Reuben Stromboli

One of my favorite main dishes to make is stromboli.  It's a go to meal for me when I can't think of anything to make because rare is the day when I don't have all the ingredients on hand.  I make my own dough for pizza every Saturday so since I use the same dough recipe for pizza and stromboli I always have the ingredients in my cupboards.  I also love stromboli for it's versatility.  So far I've made the following variations: pizza, ham & cheese, ham & turkey, chicken bacon ranch, turkey with guacamole, and my personal favorite, chicken caesar.  I've even made a breakfast version with cheddar cheese, scrambled eggs, veggies and bacon (it was yummy, by the way).

Friday night I decided that we would have stromboli because it sounded good, but I wasn't sure what kind we would have.  I looked in the fridge and saw the sauerkraut I'd purchased recently and got an idea.  I was going to make Reuben Stromboli!

Now I don't like sauerkraut, or reubens.  In fact this bag of sauerkraut was the first bag I'd purchased in my entire life.  I know, I bring shame to my very German last name.  To my credit, it's my married name, so I'm only carrying 5 years worth of shame :-)  Anyway I knew I needed to use up the sauerkraut so I pulled it out and got to work.   I usually make a full recipe's worth of dough and we have it for leftovers, but since I knew I was making pizza the next night and the leftovers would sit for a couple days I decided to make several smaller stromboli and freeze them for Will to take to lunch.

Reuben Stomboli:
Dough:
2 1/2 to 3 C all-purpose or bread flour
1 Tbsp sugar
1 Tsp salt
1 Package yeast (or 2 1/4 tsp)
3 Tbsp olive or vegetable oil
1 C very warm water (120 to 130 degrees F)

In a large bowl mix 1 cup flour, the sugar, salt and yeast. Add oil and warm water. Beat with electric mixer on medium speed 3 minutes, scraping bowl frequently. Stir in enough remaining flour until dough is soft and leaves sides of bowl. Place dough on lightly floured surfaced. Knead 5-8 minutes or until dough is smooth and springy. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rest 30 minutes.

Roll your dough out into the number of stromboli you want to have and place the circles on parchment lined baking sheets.  Once on the baking sheets cover the dough loosely with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place 30-45 minutes or until almost doubled in size. While your dough is rising pre-heat your oven to 375 degrees F.

Or if you have a bread machine throw all the ingredients in, turn it to the dough setting and let your machine do it's thing!  When it's done follow the instructions in the above paragraph!

 
Filling:
1 lb sliced corned beef
1 c thousand island dressing
1 1/2 c sauerkraut
1 c shredded swiss cheese
1 roma tomato, sliced (optional)
1/2 small white onion, sliced (optional)

On each dough circle choose one half that will have all the toppings.  Make sure to leave a 1/2 inch of clean dough around the perimeter of the half you are filling.  Squirt a thick line of thousand island dressing and top it with about 2 Tbsp of sauerkraut.  Place 4-5 slices of corned beef on top of the sauerkraut.  Then add a couple slices of tomato and onion and top it all with 2 Tbsp of shredded swiss cheese.  Fold the empty half of dough over top of the filled half making a half moon shape. Crimp the edges together using a fork (or see my picture below for a tutorial on a prettier fold) and cut a slice in the top to let out steam.  Brush the top with an egg wash or butter and sprinkle with freshly ground salt and pepper.

Bake at 375 for 25 minutes or until golden brown on the top.

Mmmm, we think tomatoes and onions make everything a little bit better!

I made 6 small stromboli, but I probably could have gotten 8, especially if they're being used for lunch!

Whoops!  I was so focused on getting the pictures taken and getting it done before Liam woke up from his nap that I forgot I didn't want Thousand Island on mine.  I had to wipe it off and put on some ranch!

Don't forget your sauerkraut!  I actually let a couple pieces drop onto mine before I realized what I was doing.  I definitely wasn't very focused!

Mmmm, meat and veggies!

This is the pretty crust I was telling you about.  In college I worked for four years in campus dining where I learned this pizza crust technique.  It's not as difficult as it looks but it does take some practice!  I like to make sure that I leave a little extra lip of dough on the bottom half of my dough (it looks like the top half isn't quite as big in the picture above).  Then, starting at one corner stretch a little section or tab of dough out and fold it up and over the top half of the dough.  Move to the next section and do the same thing, but this time make sure that the tab you fold up and over covers the edge of the tab preceding it.  In the picture above you'll notice that in the last tab that I folded up you can see the right edge, but in all the preceding tabs you can only see the left edge.  Just keep folding little tabs up and over until you get to the other end and just fold the last tab over and push it into the dough to seal it up.

So hopefully you can enjoy some Reuben Stromboli in the near future!