Philly cheese steak fresh brat, my Delaware seasoning take
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I decided to make some Philly cheese steak fresh brats for dinner.
I grew up outside Philly, just across the Delaware border, so ate a lot of authentic cheese steaks and made them in HS working at a sub shop. It is a super simple flavor profile: just thin sliced ribeye, cooked on a flat top so there is some browning. Toss on a sub bun, add fried onions, sometimes fried green pepper, and either cheese wiz or melted velveeta. That’s it.I did a search for “philly cheese steak” here and read all 65 hits, absolutely tons of folks just love the Walton’s spice mix for this. But I didn’t find any posts where someone made their own flavoring, so I decided to do it.
I used ground beef, 80/20. I’d say 95% of the posts Here, folks used pork with the Walton’s seasoning, but Jonathon did a nice post where he made some with beef and liked them. I didn’t have the spice mix to give pork the beef flavor, this was a spur of moment thing. To my mind, the #1 defining flavor is steak, so I went with ground beef. The #2 flavor is onion, so I went with dried onion and onion powder. The #3 flavor is the cheese, I went with white queso velveeta frozen and diced fine. The optional #4 flavor is the green pepper note. I went with diced fresh jalapeno pod because it has a strong green pepper note, and just a bit of heat. The last flavor note is black pepper, some places sprinkled black pepper on the steak and onions while frying.
All items listed as a % of meat block weight.
Other ingredients were 1.5% salt, lower than most sausages because the queso had salt. I used Non Fat Dried Milk as a binder, normal amounts are up to 3% but as I didnt add extra fat nor much water, I went with 0.5%. Then 10% water. The spice amounts were chosen with reference to Marianski’s tables for normal spice usage ranges.Meat 80/20 ground beef
Water 10%
Salt 1.5%
NFDM binder 0.5%
Black pepper 0.18%
Dehydrated onions 0.5%
Onion powder 0.5%
1 Diced jalapeño hull, 2.5%
White queso velveeta cheese, frozen, diced 22%.
(so example, 1370g meat x 22% = 301g cheese)My meat block was 1370 g, about 3lbs. Made 16 links of 5", in 32-35mm hog casings.
- Mixed meat, water, all other spices & milk except cheese in Kitchenaid mixer about 4 min to strong protein extraction.
- Added diced cheese, blended 30 sec.
- Stuffed in 32-35mm hog casings. Linked them when done stuffing at 5". I used a lazy susan with serving tray on it to coil the meat easy.
Cooking:
- Lightly brown brats in pan w bacon fat, low heat so they don’t burst. Do all sides.
- When brown, add half cup water and 1T or so of the queso, cover and simmer low until 165 f internal temp.
- Serve on rolls with ketchup, fried onions if desired… I didn’t as I wanted to see the flavor. Add a spoonful of the cheese brat juice or so on the bun.
Tasting Notes:
Great taste, this was pretty much spot on for the Philly cheese steak flavor. First, a strong steak/beef flavor with that light sear maillard reaction on the casings making it match griddle seared steak. Good salt level. Wee touch of heat, and a nice identifiable green pepper note. Cheese made it perfect, nice runny but still sticky, plenty of it at 22%, creamy. I thought these were perfect and will not change anything when making them again.
If you’ve got the Walton’s seasoning, everyone rates it a touchdown, and mostly with pork even. But if you don’t, I think this would make you pretty satisfied. Hope the writeup helps someone!
Dave in AZ Excellent write-up and photos, Thank You
Give a man a fish and he eats for a day
Teach a man to fish and he drinks beer for a lifetime -
Dave in AZ Excellent write-up and photos, Thank You
-
I decided to make some Philly cheese steak fresh brats for dinner.
