Sloppy Joes – Tradition – Innovation – Re-Invention
The best part of innovation is the fact that, through innovation, tradition will always be preserved! Innovation has a way of seeing traditions with a new perspective, but they are never discarded. Traditional ways or classic constructs are simply given new life with innovation, guaranteeing that they live on longer.
Knowing the traditional way of doing things is a great starting point for innovation. With new inspiration a tradition can be brought to the next level and new WOW moments created. This goes for traditional recipes, as well as traditions that we live by.
Lets take an uber classic dish that we probably remember most from our school days eating in the cafeteria – Sloppy Joes! The rich meaty concoction slathered on an toasted bun (I may be giving to much credit to the lunch ladies here as in my memory the bun was toasted, but I can’t say that I am really sure!) served in the main section of the compartmentalised plastic green tray. If my memory serves right, next to this fine sandwich, in the next tray compartment, was green beans or was it salad? (When I say salad I mean to say shredded iceberg lettuce, maybe a shred of carrot.) There may have been fries, too and certainly some kind of dessert and a carton of milk.
Back then, that was good eating. But know, Sloppy Joes are ripe for innovation. But first, the classic recipe must be revealed so we can use it as a starting point to go from.
How To Make Sloppy Joes – The Video and Recipe
The video below shows all the steps necessary to make delicious sloppy joes. The full recipe follows.
Here is the most basic recipe for Sloppy Joes that I use…
- 2 tbsp butter plus more for the buns
- 1 medium onion, diced
- 2 cloves garlic, chopped fine
- 1 orange bell pepper, diced
- ¼ lb white mushrooms, sliced
- 1 lb, lean ground beef
- 1 tbsp paprika (chilli powder could be used here)
- 1½ cups ketchup
- 1 tbsp grainy mustard
- 1 cup water
- Worcestershire Sauce
- Salt and Pepper
- 6 sesame seed buns
- In a large saute pan melt 2 tbsp of butter over medium low heat.
- Add garlic and cook until softened, do not brown.
- Add onion and pepper and soften, do not brown.
- Add mushrooms and cook until just cook through. Remove pan from heat and pour contents into a bowl.
- In the same pan, over medium heat, brown the ground beef.
- Once browned, add paprika and stir well cook five minutes.
- Add onion, pepper, mushroom mix back to pan.
- Stir in ketchup and bring to a simmer
- Stir in water and bring to a simmer
- Add a 5-6 dashes of worcestershire sauce to the simmering pan.
- Let simmer until the liquid is very thick
- Season with salt and pepper
- Serve on toasted, buttered sesame seed buns
How To Make Sloppy Joes – The Re-invention!
Sloppy Joes are delicious, but there is more to do. With a little inspiration we can come up with a few Sloppy Joe WOW moments.
We can’t have a blog post about Sloppy Joes and not mention Sloppy Janes, but it does not seem like enough to just change the meat to turkey or chicken. Here are a few ways to refine it further starting with a change to ground chicken…
| Increase garlic to 4 cloves. | Remove the paprika. | Change to ground Chicken. | Remove ketchup replace with ⅓ cup flour. | Replace water with 1 cup chicken stock and 1 cup cream, Simmer until thick. | Add a dash of herbs de Provence to taste |
Sloppy Joes could also be made a bit more fancy. If we incorporated a classic sauce into the meat it would be still be sloppy, but a very new a different take on the classic. Lets take a page from Sauce Chasseur (sometimes called hunters sauce)- We will call it Sloppy Joe on the Hunt.
| Replace onion and pepper with shallot and more mushrooms, Flambee the shallot and mushrooms with cognac after sautéing. | Add ½ cup white wine and reduce to a syrup. | Replace ketchup, worcestershire and paprika with a tablespoon of tomato paste (or a half cup fresh chopped tomato) and ⅓ cup flour, Stir well. | Replace water with 2 cups veal or beef stock. Simmer until thickened | Add 1 tsp fresh chervil and 1 tsp fresh tarragon. |
Of course, we do not have to take such large steps to make something new. Just by replacing the water in the recipe with stock. or even juice, we can take the basic recipe somewhere totally new. If we use pineapple juice (and even some fresh pineapple chunks) we can give the dish a Hawaiin feel. If we use apple cider, molasses, and ancho chilli powder (omitting the paprika) we will go in a a more barbecue sauce direction, a little taste of Texas on a bun! Simple changes can bring great new flavors!
Even with something as simple as Sloppy Joes, there is a lot we can do create new WOW moments. And, since we know where it all started, the classic sloppy joe will live on in our new creations!
