This Old-School Picnic Food Is A Perfect Way To Use Up Leftover Roast Beef

When you think of classic picnic fare, it may be things like sandwiches, salads, and spreads. Back in the day, there was an old-school dish that could be used as all of the above. And while there are some early 20th-century bites that may seem odd today, like sardine and egg sandwiches, this is not one of those, even though at first blush you may balk at the idea. It's roast beef salad, and it's delicious as a sandwich filling, as a cold salad, or even as a spread for crackers or veggies. It's in the same vein as tuna salad or chicken salad, although for some reason, those two proteins have remained popular while roast beef salad has kind of fallen off the radar.

This dish seems to have been popular in the 1950s, with the most common version being very similar to these other protein-based salads. You chop up or grind the roast beef and combine it with ingredients like mayonnaise, mustard, pickle relish, Worcestershire sauce, and chopped onions. It certainly sounds like one of those mid-century foods that deserve a comeback, but there's evidence of this type of roast beef salad dating as far back as 1902. Like other protein-based salads, this simple dish appears to have a wide array of variations.

While regular roast beef salad is plenty tasty, there are some others that deserve special mention. The 1902 version from the "Handbook of Household Science," adds chopped celery for a bit of crunch and a nice contrast with the rich meat. It also features capers and parsley for a pop of brininess from the former and freshness from the latter.

A couple of decades later, in the 1920s, roast beef salad recipes began appearing in newspapers. One even came from Manhattan's famed Delmonico restaurant and was published in a July 1920 edition of The Herald Statesman. It tacks the fancy-sounding word "Cressontere" onto the name, which may relate to the fact that Chef Nicholas Sabatini included watercress along with sliced hard-boiled eggs and olives for added visual appeal.

A later rendition from 1952 leaned heavily into umami (though they likely weren't using that term in the United States at the time), thanks to the addition of cured fish. It's an award-winning dish that appeared in The Miami Herald. Besides chopped roast beef, it included chopped anchovies, hard-boiled eggs, and tomatoes, and was served with a French dressing made with anchovy paste over a bed of lettuce. Whether you opt for the simpler version or something a bit fancier, roast beef salad is a creative way to use leftover roast beef and doesn't even require a picnic to enjoy (though you might find that being outside heightens the gastronomic experience).