Reuben-esque! Recipes

Special days call for special food, and there’s none that call for a Reuben more than St. Patrick’s Day!

Food Stylist/ Photographer: Laura Kurella

Growing up in an area of northwest Indiana that placed me within minutes of the Chicago Loop, I have fond childhood memories of watching the river dyed green, a fun parade, corned beef, and green beer served with just about everything!

When I was younger, I remember Mom refusing to use the spice packets that came with the brisket because she felt the meat was already too spicy and salty as it was.

She’d slow roast her brisket in a covered roasting pan that she’d fill with water in the hopes that it would not only keep the meat tender, but also help coax some of its excess saltiness out.

When I became a busy, working adult, the days of slow-cooked briskets were over; replaced by the much-quicker, eat-on-the-run corned beef sandwiches.

What’s interesting is I got my first introduction to Reuben thanks to a Jewish boss who had to eat them on the sly because it goes against the Hebrew “Kosher” law which prohibits the combining of dairy and meat.

Wanting to learn more about the Reuben, I came to discover that the sandwich has its own unsure past as well.

The first story I read of Reubens mentioned Arnold Reuben (18831970). He was a U.S. restaurateur, whose landmark Manhattan delicatessen was first established around 1908. According to their history, they invented the Reuben as a special in 1914, which was a sandwich that featured meat, cheese, Cole slaw, and Russian dressing piled on buttered, toasted rye bread.

Then I found a different story. One that mentioned a wholesale grocer, Reuben Kulakofsky, who claims to have invented the sandwich while at Omaha’s Blackstone Hotel in 1925 (or 1922 in some versions). Reuben’s sandwich featured corned beef, sauerkraut, and Swiss cheese on Russian rye bread with a special dressing, and he put it together as a snack for him- self during a late-night poker game.

Then I stumbled upon yet another, but much more recent article (in Saveur 2016), written by Elizabeth Weil who claims her grandfather, Bernard Schimmel, invented the sandwich.

According to her article, Weil’s grandfather was a trained chef and in the 1920s was working in Omaha, Nebraska, at the Blackstone Hotel.

Poker players called down to Schimmel’s hotel kitchen asking for sandwiches to be sent up, and requested that sauerkraut and corned beef be used because Reuben had supplied the hotel with lots of it. Schimmel applied his culinary experience, adding special dressings and cheeses, then pressing the kraut and corned beef sandwiches to heat them up and crisp them, too.

Needless to say, the sandwich was well-loved, which caused it to be placed on all the hotel menus.

In 1956, a waitress from the hotel entered the Reuben sandwich in the National Restaurant Association’s National Sandwich Idea Contest and it won!

Not surprisingly, upon publica- tion of Weil’s story, the Kulakofsky clan contacted her and continued to contend that her grandfather simply delivered a deli platter to the poker table, and maintains that Reuben made his historical sandwich at the poker table, but this only serves to add fuel the controversy. Because, if this were the case, Weil raises an interesting point: If Reuben did indeed invent the Reuben sandwich just as it continues to be made to this day, then how was Reuben able to heat the sandwich and press (grill) it while seated at a poker table in the 1920s?

Good question.

Now that we don’t know for certain, here’s some spins that we can safely bet in adding some new twists to that old, traditional Reuben.

Enjoy, and Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

Laura Kurella is an award-winning recipe developer and food columnist who enjoys sharing recipes from her Michigan kitchen. She welcomes comments atlaurakurella@yahoo.com.