I grew up outside Philly, just across the Delaware border, so ate a lot of authentic cheese steaks and made them in HS working at a sub shop. It is a super simple flavor profile: just thin sliced ribeye, cooked on a flat top so there is some browning. Toss on a sub bun, add fried onions, sometimes fried green pepper, and either cheese wiz or melted velveeta. That’s it.I did a search for “philly cheese steak” here and read all 65 hits, absolutely tons of folks just love the Walton’s spice mix for this. But I didn’t find any posts where someone made their own flavoring, so I decided to do it.
I used ground beef, 80/20. I’d say 95% of the posts Here, folks used pork with the Walton’s seasoning, but Jonathon did a nice post where he made some with beef and liked them. I didn’t have the spice mix to give pork the beef flavor, this was a spur of moment thing. To my mind, the #1 defining flavor is steak, so I went with ground beef. The #2 flavor is onion, so I went with dried onion and onion powder. The #3 flavor is the cheese, I went with white queso velveeta frozen and diced fine. The optional #4 flavor is the green pepper note. I went with diced fresh jalapeno pod because it has a strong green pepper note, and just a bit of heat. The last flavor note is black pepper, some places sprinkled black pepper on the steak and onions while frying.
All items listed as a % of meat block weight.
Other ingredients were 1.5% salt, lower than most sausages because the queso had salt. I used Non Fat Dried Milk as a binder, normal amounts are up to 3% but as I didnt add extra fat nor much water, I went with 0.5%. Then 10% water. The spice amounts were chosen with reference to Marianski’s tables for normal spice usage ranges.Meat 80/20 ground beef
Water 10%
Salt 1.5%
NFDM binder 0.5%
Black pepper 0.18%
Dehydrated onions 0.5%
Onion powder 0.5%
1 Diced jalapeño hull, 2.5%
White queso velveeta cheese, frozen, diced 22%.
(so example, 1370g meat x 22% = 301g cheese)My meat block was 1370 g, about 3lbs. Made 16 links of 5", in 32-35mm hog casings.
- Mixed meat, water, all other spices & milk except cheese in Kitchenaid mixer about 4 min to strong protein extraction.
- Added diced cheese, blended 30 sec.
- Stuffed in 32-35mm hog casings. Linked them when done stuffing at 5". I used a lazy susan with serving tray on it to coil the meat easy.
Cooking:
- Lightly brown brats in pan w bacon fat, low heat so they don’t burst. Do all sides.
- When brown, add half cup water and 1T or so of the queso, cover and simmer low until 165 f internal temp.
- Serve on rolls with ketchup, fried onions if desired… I didn’t as I wanted to see the flavor. Add a spoonful of the cheese brat juice or so on the bun.
Tasting Notes:
Great taste, this was pretty much spot on for the Philly cheese steak flavor. First, a strong steak/beef flavor with that light sear maillard reaction on the casings making it match griddle seared steak. Good salt level. Wee touch of heat, and a nice identifiable green pepper note. Cheese made it perfect, nice runny but still sticky, plenty of it at 22%, creamy. I thought these were perfect and will not change anything when making them again.
If you’ve got the Walton’s seasoning, everyone rates it a touchdown, and mostly with pork even. But if you don’t, I think this would make you pretty satisfied. Hope the writeup helps someone!
Dave in AZ Thanks. I’m going to give these a try. Appreciate your recipe.
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gus4416 doh, good idea, maybe I should of posted it there hey? Hard to decide where to post things.
Edit – Just went to make a User Recipes post, and I saw Jonathon post on 21feb, then again on 19Apr22, that they were going to to make changes to User Recipes, and maybe make it no-replies, maybe moderated, didn’t look like they were sure yet but SOME kinda change. They were waiting on hiring their new community web person, which they just announced they did on livestream…So I’m a little leery of posting a long one with pictures etc there, if people won’t be able to comment? I think I’m gonna just avoid that category for now, until I see how it all shakes out on it’s final posting rules. -
What part of Delaware you live I used to work for a company out of Claymont there is a sub shop there that has fantastic cheese steaks beats Philly hands down
gus4416 Gus, I grew up in Hockessin about 2mi fro the PA border. My Mom grew up in Claymont, so we always drove over there for subs and stromboli. My brother is still in Newcastle, so I get there a lot. There was a good sub shop in center of Hockessin when I was a kid. You’re right, some of the best subs and steaks are in that northern DE area. Hey, you will know this, I’ve been reading up to make scrapple, didn’t realize it was a local area thing til I left home.
