Tried one of the Tips Posts....they call that forking....well for the record there were no forks involved in my French Dip sandwiches!...haha

Well the other day I came across the new Campbells Soup up your Summer campaign on FB....looked rather interesting and God knows I have wondered what is in "cream of"  soup to make everything it touches taste delicious! So I clicked on and looked over one of the recipes that looked super easy. Basically it was for French Dip sandwiches. How hard could that be?

You were supposed to get a pound of roast beef from the deli. Check. Knew I could master that. Supposed to get a can of French onion soup from Campbells....knew I could do that....never tried it before so was curious about it b/c once I had some delicious French onion soup in a restaurant where I worked that I never have forgotten and that was at least 20 yrs ago. Supposed to get some worchestershire( try spelling that from memory....yikes...still not right most likely) and add a Tablespoon to the French onion soup. Surely I could do that as well.Supposed to add some provolone to the buns. Oh yeah, you were supposed to get hoagie buns. None of this activity would be hard or qualify me for genius status. So I drove to Walmart and got just what the recipe called for. Well minus the banana peppers. Not interested in adding those ( but they are yummy on the Subway sandwiches)

So as I was standing in the aisle at Walmart this old lady who looked about 80 or so was beside me in the soup aisle. I asked my daughter to help me find the French onion soup. Of course neither of us could find it but the old lady found it quickly and pointed it out to me. Call me a whippersnapper. Those depression era/war era people are no dummies.  I told her what I was buying it for and she said she had had them and they were good. Must be something to this French dip using Campbells soup thing I thought.

So we drove home and ate some roast beef sandwiches for lunch ( that pound of roast beef was a lot of meat in my book and I piled it on the sandwiches tonight and had some left over so a half pound will be fine if money's tight) and went about our day.

Well tonight I made the French dip sandwiches or souped up my summer as Campbells would say. I have to say, they were quite tasty. My only complaint was the bun was soggy. The meat was tender. The soup was good ( I did dilute mine with a can of water...wasn't sure none of the recipes called for it) and not salty like I was worried it would be. A few people had complained the worchestershire had too much kick to it but I didn't find that to be the case and I am not one for salty...I just splashed a couple splashes in mine....it called for a tablespoon so I may have even done more than that....I thought halfway through that I should have made some carmelized onions to go with the meat ( the soup has onions but any onion lover will tell you it isn't the same)....

It really was simple....I heated the soup plus can of water and the meat which I broke up into smaller hunks and some splashes of worchestershire in the medium size saucepan...I let it cook on low to med for maybe 20 minutes ( trying for tender but worried it was going to be getting tougher). I preheated the oven to 400 as instructed and got out the cookie sheet and covered it with foil. I then put the hoagie buns on there in a row and took some provolone and put it in the bottom of the bun and then I spooned the meat out along with a little bit of juice in the buns and topped it with more provolone. This dinner was not rocket science after all. I would advise you to go easy on the juice as it made the buns way too soggy and that was my main complaint with this meal. Next time no sauce on sandwiches in my house.

So I served them with a small bowl of French dip soup beside each sandwich. With chips. This was no high class meal let me tell you. But they were tasty and easy ( and soggy...remember go easy on that sauce) and I started to think the old lady knew a thing or two about cooking.The dogs enjoyed whatever juice/meat remnants that were leftover so it was a winwin for the whole family. Did I mention the recipe is on the back of the soup can? It is. So run out to Walmart and get you the things you need and serve the sauce on the side. After all, it isn't rocket science--Tips

 

this is the pot with the meat that simmered in the soup and worchestershire and the sandwich on the cookie sheet....added some provolone and heated it til cheese melted

 

this is my sandwich which the left half looks like the meat wasn't piled on enough but I think the soggy bun was the culprit

 

this was my husbands and his bun was so soggy I had to use a spatula and the bottom bun was heavy with juice so it wouldn't stand up but tilted toward the plate