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Dinner’s Gone to Pot (Roast)

Today’s dinner is another one of my all-time favorites (and it’s already cooking by the way, since it does take some time). I love pot roast; it was always one of my favorite meals growing up. The best thing about pot roast is that shouldn’t even have to slice it. Just leaning a knife or fork up against it should make it fall apart (we always called it “the meat that falls apart” when we were growing up). The nice thing about pot roast is that it’s nearly impossible to overcook it. if you don’t think it looks right to you, leave it in a little longer. I’ve tried a few different recipes over the years, but this one from an old America’s Test Kitchen cookbook seems to give me the best results. I have cooked it in the slow cooker before and it comes out just fine also, but I like the gravy that comes out of this one better.

Simple Pot Roast

1 boneless chuck roast (about 3 1/2 pounds)

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 medium onion, chopped medium

1 small carrot, chopped medium

1 small rib celery, chopped medium

2 garlic cloves, minced

2 teaspoons sugar

1 cup chicken broth

1 cup beef broth

1 sprig fresh thyme

1-2 cups water

1/4 cup dry red wine

Adjust an oven rack to the middle position and heat the oven to 300 degrees. Thoroughly pat the roast dry with paper towels; sprinkle generously with salt and pepper.

Heat the oil in a large heavy-bottomed Dutch Oven over medium-high heat until shimmering but not smoking. Brown the roast thoroughly on all sides, reducing the heat if the fat begins to smoke, 8 to 10 minutes. Transfer the roast to a large plate; set aside. Reduce the heat to medium; add the onion, carrot and celery to the pot and cook, stirring occasionally, until beginning to brown, 6 to 8 minutes. Add the garlic and the sugar; cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add the chicken and beef broths and thyme, scraping the bottom of the pan with a wooden spoon to loosen the browned bits. Return the roast and any accumulated juices to the pot; add enough water to come halfway up the sides of the roast. Place a large piece of foil over the pot and cover tightly with a lid; bring the liquid to a simmer over medium heat, then transfer the pot to the oven. Cook turning the roast every 30 minutes, until fully tender and a meat fork or sharp knife slips in and out of the meat, 3 1/2 to 4 hours.

Transfer the roast to a carving board; tent with foil to keep warm. Allow the liquid in the pot to settle about 5 minutes, then use a wide spoon to skim the fat off the surface; discard the thyme sprig. Boil over high heat until reduced to about 1 1/2 cups, about 8 minutes. Add the red wine and reduce again to 1 1/2 cups, about 2 minutes. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Using a chef’s knife or carving knife, cut the meat into 1/2-inch-thick slices, or pull apart into large pieces; transfer the meat to a warmed serving platter and pour about 1/2 cup of sauce over the meat. Serve, passing the remaining sauce separately.

Yum, yum. There are variations of this recipe, of course. One adds root vegetables such as carrots, small red potatoes and parsnips after the roast is done. Just strain the liquid after you remove the roast, pour the liquid back in the pot, return the roast and the new vegetables to the pot and continue to until the vegetables are almost tender, about 20 to 30 minutes. Then remove the roast, add the wine and boil the vegetables over high heat until fully tender, about another 10 minutes. Remove the vegetables with a slotted spoon, and you are good to go.

I like to serve pot roast with mashed potatoes instead of putting potatoes in the pot with the roast. I love the mashed potatoes with the gravy produced by this roast. I have made mashed potatoes a few times on this meal plan, but if you would like the recipe, you can just click here to see it from an earlier posting.

I was going to make green beans to go with the pot roast, but when I got Adams Farms yesterday, Brussels sprouts were on sale, so I am making those instead. I love Brussels sprouts, but I admit they are an acquired taste. A lot of people don’t care for them, but we eat them regularly in our house. One of my favorite ways to cook them is to make them in a skillet with some bacon and shallots, which is what I am going to do tonight.

