Arby's Reuben

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A Reuben is a sandwich built almost entirely of wet ingredients — sauerkraut, dressing, melting cheese — pressed against bread and heated. Something has to manage the moisture and nothing in the standard build does it for you.

Squeeze the sauerkraut out. Hard. A handful straight from the jar carries several tablespoons of brine, and every one of them goes into the rye.

Put it in a sieve, press with the back of a spoon, then squeeze it in your hands. You want it damp, not dripping.

Warm the kraut before it goes in

Cold sauerkraut in the middle of a hot sandwich acts as a heat sink. The bread browns and the cheese on the outside melts while the centre stays cold, and by the time the middle warms up the bread is too dark.

A minute in a dry pan solves it and drives off a little more moisture at the same time.

Butter the bread, do not oil the pan

Butter on the outside of the bread browns evenly across the whole face and carries flavour into it.

Oil in the pan pools, so parts of the slice fry and parts sit dry. It is the difference between an even golden face and a patchy one.

Soft butter, spread edge to edge.

Cheese on both sides of the filling

Swiss cheese against both slices does two jobs. It glues the sandwich together so it does not slide apart when cut, and it forms a fat barrier between the wet filling and the bread.

Cheese in the middle only leaves both slices exposed.

What you need

• 4 slices rye bread
• 300 g corned beef or pastrami, sliced
• 150 g sauerkraut, squeezed dry
• 4 slices Swiss cheese
• 4 tbsp butter, softened

Russian dressing

• 4 tbsp mayonnaise
• 2 tbsp tomato ketchup
• 1 tbsp sweet pickle relish, drained
• 1 tsp horseradish
• 1/4 tsp paprika
• 1/4 tsp Worcestershire sauce

Method

1. 1. Whisk the dressing ingredients together.
2. 2. Squeeze the sauerkraut dry, then warm it in a dry pan for a minute.
3. 3. Warm the corned beef in the same pan, 1 minute — cold meat is the other heat sink.
4. 4. Butter one side of each bread slice.
5. 5. Build, unbuttered side up: cheese, corned beef, sauerkraut, dressing, cheese, then the top slice buttered side out.
6. 6. Medium-low heat, 4–5 minutes a side. Press gently with a spatula.
7. 7. Rest 1 minute, then cut diagonally.

Medium-low, and why

A Reuben needs the cheese to melt all the way through, and that takes four or five minutes a side. On a high heat the bread is black by minute two.

The temptation to speed it up is the single most common way this sandwich fails.

Press gently

A firm press squeezes the filling out of the sides and compacts the bread into a dense layer. Light pressure with a spatula is enough to keep everything in contact with the pan.

Storing

None. A Reuben is a made-to-order sandwich and it does not survive being wrapped — the kraut keeps working on the bread even cold.

The dressing keeps a week in the fridge and is good on anything.