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Cooking method #2, better: today I pulled a bag of 5 from fridge for lunch. I put bag in SV at 152 for 30 min, was trying for >= 145 internal temp, which is 4 minute lethality . Mine were a bit pink like a med burger at 145f, so I figured was ok as its all beef, basically just a burger in a casing. Then I quick seared them in a pan for some brown. This method resulted in a lot juicier brat and no cheese loss.
Basically I’m starting to sous vide all my sausage with a quick sear at end, they always seem juicier and better texture. -
I decided to make some Philly cheese steak fresh brats for dinner.
I grew up outside Philly, just across the Delaware border, so ate a lot of authentic cheese steaks and made them in HS working at a sub shop. It is a super simple flavor profile: just thin sliced ribeye, cooked on a flat top so there is some browning. Toss on a sub bun, add fried onions, sometimes fried green pepper, and either cheese wiz or melted velveeta. That’s it.I did a search for “philly cheese steak” here and read all 65 hits, absolutely tons of folks just love the Walton’s spice mix for this. But I didn’t find any posts where someone made their own flavoring, so I decided to do it.
I used ground beef, 80/20. I’d say 95% of the posts Here, folks used pork with the Walton’s seasoning, but Jonathon did a nice post where he made some with beef and liked them. I didn’t have the spice mix to give pork the beef flavor, this was a spur of moment thing. To my mind, the #1 defining flavor is steak, so I went with ground beef. The #2 flavor is onion, so I went with dried onion and onion powder. The #3 flavor is the cheese, I went with white queso velveeta frozen and diced fine. The optional #4 flavor is the green pepper note. I went with diced fresh jalapeno pod because it has a strong green pepper note, and just a bit of heat. The last flavor note is black pepper, some places sprinkled black pepper on the steak and onions while frying.
All items listed as a % of meat block weight.
Other ingredients were 1.5% salt, lower than most sausages because the queso had salt. I used Non Fat Dried Milk as a binder, normal amounts are up to 3% but as I didnt add extra fat nor much water, I went with 0.5%. Then 10% water. The spice amounts were chosen with reference to Marianski’s tables for normal spice usage ranges.Meat 80/20 ground beef
Water 10%
Salt 1.5%
NFDM binder 0.5%
Black pepper 0.18%
Dehydrated onions 0.5%
Onion powder 0.5%
1 Diced jalapeño hull, 2.5%
White queso velveeta cheese, frozen, diced 22%.
(so example, 1370g meat x 22% = 301g cheese)My meat block was 1370 g, about 3lbs. Made 16 links of 5", in 32-35mm hog casings.
- Mixed meat, water, all other spices & milk except cheese in Kitchenaid mixer about 4 min to strong protein extraction.
- Added diced cheese, blended 30 sec.
- Stuffed in 32-35mm hog casings. Linked them when done stuffing at 5". I used a lazy susan with serving tray on it to coil the meat easy.
Cooking:
- Lightly brown brats in pan w bacon fat, low heat so they don’t burst. Do all sides.
- When brown, add half cup water and 1T or so of the queso, cover and simmer low until 165 f internal temp.
- Serve on rolls with ketchup, fried onions if desired… I didn’t as I wanted to see the flavor. Add a spoonful of the cheese brat juice or so on the bun.
Tasting Notes:
Great taste, this was pretty much spot on for the Philly cheese steak flavor. First, a strong steak/beef flavor with that light sear maillard reaction on the casings making it match griddle seared steak. Good salt level. Wee touch of heat, and a nice identifiable green pepper note. Cheese made it perfect, nice runny but still sticky, plenty of it at 22%, creamy. I thought these were perfect and will not change anything when making them again.
