Beef Roulade by Benz. Filled beef roulade, braised in its own gravy.
Beef Roulade by Benz is a traditionally filled roulade from the Benz butcher shop in Köngen: beef filled with bacon, onions, and pickled cucumber, braised in their own house-made gravy. No restructured meat, flavor enhancers, or added flavorings – 400-gram can, ready to heat.
Buying beef roulades that are already rolled and braised – for many, that is the difference between "we have this on Sundays" and "we never have this." Roulades are among the most labor-intensive dishes in German home cooking: pounding the meat, filling it, rolling, tying, searing, and braising for two hours. Those who know how to do it only make it twice a year. At Benz, it is done in the butcher shop, using meat from their own butchery. You just heat the can for fifteen minutes and serve it with red cabbage and dumplings.
Bacon, onion, cucumber – the filling makes the roulade
The roulade from Benz tastes just as a roulade should: on the outside, the braised beef; on the inside, the filling of bacon, onions, and pickled cucumber, which releases its acidity into the sauce during braising. It is precisely this slight acidity that is the heart of the dish – it distinguishes a roulade from a standard roast. A touch of mustard and celery in the seasoning rounds it all off.
The sauce is the house's dark gravy, here with a bit more thickness from wheat flour and cornstarch so that it clings to the dumplings. The meat is tender, can be divided with a fork, and yet retains its shape. The filling stays in place while heating as long as you handle the roulade carefully.
One caveat: The dish contains wheat flour and is therefore not suitable for people with a gluten intolerance. The bacon in the filling is cured, which is why sodium nitrite is on the list of ingredients – this is common for bacon, but those who avoid curing salt should be aware of this.
Red cabbage, dumplings, and a fork for sharing
Open the can, carefully pour the contents into a pot, and heat on a low setting for about fifteen minutes. Do not stir; just turn the roulade once so that the filling stays where it belongs. The classic side dish is apple red cabbage with bread or potato dumplings, which is what the Benz family recommends. Equally good: mashed potatoes or wide ribbon noodles that soak up the sauce.
A few ideas beyond that: Cut the roulade into thick slices and serve on mashed potatoes so you can see the filling in the cross-section. Round off the sauce with a spoonful of lingonberries, which pairs well with the acidity of the cucumber. Or, eat the cold roulade in slices on bread – a leftover that rarely exists. If you are cooking for four people, take two cans and add a can of gravy so that the dumplings have enough sauce.
For a complete Sunday dinner in thirty minutes: warm up jarred red cabbage with an apple and a little butter, let dumplings from the refrigerated section soak, and heat the roulade. Put everything on the plate and pour the sauce over it. This is "heating up" with ambition: a meal that looks and tastes like real home cooking.
Our tip: One can is a portion for one person with a big appetite, or for two with plenty of sides. If you have guests, it is better to calculate one can per person. The sauce in the can is barely enough, which is why the plain gravy is available.
Patience pays off when heating: If you heat the roulade too hot and too fast, the surface becomes dry while the middle is still cool. Low setting, lid on, fifteen minutes – and turn once in between. It also works in the microwave, four minutes in a suitable container, but the sauce remains more consistent in a pot.
Why a butcher rolls the roulade for you
Roulades are a butcher's craft before they are a culinary craft. The beef must be cut evenly and thinly, otherwise, it will tear when rolled or remain tough in spots. At the Benz butcher shop, it is cut from their own butchery; the beef comes from family farms in the Stauferland and the Swabian Alb, the bacon from pork in Köngen. There are at least 180 grams of meat in every can.
They are filled according to the Schwanen butcher shop's recipe: bacon, onions, pickled cucumber, mustard. Then they are rolled, seared, and braised in the gravy, which is reduced for at least 24 hours from beef bones and vegetables from Köngen. During braising, the meat's connective tissue turns into gelatin, and the filling releases salt and acidity into the sauce. After that, the roulade is put into the can and heated a second time – this makes it shelf-stable unopened for about two years.
The secret to a good roulade is the balance between filling and meat. Too much bacon, and it becomes greasy. Too much cucumber, and the sauce becomes sour. Too little of both, and it is just a rolled roast. The butcher shop has fine-tuned this ratio over decades of counter sales – roulades are among the items there that customers pre-order because they know what they are getting.
The Benz butcher shop has been in Köngen for over 100 years, run by master butcher Daniel Benz and his wife Monika. Their daughter Gina, a master butcher and food manager, founded the gourmet workshop with them in 2019 to make exactly such dishes shelf-stable: the ones that almost no one cooks at home anymore because they take too long.
The Sunday dinner that waits in the cupboard
A beef roulade in a can is a dish that awakens memories – of grandparents, of family dinners, of a table where someone stood at the stove for hours. Benz turns it into something that is possible on a Wednesday. It is a way to enjoy the dish at all again.
As a gift, it is a big hit for parents or grandparents who only cook for a few but enjoy eating well. Together with the gourmet beef goulash and the pork cheeks from the same butcher, it makes a package with three Sunday meals. All keep in the cupboard, all are on the table in twenty minutes.
Beef roulade from Köngen, rolled and braised – all that's missing from your side is red cabbage and dumplings.
