Stuffed beef rolls served in a pleasantly acidulated gravy! This is a delicious Czech dish called, despite its origin, "Spanish birds." Curious? Let's take a look at the recipe!
➜ What are Czech beef roll ups?
These are thin slices of beef steak stuffed with boiled eggs, dill pickles, onions, bacon, and soft sausage. After stuffing, the beef slices are rolled up, tightened with kitchen twine, and slowly cooked in the liquid that serves as the base for tasty gravy.
When finished, the rolls and gravy are served as a main course with rice or bread dumplings.
The Czech name for these beef rolls or roulades is Spanelske ptacky (Spanish birds).
FUN FACT: Although they have nothing to do with Spain, Spanish birds are a popular Czech dish. Similar puns in Czech cuisine include Dutch schnitzel, French potatoes, Frankfurt soup, or Russian eggs. Don't let the names fool you; these are all great foods with Czech heritage!
➜ Ingredients
To make Czech beef roulades (roll-ups), called ptacky or vtacky, you will need:
- Round steak, beef slices large enough to stuff and roll up, at least 4×8 inches in size and about ¼ inch thick, each weighing about 5 ounces (150 g). In the Czech Republic, we buy beef cuts especially sliced for roulades. Thin cuts of beef can be found in the refrigerated section of the store or at our local butcher. Beef round (in Czech hovězí kýta) is the best type of meat for slowly braised roll ups.
- Soft sausage; such as Frankfurter pork sausage
- Bacon; sliced into 1-inch dices
- Hard-boiled eggs
- Dill pickles; plus a pickle brine. If possible, buy pickles from a German or Polish deli. Here is a Czech recipe for homemade dill pickles.
- Onions
- Yellow mustard; Polish or German
- Lard; or vegetable oil, such as sunflower or Canola
- All-purpose flour; to thicken the gravy
- Beef stock
- Salt and black pepper; to season
✅ You’ll find the exact amount of ingredients below in the recipe card, which you can also print out.
➜ Instructions with photos
STEP 1: Prepare stuffing: Peel and halve hard-boiled eggs. Cut the soft sausage into thin strips. Cut the pickles in half or quarters lengthwise, depending on how big they are.
If the ingredients are too large, simply trim them when filling the beef slice.
STEP 2: Filling of the rolls: Use a meat mallet to tenderize the beef cuts on both sides gently. The final result should be a slice of meat that is twice as long as it is wide and no thicker than ¼ inch.
Season the beef with salt and pepper on both sides. Slather one side with a layer of mustard. On the top half of each piece of steak, spread half of a boiled egg, a piece of bacon, soft sausage, an onion wedge, and pickles.
TIP: Now, cut the remaining bacon into smaller cubes for later use.
Roll the meat slowly from top to bottom, tucking in the sides. Finally, tie it thoroughly with kitchen twine. Don't be afraid to tighten the string a little. The meat will shrink during cooking, and the contents of the roll could fall out.
STEP 3: Sear the meat: Heat the lard in a saucepan (I used my time-tested cast iron casserole) over medium-high heat and brown the beef rolls on all sides.
STEP 4: Make a gravy: Transfer the browned steak rolls to a plate and add the onion and bacon to the pan with the browned bits. Turn the heat down to medium and cook the onions, stirring them often, until they are golden, which will take about 5 minutes. Add the flour and stir for a further 1 minute.
STEP 5: Add the remaining mustard and stir. Add the pickle brine and beef broth and stir. Return the meat to the pan, bring to a boil, reduce the heat to low, cover with a lid and slowly cook for 1½ hours or until fork tender.
STEP 6: Take the finished roll ups out, remove the string, and set the meat aside on a plate. Season the gravy with salt and pepper and mix it briefly with an immersion blender. Return the ptacky rolls to the sauce and let them warm through.
➜ Serving
Serve the roll ups warm, topped with the gravy on the plate. The best side dish is boiled rice or Czech dumplings.
TIP: For a nicer presentation, cut the roll in half crosswise.
➜ Storage
In the fridge: Store completely cooled roll-ups with gravy in a resealable container in the refrigerator, where they will keep for about five days.
In the freezer: Beef rolls, including gravy, freeze great. Seal them in an airtight container and store them in the freezer, where they last about three months.
➜ Beef roll ups at our neighbors
Beef rolls are also very popular in the European countries bordering the Czech Republic.
They are probably most common in Germany, where they are called Rinderrouladen (beef roulades). In Poland, thin slices of steak, stuffed and then rolled up, are used to make a dish called Zrazy. And our friends and neighbors to the east, the Slovaks, will devour the Hovadzia rolada with great relish.
