I’m not actually sure if life can get any better than a French dip sandwich. You’ve got delicious beef cooked in a rich and juicy jus, with onions, cheese and even more jus for dunking on the side. This might just be the best sandwich of my life. And even better, you can actually make it at home pretty easily! So that’s just what I’ve done with today’s video, and tested out a couple of options to nail down the best French dip sandwich I can.
There are actually two LA sandwich establishments that claim to have the “original” French dip sandwich – Phillippe’s, where they serve it wet, and Cole’s, where it’s served with a side of the delicious cooking juices. The drama is still unresolved, but they actually both sounded so good that I had to try both of them!
Although I only figured out at the end of the recipe that no one actually submerges the entire sandwich apart from me – apparently the “wet” version is just the roll getting dunked before it’s built. But you know, I decided to go the whole way! Here’s the French dip sandwich recipe if you want to give it a go.
French Dip Sandwich Recipe
There are all sorts of different cuts of meat you could use for a French Dip sandwich, from the best piece of steak to a roasting joint of beef, which is what I used. Brush the whole joint with oil then season with pepper before whacking it into a hot pan to sear it and brown it on all sides.
Next, stick your seared beef into Betty the crock pot or a slow cooker along with some herbs – I winged it here with some sage, rosemary and thyme. On top of that, add the beef stock, the tin of French onion soup (which already has onions in, who knew?!), a few dashes of Worcestershire sauce and the beer. You could add more like mustard here to enhance it, but we’re saving ours till the end. If you happen to find some garlic paste on the side, whack that in too. And finally, roughly chop your onions in half or big wedges and dollop those in.
If you want to slow cook it, you absolutely can for like 8 hours. But honestly I just wanted mine immediately, like I could literally have drank the juice from this at this point, so I put my crock pot on high power for 4 hours. If you use an Instant Pot, it could be even quicker!
When the time is up, take your beef out and slice it up into fairly thick cuts. I like mine nice and chunky in my sandwich! Add those slices back into the juices in the crockpot for another hour on high heat to let the beef soak up all the saucy goodness, and let the jus that we’re going to dunk it develop that rich meaty flavour.
It’s finally time to build the French Dip sandwich now! Remove the onion wedges and beef slices from the liquid, then strain all the herbs and bits out so you’re left with pure jus.
Now slice the baguette down the middle and spread on some Dijon mustard. Layer in the beef and onions, then top with the slices of cheese and a sprinkle of parsley. Pop the sandwich into a warm oven now, just enough to let the cheese melt a little bit.
You’ve now got two options – or at least with my method you do, I may or may not have read it wrong! But option number one is to grab the sandwich then dunk the end and bite then repeat, dunk and bite, dunk and bite – we’re not worried about double dunkers here! Option number two, get the entire sandwich and totally submerge it in your jus. You may need a knife and fork for this option, but this is totally the one that Mrs B and I would recommend, it’s absolutely incredible with all the juices soaking into every part of the sandwich.