Sunday, July 24, 2011

Creole Roast Beef Wraps

Whether you are at the pool, on the run, or just trying to hide from the heat at home, wraps are a quintessential summer lunch. You can almost feel yourself cooling off as you bite into the chilled crisp veggies and meat. Wraps are convenient for a busy summer lifestyle because they are portable, can be made ahead of time, and can pack a variety of summer time flavors.


Alexis bought a 6 lb beef eye of round roast on sale this week and I slow roasted it on her Big Green Egg. Eye of round can be a little less flavorful than other cuts of beef so I added flavor. I injected it with Cajun Injector'sCreole Butter and gave it a heavy coat of Tony Chachere's CreoleSeasoning.  (For tips on injecting see the previous post.)


The cooking set up was indirect on a roast rack over a dripping pan filled with 2 cups of beef broth. The drippings of rendered fat and seasonings are captured in the broth making an excellent au jus.

There are two things to think about when using a set up like this.
  1. The roasting rack will raise the roast several inches off of the grate. But you always want a roast to cook in the center of your oven or grill for even cooking. So I skipped the grate altogether and had the rack sitting directly on the “plate setter” of the Big Green Egg. For a standard grill if you can't adjust the height of the grates, you will need to flip the roast half way through the cooking time.
  2. For Big Green Egg Users: If the dripping pan sits directly on the hot plate setter, it can get too hot from conductive heat and evaporate a lot of your broth. That will make it too concentrated and salty. I raise the drip pan off the plate setter with some spacers.

I cooked it indirect at 250f until it hit an internal temperature of 135f (about 2 ½ hours) and then pulled it to rest lightly covered for 15 minutes. We could have eaten it then but we wrapped it in foil and put it in the fridge for a few hours before slicing thin. Here's how the time/temps worked out.  I would have liked the roast a bit more on the rare side of medium rare so next time I will pull it earlier, maybe around 130f.  This was twice the size of the normal eye roasts I do so maybe it carried temp longer after it came off the grill.  I normally allow 10 degrees for carry over cooking. 

Time
Grill Temperature (f)
Internal Temperature (f)

250
40
30 min
275
56
1 hour
250
91
1 hour 30 minutes
250
115
2 hours
250
127
2 hours 20ish minutes
260
135


This creole roast beef and a spicy creole sauce add pizazz to these wraps and the spicy au jus finishes it off like a summer dip in the pool. 


Creole Roast Beef Wraps
4 servings or 8 snack portions

4 ten inch wraps (We used MissionSundried Tomato Basil wraps)
½ cup creole sauce (see recipe)
4 leaves green leaf lettuce
1 lb creole roast beef, thin sliced
½ cup roasted red pepper
8 slices French Emmental cheese (or whatever floats your boat)
1 cup au jus

Creole Sauce
2 Tbsp sour cream
3 Tbsp coarse ground creole mustard
2 Tbsp mayonnaise
½ tsp prepared horseradish
¼ tsp garlic powder
¼ tsp sugar
¼ tsp white pepper
¼ tsp kosher salt
1/8 tsp cayenne pepper
1/8 tsp black pepper

Whisk together ingredients for Creole sauce and refrigerate for at least 1 hour to let the flavors combine.

Spread 2 Tbsp of Creole sauce on ½ side of a wrap. Top with lettuce leaf, ¼ lb of roast beef, 2 slices cheese, and 2 Tbsp of roasted red pepper.

Fold in top and bottom of the wrap and roll up burrito style. Slice in half with a bias cut (at an angle) and serve with ¼ cup of hot au jus.

This has been our lunch for the past two days and I am already looking forward to having them for lunch at work tomorrow too! 

[Standard Disclaimer]  I have no affiliation with the mentioned companies or products and paid full retail costs.