➜ Useful tips
- Instead of cooking twine, close the roll ups with wooden toothpicks.
- If you have an oven-safe pot, you can also put the beef rolls to roast in the oven, set at 340°F (170°C). In this case, cover the pot with a lid and let it simmer for 90 minutes. Cooking in the oven will save you space on the stovetop.
- How complicated is it to make beef roll ups? Making beef rolls is not complicated; just follow the steps in the proven recipe. Expect the dish to take two hours to prepare - plan ahead!
More beef recipes:
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Beef Roll Ups in Gravy (Czech Ptacky)
Ingredients
- 4 slices beef round at least 4×8 inches in size and about ¼ inch thick, each weighing about 5 ounces (150 g)
- 1 soft sausage e.g. Frankfurter or Vienna sausage
- 3 ½ ounces bacon (100 g)
- 2 hard-boiled eggs
- 2 dill pickles small
- ⅓ cup pickle brine (80 ml)
- 4 onions
- 5 Tablespoons yellow mustard German or Polish
- 2 Tablespoons sunflower oil or Canola
- 1 ½ Tablespoons flour
- ½ teaspoon black pepper ground
- salt to taste
- 4 cups beef broth
Instructions
- Prepare stuffing: Peel and halve hard-boiled eggs. Cut the soft sausage into thin strips. Cut the pickles in half or quarters lengthwise, depending on how big they are. If the ingredients are too large, simply trim them when filling the beef slice.
- Use a meat mallet to tenderize the beef cuts on both sides gently. The final result should be a slice of meat that is twice as long as it is wide and no thicker than ¼ inch.
- Season the beef with salt and pepper on both sides. Slather one side with a layer of mustard. On the top half of each piece of steak, spread half of a boiled egg, a piece of bacon, soft sausage, an onion wedge, and pickles.
- Roll the meat slowly from top to bottom, tucking in the sides. Finally, tie it thoroughly with kitchen twine. Don't be afraid to tighten the string a little. The meat will shrink during cooking, and the contents of the roll could fall out.
- Sear the meat: Heat the lard in a saucepan (I used my time-tested cast iron casserole) over medium-high heat and brown the beef rolls on all sides.
- Make a gravy: Transfer the browned steak rolls to a plate and add the onion and bacon to the pan with the browned bits. Turn the heat down to medium and cook the onions, stirring them often, until they are golden, which will take about 5 minutes. Add the flour and stir for a further 1 minute.
- Add the remaining mustard and stir. Add the pickle brine and beef broth and stir. Return the meat to the pan, bring to a boil, reduce the heat to low, cover with a lid and slowly cook for 1½ hours or until fork tender.
- Take the finished roll ups out, remove the string, and set the meat aside on a plate. Season the gravy with salt and pepper and mix it briefly with an immersion blender. Return the ptacky rolls to the sauce and let them warm through.
Notes
- Makes 4 portions. For hungry eaters, serve two roll-ups pro person.
- SERVING: Serve the rolls warm, topped with the gravy on the plate. The best side dish is boiled rice or Czech dumplings.
- STORAGE: In the fridge: Store completely cooled roll-ups with gravy in a resealable container in the refrigerator, where they will keep for about five days. In the freezer: Beef rolls, including gravy, freeze great. Seal them in an airtight container and store them in the freezer, where they last about three months.
- Instead of cooking twine, close the roll ups with wooden toothpicks.
- If you have an oven-safe pot, you can also put the beef rolls to cook in the oven, set at 340°F (170°C). In this case, cover the pot with a lid and let it simmer for 90 minutes. Cooking in the oven will save you space on the stovetop.
DISCLAIMER: Because I come from Central Europe, my recipes are based on metric units such as grams or milliliters. Check out how I convert metric units to the U.S. system:
Conversion chart
Carole
My mother would make a rollup with beef and bacon. She would slice the beef thinly. Then she would layer on bacon slices and roll it all up and tie it with string. She would fry it up, make gravy with the drippings and serve it over mashed potatoes. YUM!!!! Is that a version of your recipe or an entirely different recipe?
Petra Kupská
Hi Carole, thank you for your comment! I think your mom's method is very similar to the one I describe in the recipe on my blog. If I don't have kitchen string at home, I also use a wooden toothpick to close the rolls. What differentiates each recipe are the ingredients used to stuff the beef slices. There are no limits to the imagination here; each filling can be a little different. Czech ptacky rolls are specific for the slightly sour sauce in which the meat is cooked. Mustard and pickles are added to it.