This week we have a legendary match between two big hitters, the copy car maid rite and the sloppy Joe! While we were making this video even we thought, "what is the difference between a sloppy joe and a maid rite?" Well, it turns out that there's not a ton and it mostly comes down to sauce.
During our intense research, we found that sloppy joes are typically ground beef, ketchup, and mustard... and that's it for the most basic variation of this recipe. This checked out with my crew (Evan and Adham), and myself. I remember my mom making it this way while I was growing up. During our research, however, we discovered that there are a ton of different ways people make this. I saw some that used chili flakes for some heat, some that had a little Mexican flair with the spices and, to my surprise, a BBQ style one. However, when we started looking into the the "maid rite," or loose meat sandwich, we found that mustard was used.
This discovery changed our ENTIRE WORLD, not really, but we did decide that the maid rite was decidedly more simple, but as Albrecht Durer said, "Simplicity is the greatest adornment of art." So, what makes up the loose meat sandwich? Basically, we use a ground beef with a slightly higher fat content in order to bring the beefy flavor, we add the aforementioned mustard for some acidity, then we finish by hitting it all with a little sugar. The sugar doesn't make it sweet though, it simply cuts the acidity from the mustard a bit so that when we add our onions we aren't overloaded with tang. No one likes loose, tangy meat sandwiches. We also add some water which gives our meat something we, in the loosest way possible, will call a "sauce." The water also helps to tenderize the onion that we add just before finishing the meat.
Although in the vid we show making the sloppy joe first, we actually made that second. I know, movie magic at it's finest. We did that during recording because we still hadn't decided for sure if we were going to omit the mustard from the sloppy sauce as we had discussed. After making the copy cat maid rite, we knew. It had to be done. And so it was. The sloppy sauce focused more on things that we knew worked with beef while also making the sauce a little something more. And what more it was! I won't pretend that either one of these recipes are my favorite, but after trying each it occurred to me that these recipes, while seemingly boring, were actually quite tasty and had surprising depth of taste. The flavor took me back to middle school on weekend when I had my friends spending the night, and it was really nice. That is something magical that only the best recipes can give to you. I've added this recipe to my routine list of after work dinners simply for that reason alone, not to mention how easy it is.
But I think that's about all the gushing I can do here, let's not forget this is a competitive match-up between two heavy hitters! While we at the office knew who won, we wanted to see if what you thought, so go to our instagram or YouTube and let us know which you prefer!
Check out the full written recipe below or keep scrolling to watch us make both these tasty recipes
