Outside of My Comfort Zone

This year I've decided (from time to time) to take short journeys outside of my comfort zone.  The first sojourn lead me to the kitchen.  I made loose meat sandwich (es).  For those of you reading in other countries it may help for you to know the USA is broken up into regions or territories, one of which is the Midwest.  Foods tend to remain in the respective regions.  I have a friend in the Midwest who has been talking about this sloppy sandwich recently.  I thought this was a good area to step out of my comfort zone so I looked up a recipe and got to cooking.  The chosen recipe comes from the Blue Mill Tavern.  I figured if they had repeat customers then the recipe had to be a winner.  It was indeed.  

The finished dish is much more appealing than the name that's been hung
 on it.  One of the detailed instructions in the recipe was to sprinkle  2 teaspoons (t.) of salt over the melted shortening.  Even though it was recommended to follow the recipe closely, I didn't.  I used 1 t. of salt.  If I had followed directions the dish would most likely have been a ten.  With my stubborn mess up I gave it an eight.  All of. the other directions were followed, right down to using a cast iron pan.

Recipe Points

*Use a cast iron pan
*Use shortening
*Steam the bread
*Eat the sandwich with mustard and dill pickles
* Cook out all of the liquid

Here's the results in pictures.

Browning the meat and onions.

Adding the 'secret' ingredients.  Mustard, sugar, vinegar.

Layering the roll with mustard and home made dill pickles.



The finished dish.  If there was an additional picture,
it would be of an empty dish!

You can find the recipe here:      http://www.food.com/recipe/the-blue-mill-tavern-loosemeat-sandwich-87075  If you decide to try this, let me know what you think.  I will be making this again, but following the directions 100%.

Stay safe.

PS:  A warm welcome goes out to new readers.  FYI:  I just found out if you sign up under 'followers' an email is sent to you when a new post goes up.  Some say it takes a day to receive the email.