If you’ve got the Walton’s seasoning, everyone rates it a touchdown, and mostly with pork even. But if you don’t, I think this would make you pretty satisfied. Hope the writeup helps someone!
Dave in AZ Thank you for the outstanding details and recipe I cannot wait to try.
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Dave in AZ Thank you for the outstanding details and recipe I cannot wait to try.
mrobisr thx, hope you enjoy!
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I decided to make some Philly cheese steak fresh brats for dinner.
I grew up outside Philly, just across the Delaware border, so ate a lot of authentic cheese steaks and made them in HS working at a sub shop. It is a super simple flavor profile: just thin sliced ribeye, cooked on a flat top so there is some browning. Toss on a sub bun, add fried onions, sometimes fried green pepper, and either cheese wiz or melted velveeta. That’s it.I did a search for “philly cheese steak” here and read all 65 hits, absolutely tons of folks just love the Walton’s spice mix for this. But I didn’t find any posts where someone made their own flavoring, so I decided to do it.
I used ground beef, 80/20. I’d say 95% of the posts Here, folks used pork with the Walton’s seasoning, but Jonathon did a nice post where he made some with beef and liked them. I didn’t have the spice mix to give pork the beef flavor, this was a spur of moment thing. To my mind, the #1 defining flavor is steak, so I went with ground beef. The #2 flavor is onion, so I went with dried onion and onion powder. The #3 flavor is the cheese, I went with white queso velveeta frozen and diced fine. The optional #4 flavor is the green pepper note. I went with diced fresh jalapeno pod because it has a strong green pepper note, and just a bit of heat. The last flavor note is black pepper, some places sprinkled black pepper on the steak and onions while frying.
All items listed as a % of meat block weight.
Other ingredients were 1.5% salt, lower than most sausages because the queso had salt. I used Non Fat Dried Milk as a binder, normal amounts are up to 3% but as I didnt add extra fat nor much water, I went with 0.5%. Then 10% water. The spice amounts were chosen with reference to Marianski’s tables for normal spice usage ranges.Meat 80/20 ground beef
Water 10%
Salt 1.5%
NFDM binder 0.5%
Black pepper 0.18%
Dehydrated onions 0.5%
Onion powder 0.5%
1 Diced jalapeño hull, 2.5%
White queso velveeta cheese, frozen, diced 22%.
(so example, 1370g meat x 22% = 301g cheese)My meat block was 1370 g, about 3lbs. Made 16 links of 5", in 32-35mm hog casings.
- Mixed meat, water, all other spices & milk except cheese in Kitchenaid mixer about 4 min to strong protein extraction.
- Added diced cheese, blended 30 sec.
- Stuffed in 32-35mm hog casings. Linked them when done stuffing at 5". I used a lazy susan with serving tray on it to coil the meat easy.
Cooking:
- Lightly brown brats in pan w bacon fat, low heat so they don’t burst. Do all sides.
- When brown, add half cup water and 1T or so of the queso, cover and simmer low until 165 f internal temp.
- Serve on rolls with ketchup, fried onions if desired… I didn’t as I wanted to see the flavor. Add a spoonful of the cheese brat juice or so on the bun.
Tasting Notes:
Great taste, this was pretty much spot on for the Philly cheese steak flavor. First, a strong steak/beef flavor with that light sear maillard reaction on the casings making it match griddle seared steak. Good salt level. Wee touch of heat, and a nice identifiable green pepper note. Cheese made it perfect, nice runny but still sticky, plenty of it at 22%, creamy. I thought these were perfect and will not change anything when making them again.
If you’ve got the Walton’s seasoning, everyone rates it a touchdown, and mostly with pork even. But if you don’t, I think this would make you pretty satisfied. Hope the writeup helps someone!
Dave in AZ sounds great. Thanks for sharing
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