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Roast Beef Patties combine beef, mashed potatoes, gravy, eggs, and onions in a fantastic crispy patty. Serve them smothered with more delicious gravy on top!
A few months ago, a reader reached out to us looking for a recipe that her father used to make. He took leftover roast beef and gravy, mashed potatoes, onions and eggs, and formed the mixture into a patty which he would then fry to cook.
My husband Jack’s eyes instantly lit up at the idea…and these Roast Beef Patties are his attempt to recreate that recipe.
How do you make Roast Beef Patties?
- Start with leftover roast beef. You can use leftover Prime Rib, Top of the Round, or Eye of the Round roast beef.
- Make a gravy using the roast beef pan drippings while you are at it. If you don’t have drippings, we include a recipe below to make gravy without drippings. You’ll need a gravy seasoning such as Kitchen Bouquet or Gravy Master. (affiliate links)
- Chop the roast beef. Chill the beef, then use a food processor to pulse the beef into small rice-sized pieces. (If you have a food grinder, you can also use that.)
- Add in leftover mashed potatoes. Our Perfect Mashed Potatoes recipe is a great option. Just be sure to avoid adding too much milk to the potatoes; you don’t want to use super soft potatoes in your Roast Beef Patties.
- Sauté onions and garlic in a skillet, then mix it in with the chopped roast beef and mashed potatoes. Add in eggs, shredded cheddar cheese, thyme, and some of the prepared gravy.
- Form your patties and place them on a sheet pan that has been lined with parchment paper and sprinkled with flour. Sprinkle more flour on top of each of the Roast Beef Patties. (The flour will help the patties crisp up as the fry.)
- Chill the Roast Beef Patties for at least an hour to firm up before cooking. You’ll actually bake the patties in a hot oven – it’s a much quicker and easier process than frying the patties – plus clean-up is easy too!
How do you serve Roast Beef Patties?
Serve your Roast Beef Patties with more gravy on top, mashed potatoes on the side, and your favorite vegetable.
Can I freeze the Roast Beef Patties?
Yes – freeze the patties laid out on a flat baking sheet until firm. Then wrap them individually in plastic wrap.
When ready to bake, lay them out in a flat layer on a baking sheet and only partially thaw. Then baked as written in the recipe.
You can also freeze already-cooked patties – laying flat as above. Then reheat in the oven to heat through and crisp up before serving.
You might enjoy these other beef recipes:
We love seeing what you made! Tag us on Instagram at @afamilyfeast or hashtag #afamilyfeast so we can see your creations!
Roast Beef Patties
Ingredients
2 pounds diced cooked roast beef such as Prime Rib, Top of the Round Roast, or Eye of the Round (about 5-6 cups)
3 cups mashed potatoes
4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, divided
1 cup onion, diced
1 tablespoon fresh garlic, minced
3 whole eggs, beaten
8 ounces sharp white cheddar cheese, shredded fine
1 tablespoon fresh thyme
2 tablespoons plus 1 cup all-purpose flour, divided
1 1/2 cups beef gravy, see below, divided
8 tablespoons butter (1 stick, or half a cup)
Gravy
Pan drippings, if available from your roast
2 tablespoons strong red wine such as merlot
1 1/4 cups beef broth or stock
1/2 teaspoon gravy browning & seasoning sauce, such as Kitchen Bouquet or Gravy Master (affiliate links)
2 tablespoons butter, softened
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
Salt and pepper, as needed
Instructions
Place the cold cooked and cubed roast beef (fat and all if you have it) into the bowl of a food processor and run for 15 seconds. The texture should be rice size. Continue to pulse in short bursts to achieve the rice size pieces.
Pour into a large bowl along with cold mashed potatoes and 2 tablespoons of the oil.
In a small saute pan, place remaining two tablespoons of oil and over medium heat, saute onions for 3 minutes. Add garlic and cook for another minute then remove and add to the bowl with the beef and potatoes and stir to combine.
Add the eggs, cheese, thyme and 2 tablespoons of the flour and mix to combine.
Make the gravy by adding any drippings from the roast if you have them into a small sauce pan and heat. (If you don’t have drippings, just reduce the wine and continue on) Once bubbling, add the wine and cook to evaporate. Add the stock and gravy color and heat to bubbling. Mix the softened butter and flour to form a paste (called a beurre manié), then add to the sauce pan and cook the gravy over medium low for ten minutes. Taste and season if needed with salt and pepper.
