Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Pot Roast with Veggies

So I don't end up making this all about baking, I want to share my Grandmother's recipe for pot roast. I can clearly remember my Mom telling me she spent 9 years of marriage figuring out how to make it, before she figured out "you need to burn it!".   In other words, slow roasted for 5 or 6 hours.

There's no real recipe to it, 'cause the every day foods never really had a recipe.  (The best cooks don't use recipes, and my Mom was one!)

Get a nice English cut pot roast about 2 or 3 inches thick. Place in a pyrex dish large enough to hold the roast with a couple inches all around to spare.  Cover with foil, and roast at 300 degrees farenheit for 5 or 6 hours.  You'll know it's done when it's just starting to fall apart.

Leaving the roast in the pan, remove the drippings (pour off, or spoon off) into a saucepan, and make a simple brown gravy by whisking in flour, salt and pepper and water until it's thick.  (keep the roast in the oven to keep it warm, and let it rest)  She never put veggies in with the roast. "It'll ruin the gravy", she'd say.

Serve with mashed potatoes and cut steamed green beans or cooked penny carrots.  Oh, and always have a salad with dinner!

Leftovers can make an excellent stew the next day.  Cut some potatoes up into 1" or so cubes, and boil 'til just barely tender, about 15 minutes. Put in a large saucepan with leftover pot roast cut up, and add some cut veggies and the leftover gravy.  Place on low-medium heat for about 30 minutes, or 'til everything's good and hot and the veggies are cooked.  The veggies my Mom used varied with the seasonal availabilty, but standards for stew were carrots, celery, onion and peas or green beans. 

My apologies to all my vegetarian friends, but Mom was not a vegetarian. LOL

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