Cheap and Chic Kitchen: French Dip and Zucchini Sticks

french dip and zucchini sticks

 First of all,  let me just say that this meal was really, really good. The French dip was super easy and so tasty. The zucchini sticks were a lot of work, but also very good. I wasn't crazy about the sweet onion dip, but I enjoyed them just as much on their own.

The French dip recipe is available here. However, we don't drink beer in our house and frankly the smell makes me gag. So I sort of modified the recipe a bit. I had French onion soup mix on hand and bought a carton of beef broth. All I did was put my roast in the crock pot, add the pouch of soup mix and pour the beef broth to cover the whole thing. Then just cook on low for 7 hours. Easy.

french rolls, toasted and sliced open

I used provolone cheese because the smokey flavor goes well with the oniony french dip

finally the thinly sliced roast - yum

The zucchini sticks were a lot more work. I didn't have an hour to let the sticks sit in the salt and so they didn't get as crisp as they were supposed to. Still tasty. Probably won't be adding this to the regular rotation simply because it is so work intensive.

zucchini sliced and setting in salt (supposed to be for an hour or more)

dredge in egg then this panko bread crumb, parm cheese mixure

What about you? Do you prefer easy peasy or tasty but complicated?