![]() Modern chipped beef product, showing coiled packing | |
Type | Meat |
---|---|
Place of origin | United States |
Main ingredients | Beef |
Chipped beef is a form of pressed, salted and dried beef that has been sliced into thin pieces. Some makers smoke the dried beef for more flavor. The modern product consists of small, thin, flexible leaves of partially dried beef, generally sold compressed together in jars or flat in plastic packets. The processed meat producer Hormel once described it as "an air-dried product that is similar to bresaola, but not as tasty." [1]
Chipped beef could be used to make frizzled beef (creamed chipped beef or SOS in military slang), or with eggs. [2]
Chipped beef is served in many diners and restaurants in the United States as a breakfast item.[ citation needed ] It is popular among the veteran community who generally refer to it by the dysphemism "Shit On a Shingle" or "S.O.S." (when polite company and/or children are present, the acronym is said to mean "Same Old Stuff."). Chipped beef in milk gravy is a common traditional meal served in all branches of the United States Armed Forces due to its reasonable nutritional profile, ease and speed of preparing, and relatively low cost to produce in large quantities (i.e., in quantities sufficient to properly feed an entire military outpost). Creamed chipped beef is also a standard fare on many diner menus, especially in the Mid-Atlantic, but has become harder to find in chain restaurants that serve breakfast. Among the restaurants still offering chipped beef on toast are Golden Corral and Silver Diner. IHOP no longer offers this on their menus, having substituted sausage gravy, and the same is true for Cracker Barrel restaurants. It is also available from companies such as Stouffer's in a frozen form which can be put on top of separately-prepared toast; it is typically quite salty. For instance, Stouffer's creamed chipped beef contains 540 mg sodium per 140 kcal serving, [3] down only slightly from 590 mg per 140 kcal serving in 2010. [4] The mixture was also, at one point, available from both Freezer Queen and Banquet as "hot sandwich toppers"; as of late 2007, Freezer Queen no longer makes this product, and the Banquet variety is rarely found. Finally, both the Esskay Meat Company of Baltimore and Knauss Foods make a refrigerated version of creamed chipped beef which can be easily microwaved. The meat itself is also available for purchase under the Knauss and Carson's Brand names. Steak-umm is used as a substitute. [5]
Chipped beef on toast (or creamed chipped beef on toast) is a dish comprising a white sauce and rehydrated slivers of dried beef, served on toasted bread. Hormel recommends flavoring the dish with Worcestershire sauce. [6] Chipped beef is also often served on bagels, English muffins, biscuits, home fries, rice, mashed potato and in casserole.
In the United States, chipped beef on toast was commonly served to service members of the United States Armed Forces from World War I through Vietnam. It was considered emblematic of the military experience and consequently also served to Boy Scouts of the era. [7] In American military slang it is commonly referred to by the dysphemism "Shit on a Shingle" (SOS). [8]
According to We Are The Mighty, the dish first appears in the 1910 Manual for Army Cooks, where a recipe for feeding 60 men can be found as below: [9]
Ingredients used:
15 pounds chipped beef
1½ pound of fat, butter preferred
1¼ lbs flour
2 12-oz cans of evaporated milk
1 bunch parsley
¼ oz pepper
6 quarts beef stock
Melt the fat in the pan, and add the flour; when it has cooked a few minutes, add the milk, dissolved in the beef stock, or water. Stir the batter in slowly to prevent lumping, and then add the beef. Cook a few minutes, add the parsley, and serve on toast. If the beef is very salty, it should be scalded before cooking.
-1910 Manual for Army Cooks [10]
Wentworth and Flexner cite no origin for the term, but noted "shingle" for slice of toast has had "some use since 1935" in the U.S. Army, mostly in the expression "shit on a shingle", and the latter had "wide World War II Army use". [11]
In his World War II book Band of Brothers , Stephen E. Ambrose evokes the military basics:
At the end of May, the men of Easy packed up their barracks bags and … [took] a stop-and-go train ride to Sturgis, Kentucky. At the depot Red Cross girls had coffee and doughnuts for them, the last bit of comfort they would know for a month. They marched out to the countryside and pitched up tents, dug straddle trenches for latrines, and ate the Army's favorite meal for troops in the field, creamed chipped beef on toast, universally known as SOS, or Shit on a Shingle. [12]
Gravy is a sauce often made from the juices of meats that run naturally during cooking and often thickened with corn starch or other thickeners for added texture. The gravy may be further coloured and flavoured with gravy salt or gravy browning or ready-made cubes. Powders can be used as a substitute for natural meat or vegetable extracts. Canned and instant gravies are also available. Gravy is commonly served with roasts, meatloaf, rice, noodles, chips (fries), mashed potatoes, or biscuits.
French toast is a dish of sliced bread soaked in beaten eggs and often milk or cream, then pan-fried. Alternative names and variants include eggy bread, Bombay toast, gypsy toast, and poor knights (of Windsor).
Chicken-fried steak, also known as country-fried steak, is an American breaded cutlet dish consisting of a piece of beefsteak coated with seasoned flour and either deep-fried or pan-fried. It is sometimes associated with the Southern cuisine of the United States. It is breaded and fried with a technique similar to the more common fried chicken, hence "chicken-fried". When deep-fried, it is usually referred to as "chicken-fried steak". Pan-fried versions are typically referred to as "country-fried steak".
