The Reuben, Minus the Rye
A reuben is really an exercise in balance: salty cured meat, sour sauerkraut, rich cheese and a tangy dressing. Take away the rye bread and it turns out that balance survives perfectly well over a bowl of crisp shredded greens. Elk pastrami is leaner and more intensely flavoured than the beef version, so a little goes a surprisingly long way.
Ingredients
Serves 2 | Cost: $8.75 per serving | Total: $17.50 | Ready in 20 min
- 250 g (9 oz) elk pastrami, sliced and roughly torn
- 150 g (5 oz) sauerkraut, well drained
- 80 g (3 oz) Swiss cheese, cut into small cubes
- 1 small head green cabbage, very finely shredded
- 3 tablespoons mayonnaise
- 1 tablespoon tomato paste
- 1 tablespoon dill pickle, finely chopped
- 1 teaspoon horseradish
- 2 tablespoons chopped fresh dill
- Black pepper, to taste
Instructions
- Make the dressing. Whisk the mayonnaise with the tomato paste, chopped dill pickle and horseradish until smooth and pale pink. Loosen with a teaspoon of water if it is too thick to drizzle, and season with black pepper.
- Prepare the greens. Shred the cabbage as finely as you can manage — the texture should be closer to slaw than to salad leaves. Place in a large bowl and toss with a pinch of salt.
- Warm the pastrami. Heat a dry pan over medium-high and add the torn pastrami for 2 minutes, turning once, just until the edges begin to frizzle and the fat softens. Warming it makes a considerable difference.
- Combine. Add the drained sauerkraut and cubed Swiss cheese to the shredded cabbage and toss through half the dressing until everything is lightly coated.
- Serve. Divide the dressed cabbage between two bowls, top with the warm pastrami, drizzle over the remaining dressing, and finish with plenty of fresh dill and cracked black pepper.
Nutritional & Dietary Notes
Gluten-Free
Every ingredient in this recipe is naturally free from wheat, barley and rye. If you are cooking for someone with coeliac disease, double-check any stock, sauce or spice blend you buy in, as gluten-containing thickeners and malt derivatives are common hidden additions in commercial products.
High Protein
Built around a generous serving of premium BC-sourced protein, this dish is designed to support muscle repair, satiety and steady energy through the day. It works particularly well as a post-training meal or as the anchor of a high-protein meal prep rotation.
Keto
Carbohydrates are kept deliberately low here. The bulk of the energy in this dish comes from quality protein and natural fats, so it slots neatly into a ketogenic day without pushing you out of ketosis. If you are tracking closely, weigh any starchy vegetables and adjust the portion to suit your own daily carbohydrate target.
Featured HOTRO.ca Product
This recipe is built around Elk Pastrami from HOTRO.ca. We source premium BC-raised and ethically farmed meats and slow-simmered bone broth, so the quality of the core ingredient does most of the work for you. Substituting a lesser product will change the result more than any other single change you could make to this recipe.
All the flavours of a reuben — elk pastrami, sauerkraut and Swiss — over crisp shredded greens.