Add ½ cup of the gravy to the beef mixture and save the remaining cup of gravy to serve with the finished patties.
Completely mix the beef mixture and using a scoop, portion out 18 balls, about four ounces each.
Line two sheet trays with parchment and using a sifter, sift on ¼ cup of flour onto the parchment paper of each pan.
With wet hands, form each patty into a puck shape about a half inch or so thick and lay down on the floured pan. Repeat for all filling ending with about nine per pan.
Sprinkle on the remaining ½ cup of flour over the 18 patties, cover and refrigerate for an hour or more to firm up. They should be firm when lifted.
When ready to cook, preheat oven to 425 degrees F and melt the butter in a small sauce pan.
Butter the bottoms of two sheet trays. (You could reuse the first two sheet trays by sliding the parchment and patties onto your counter.)
Divided the now chilled patties onto the two buttered pans by lifting each one off of the floured surface and onto the buttered pan.
Using the remaining butter, butter the tops.
Place the two pans in the oven for 12 minutes. Remove and carefully flip each patty over (we used a fish turner). Place back in the oven for another 12-13 minutes until nicely browned and crisp on both sides. (Patties are delicate so be careful flipping and moving them around).
Reheat gravy and serve two patties to each guest with gravy over the top along with your favorite starch and vegetable.
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I’m sad! I had high hopes for this recipe. I had this bombdiggity tri-tip roast leftover, and a DELICIOUS bacon kale mashed potato with parm cheese. My eggs are from my free range chickens, so they’re flavorful and just awesome. Local sharp cheddar cheese. It was the perfect set of ingredients. The execution though, not so much. I followed the recipe to a T regarding portions etc. The flavor was excellent. The texture though…it just ended up a sloppy gloopy mess!!! It didn’t get crispy like it should have. The outside was crispy, the inside was just mush. My husband who is just kind as can be said “well, it was just a meal. It filled us up I guess.” I even took the baked patties and then air fried them to see if they just needed more baking. And nope! Still sloppy mess on the inside. It also was pretty labor intensive for a weeknight leftover kind of meal. I spent about 1.5 hrs in the kitchen altogether putting these together. Also oh my gawsh it makes SO MANY. I froze them, but we’ll most likely never eat them.
Sorry you were disappointed Jess. Since you were using mashed potatoes with a bunch of ingredients added, including bacon and kale (both of which release moisture or fat as they are heated/cooked) it’s likely that the mushy inside you experienced was caused by that? I applaud your creativity, but sometimes making changes to recipes can impact the finished results.
This is a really amazing and interesting use of left over roast. I have never thought of using it like this and am excited to try it. I purchased a roast yesterday and will try this with the leftovers. Thank you for consistently providing us with unique yet easy recipes using easily obtained ingredients. Your pictures are beautiful and so helpful to the success of making these recipes. Thanks for all of your hard work.
Thank you for such a nice note Linda! We hope you enjoy this recipe – and we’re glad you are enjoying the others too!
Can I wait to rate the recipe until I make it? Puh-leeze?
It looks absolutely wonderful! Thank you, Jack, for doing all the R&D for us.
The recipe generates two questions:
1) Can the patties be frozen for later use and if so, would you recommend freezing them already cooked or unbaked?
and 2) What about using other meats (eg, pork roast, chicken, or even fish(?))
Your thoughts?
So glad you saw the recipe and yes – you can wait to rate it until after you’ve made it. 🙂 I’m sure other meats could be used – maybe fish too, but depending on the type of fish, you may need to make more adjustments to the ingredients to get the patties to stick together, as fish is a softer and often moister protein.
We answer the freezing question at the end of the post – you can do it either way. Whether the patties are cooked, frozen and reheated or frozen before cooking, we suggest freezing them in a single layer on a pan, then once frozen solid, wrap them individually so you can pull out what you need. (You’ll also want to thaw them laid flat on a pan so they don’t stick to each other.) Hope you enjoy the recipe – thanks for the inspiration!
My grandmother always made this but no cheese, just roast beef potatoes and onion and egg to bind, salt and pepper.pat with flour and she always fried them but I like the baked idea. Making some tomorrow
Hope you enjoy the recipe Kathy!
My mom always made these with leftover mashed potatoes and grated leftover roast beef and half a grated onion and big spoon of gravy mixed in.Form into Pattie’s and fry until brown. Hubby loves them and helps mix them. Serve with veggies and chow or relish. Delicious!
Thanks Marni!