Italian Beef Sandwiches: What Temp is the Perfect Gravy?
Have our feelings about sandwiches been made clear on this blog yet? If not, let us state unequivocally that we are sandwich fans. And one that we come back to again and again and again, with more love each time, is the great Italian Beef of Chicago. It’s got everything. Tender, savory roast beef, grilled peppers, rich meaty gravy, crusty (for now!) bread, and, if you like it like we do, spicy Italian giardiniera. But what does this all have to do with thermometer and temperature? Well, it turns out that there is an optimal temperature for the gravy/jus for this sandwich. Keep reading to learn more!
Get the tools for perfect sandwiches here:
What an Italian beef sandwich is, and what makes it great
Italian beef’s starts with beef, often of the round, sometimes of the sirloin, that is seasoned and roasted (though that roasting should more often be called braising the way it is done in many restaurants). The beef is thinly sliced and dipped or steeped in a beef jus which Chicagoans call gravy—not broth. From there you can choose to get your sandwich sweet or hot, meaning it has charred bell peppers or spicy giardiniera.
And then there is the issue of dipping. You can order your beef dry, in which case they’ll shake off some of the excess jus from the meat before adding it to the sandwich. If you do that, definitely get some gravy on the side for dipping. But you can do better. You can order it wet, and they’ll dredge the meat right out of the gravy and onto the bun, bringing lots of gravy with it. Or, and this is where the fun lies, you can get it dipped. A dipped sandwich is just that: they make the sandwich, then submerge the whole thing briefly in the gravy. The bread soaks up the gravy and the thing is a mess to eat. A delicious, glorious mess.
On the roast beef for the sandwich
As stated above, round or sirloin are the meats of choice for an Italian beef. If you want to go the super traditional route, you may want to cook your own, which can be a worthwhile exercise. We’ve written before about making your own roast beef deli meat at home, and if you follow those instructions, but perhaps with more garlic and some oregano, you’re going to be in a pretty good place for this. Braise it in some seasoned stock and you’re also headed in the right direction.
The difficult thing, though, is the slicing. Part of the appeal of the sandwich is the mouthfeel, and thin-sliced beef is key to that. If you have a slicer at home, by all means, make your own roast and slice it thin after chilling it (slicing it hot is…difficult, and requires a better slicer than the cheapest ones).
But those without slicers should head to the deli. You read that right. Don’t be taken in by recipes that tell you to cook the meat until it shreds, pot roast-style. Tasty? Yes. But an Italian Beef, it’s not. Rather, find a good brand of roast beef at your local deli that is a whole-muscle, not beef that is chopped and compressed into a log. Choose the rarest beef at the counter, and have them slice it thinly. (It needn’t be super rare—it will be taking a bath in warm gravy later that will cook it more—but starting with something that isn’t overcooked is better.) This will do for a homemade version, if you can’t get to the Second City for a professional one.
Italian beef gravy temperature
We thought that gravy temperature might be more important than the obvious “hot sandwich good,” but didn’t know how strong the connection was. Boy were we excited when we stumbled on some great work by Nick Kindelsperger at Serious Eats. He tested various gravy temperatures to see if or how the temperature of the gravy affected the meat. And did it ever! A little extra cooking tenderizes the meat further than it is right off the slicer. But cooking it too high in the gravy tends to actually dry it out. If the gravy is too hot, the proteins fully denature in the slices, and the meat shrivels up, drying out though swimming in gravy. Long , drapey slices of tender beef are what we want and the ideal temperature for that is 140°F (60°C).
Your Thermapen ONE is your friend here, of course. Use it to check and monitor the gravy as you move meat through it and dip sandwiches in it. The one-second readings will keep you slinging beefs as fast as you can split bread. You may be thinking that this is silly, but you can bet that the baths of gravy they keep at your favorite sandwich joint are carefully temperature-controlled. It’s essential for a top-quality sandwich.
On making the gravy yourself
The version we present to you here is made with beef stock, zhuzhed up with some extra sauteed carrot, onion, and garlic. By all means, though, make yours from scratch! Nick Kindelsperger gives excellent instructions for that process in his article. But we wanted something we could throw together for a Monday-night dinner in a hurry, and that didn’t include 4–5 hours for stock making. Just be sure you use good quality stock or broth to start with.
This is a fantastic sandwich you can easily put on your rotating menu. Maybe do get a slicer and make every Saturday Italian beef day—you can roast the beef, make the stock, slice it up, warm your rolls, and make sure the gravy is just the right temp to get perfect meat every time. Sounds like a good life to us…
Give it a try, and happy cooking!
Italian Beef Sandwich Recipe
Ingredients
- 2 Tbsp Olive oil
- 1 Large carrot, sliced
- 1 Yellow onion, sliced
- 1 head garlic cut in half around the equator
- 2 qt Beef stock
- 1.25 lb Medium-rare roast beef From the deli is fine as long as it's good
- 4 Hoagie rolls, on the crusty side
- Roasted red peppers optional, recommended
- Hot Italian-style giardiniera optional, recommended
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 450°F (232°C).
- In a 4–8 qt. pot, heat the oil over medium-high heat. Add the sliced carrot, sliced onion, and both halves of the garlic bulb. Sautee until things just start to brown.
- Add 2 quarts of good quality beef stock to the pot and bring to a high simmer. Cook 30 minutes. Then strain out the veggies and keep the gravy in the pot.
- While the gravy is heating and simmering, wrap the hoagies in foil and place them in the oven for 8–10 minutes to warm and soften.
- Check the temperature of the gravy with your Thermapen ONE. If the temperature is above 140°F (60°C) whisk it vigorously to cool it down more quickly.
- Once the gravy lands on 140°F (60°C), adjust the heat on your stove to try to keep it there. This will be kind of like deep frying, as we add things to the pot it'll cool, so we need to add more heat.
- Take 5 ounces of the sliced meat and submerge it in the gravy with some tongs. Let it sit for a liittle while, about half a minute, while you slice one of the rolls most of the way through, but not all the way through.
- With the tongs, grab the roast beef from the gravy and lay it in the bun, either keeping or shaking off the excess gravy.
- Top with rosted peppers and/or giardiniera, then, if you want, use the tongs to dunk the whole sandwich in the gravy. How long you can take to do this will depend on the structure of your bread! Too long and it'll fall apart.
- Devour your sandwich, dripping with juice, over a plate. Repeat.
Quick note to your editor. You spelled sammich wrong… 🤣
Thanks for the gravy temp recommendation, I’ve been having trouble with dry and shriveled beef coming out of the pot!
Best regards,
Karl
I always appreciate the spelling corrections! 🤣
I am from chgo, and good gravy requires spices like oregano, pepper, etc. to make it right.