Chili con carne or Carne con chile, also spelled chilli con carne or chile con carne and shortened to chili or chilli, is a spicy stew of Mexican origin containing chili peppers, meat, tomatoes, and often pinto beans or kidney beans. Other seasonings may include garlic, onions, and cumin.
Malaysian cuisine consists of cooking traditions and practices found in Malaysia, and reflects the multi-ethnic makeup of its population. The vast majority of Malaysia's population can roughly be divided among three major ethnic groups: Malays, Chinese and Indians. The remainder consists of the indigenous peoples of Sabah and Sarawak in East Malaysia, the Orang Asli of Peninsular Malaysia, the Peranakan and Eurasian creole communities, as well as a significant number of foreign workers and expatriates.
Cheese fries or cheesy chips is a dish consisting of French fries covered in cheese, with the possible addition of various other toppings. Cheese fries are generally served as a lunch or dinner dish. They can be found in fast-food locations, diners, and grills mainly in English speaking countries.
A schnitzel is a thin slice of meat. The meat is usually thinned by pounding with a meat tenderizer. Most commonly, the meat is breaded before frying. Breaded schnitzel is popular in many countries and is made using veal, pork, chicken, mutton, beef, or turkey. Schnitzel originated as wiener schnitzel and is very similar to other breaded meat dishes.
South African cuisine reflects the diverse range of culinary traditions embodied by the various communities that inhabit the country. Among the indigenous peoples of South Africa, the Khoisan foraged over 300 species of edible food plants, such as the rooibos shrub legume, whose culinary value continues to exert a salient influence on South African cuisine. Subsequent encounters with Bantu pastoralists facilitated the emergence of cultivated crops and domestic cattle, which supplemented traditional Khoisan techniques of meat preservation. In addition, Bantu-speaking communities forged an extensive repertoire of culinary ingredients and dishes, many of which are still consumed today in traditional settlements and urban entrepôts alike.
Norwegian cuisine in its traditional form is based largely on the raw materials readily available in Norway and its mountains, wilderness, and coast. It differs in many respects from continental cuisine through the stronger focus on game and fish. Many of the traditional dishes are the result of using conserved materials, necessary because of the long winters.
Biscuits and gravy is a popular breakfast dish in the United States, especially in the South. The dish consists of soft dough biscuits covered in white gravy, made from the drippings of cooked pork sausage, flour, milk, and often bits of sausage, bacon, ground beef, or other meat. The gravy is often flavored with black pepper.
Diner lingo is a kind of American verbal slang used by cooks and chefs in diners and diner-style restaurants, and by the wait staff to communicate their orders to the cooks. Usage of terms with similar meaning, propagated by oral culture within each establishment, may vary by region or even among restaurants in the same locale.
A collop is a slice of meat, according to one definition in the Oxford English Dictionary. In Elizabethan times, "collops" came to refer specifically to slices of bacon. Shrove Monday, also known as Collop Monday, was traditionally the last day to cook and eat meat before Ash Wednesday, which was a non-meat day in the pre-Lenten season also known as Shrovetide. A traditional breakfast dish was collops of bacon topped with a fried egg.
Afghan cuisine is influenced to a certain extent by Persian, Central Asian and Indian cuisines due to Afghanistan's close proximity and cultural ties. The cuisine is halal and mainly based on mutton, beef, poultry and fish with rice and Afghan bread. Accompanying these are common vegetables and dairy products, such as milk, yogurt, and whey, and fresh and dried fruits such as apples, apricots, grapes, bananas, oranges, plums, pomegranates, sweet melons, and raisins. The diet of most Afghans revolves around rice-based dishes, while various forms of naan are consumed with most meals. Tea is generally consumed daily in large quantities, and is a major part of hospitality. The culinary specialties reflect the nation's ethnic and geographic diversity. The national dish of Afghanistan is Kabuli palaw, a rice dish cooked with raisins, carrots, nuts, and lamb or beef.
Liver and onions is a dish consisting of slices of liver and bulb onions. The liver and the onions are usually sautéed or otherwise cooked together, but sometimes they may be sautéed separately and mixed together afterwards. The liver is often cut in fine slices, but it also may be diced.
Javanese cuisine is the cuisine of Javanese people, a major ethnic group in Indonesia, more precisely the province of Central Java, Yogyakarta and East Java.
A great variety of cassava-based dishes are consumed in the regions where cassava is cultivated, and the ingredient is included many national or ethnic specialities.
A meatball is ground meat (mince) rolled into a ball, sometimes along with other ingredients, such as bread crumbs, minced onion, eggs, butter, and seasoning. Meatballs are cooked by frying, baking, steaming, or braising in sauce. There are many types of meatballs using different types of meats and spices. The term is sometimes extended to meatless versions based on vegetables or fish; the latter are also commonly known as fish balls.
Malaysian Indian cuisine, or the cooking of the ethnic Indian communities in Malaysia, consists of adaptations of authentic dishes from India, as well as original creations inspired by the diverse food culture of Malaysia. Because the vast majority of Malaysia's Indian community are of South Indian descent, and are mostly ethnic Tamils who are descendants of immigrants from a historical region which consists of the modern Indian state of Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka's Northern Province, much of Malaysian Indian cuisine is predominantly South Indian inspired in character and taste. A typical Malaysian Indian dish is likely to be redolent with curry leaves, whole and powdered spice, and contains fresh coconut in various forms. Ghee is still widely used for cooking, although vegetable oils and refined palm oils are now commonplace in home kitchens. Before a meal it is customary to wash hands as cutlery is often not used while eating, with the exception of a serving spoon for each respective dish.