a brisket quite nicely in some meat jus, but Remko Winkelaar from T-Rex Restaurant BBQ & Smokehouse in Putten(the Netherlands) had a better idea: a brisket sandwich.
Grocery List
- 600 gr brisket
- 100 ml beef gravy
- 500 gr sauerkraut
- 8 slices of white bread
- 70 ml spiced mayonnaise
- 70 ml BBQ sauce
- 70 ml mustard sauce
- 4 slices of Gouda cheese
- 100 gr melted herb butter
Also needed:
- BBQ with sufficient charcoal
- Meat thermometer
- Skillet, for example Skillet L
- Heat-resistant BBQ gloves
- BBQ spatula
Let's get started!
Prepare your barbecue for indirect grilling, but add enough charcoal so you can later increase the heat for hot and fast grilling. First, heat the BBQ to a temperature of 110 °C. Use premium quality charcoal. With The Windmill Cast Iron Premium South African Black Wattle charcoal, you have an excellent charcoal that burns hot and evenly, perfect for this recipe.
Place the remaining brisket on a large piece of butcher paper (aluminum foil can also be used, but it tears easily and sometimes sticks to the meat) and pour the gravy over it. Then, wrap the brisket tightly. Heat the meat on your barbecue until it reaches a core temperature of 75 °C.
Remove the brisket from the barbecue and place it in a warm spot. This could be in the oven (without turning it on, as the brisket will continue to cook!), or in a cooler. In any case, keep the brisket at the right temperature. Now, heat your barbecue to 250 °C. You can maintain your setup for indirect grilling. While heating the BBQ, you can already place the skillet on the grill and add the sauerkraut. It will heat up as the BBQ warms up.
Slice the brisket. Spread one side of the eight slices of bread with the spiced mayonnaise. Place four of the bread slices with the warm sauerkraut and drizzle some BBQ sauce over them. Place the brisket slices on the sauerkraut with BBQ sauce and add some mustard sauce on the meat. Finish with a slice of cheese and cover with another bread slice, with the spiced mayo side facing down. Spread the two outer sides of the sandwiches with the melted herb butter. It can be a messy job, but you can make it less messy by spreading butter on one side now and the other side when the sandwich is on the BBQ.
Put on heat-resistant BBQ gloves and clean the grill grate of your barbecue with a some kitchen paper or - if the grate contains burnt food residues - some aluminum foil. Place the sandwiches on the grate with a spatula and grill them until golden brown and crispy on both sides. Cut the sandwiches diagonally before serving.