Skillet-Braised Brussels Sprouts with Bacon and Shallots

4 ounces bacon (4 slices), chopped fine

2 shallots, sliced thin

1 pound Brussels sprouts, stem ends trimmed, discolored leaves removed, and halved through the stem

1/2 cup water

Salt

1 tablespoon butter

1 tablespoon red wine vinegar

Pepper

Cook the bacon and shallots together in a large skillet over medium heat until the bacon is crisp and the shallots are browned, about 10 minutes. Transfer the mixture to a paper towel-lined plate to drain.

Add the Brussels sprouts, water, and 1/2 teaspoon salt to the skillet and increase the heat to medium-high. Cover and simmer until the Brussels sprouts are bright green, about 9 minutes. Uncover the pan and cook until the liquid has evaporated and the sprouts are tender, about 5 minutes longer.

Off the heat, stir in the bacon mixture, butter and vinegar. Season with salt and pepper to taste before serving.

You really need to halve the sprouts when you are braising them like this. If you leave them whole, they are just too dense and won’t cook well all the way through, making them mushy outside and nearly raw inside. Cooking them this way also eliminates the aroma sprouts can give off that seems to turn a lot of people off to them.

So that’s today’s meal. If they are any leftovers, you can make a great open-faced sandwich with the pot roast and gravy with some mashed potatoes on the side. We have tomorrow marked as a leftovers night for dinner, so we may have that ourselves. We have the meal plan for next week just about finalized, so I will be writing about that tomorrow. I will say that all the meals for next week are going to be one pot meals and two of them are specifically slow cooker meals. Check it out tomorrow to see what you have to look forward to for dinners. If you have any questions, comments or suggestions, please feel free to pass them along here. Thanks again for checking the blog out. I am pretty happy with the way things are going with it so far, so we’ll keep going! Enjoy your day and enjoy your meal tonight!

A Nice Sunday Dinner

29 Jan

It’s another nice day here in New York. So far I am loving this mild winter with warmer temperatures and no snow. I don’t get around too well in the snow and cold anymore, so this makes things a lot better for me as far as doing things outside and getting to go places. Since today is Sunday, we are relaxing at home, reading and listening to music, and it’s a great day to cook a nice family meal. While this meal is probably better in the summertime when you can grill outside, it’s still a good one and one of my favorites. Today we are making Pan Seared Steaks with a Red Wine Pan Sauce, Sautéed Mushrooms, Mashed Potatoes, Shrimp Scampi and Asparagus. It seems like a lot, but it really isn’t. You’ll probably spend more time peeling potatoes and shrimp than you will actually cooking, so if you can do some prep work ahead of time, your evening will go smoothly.

Pan-Seared Steaks with Red Wine Pan Sauce

Steaks

4 boneless beef steaks, 1 to 1 1/4 inches thick, trimmed (I am using boneless ribeyes, but you could easily use any type of boneless steak for this one, Check and see what’s on sale)

Salt and pepper

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

Red Wine Sauce

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

1 shallot, minced

3/4 cup chicken broth (use your own or store-bought)

1/2 cup dry red wine

2 teaspoons brown sugar

3 tablespoons butter, cut into 3 pieces and chilled (it does make a difference if it’s chilled)

1 teaspoon minced fresh thyme, or 1/4 teaspoon dried

Salt and pepper

For the steaks: pat the steaks dry with paper towels, then season with salt and pepper. Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat until just smoking. Brown the steaks on the first side, about 4 minutes. Flip the steaks over and continue to cook until the desired doneness (I prefer medium), another 4 to 6 minutes. Transfer the steaks to a clean plate, tent with foil, and let them rest for 5 minutes.

For the sauce, add oil to the skillet and return to medium-high heat until shimmering. Add the shallot and cook until softened, about 2 minutes. Stir in the broth, wine and brown sugar, scraping up any browned bits, and simmer until thickened, about 5 minutes. Stir in any accumulated meat juice. Turn the heat to low and whisk in the butter, one piece at a time. Off the heat, stir in the thyme and season with salt and pepper to taste. Spoon the sauce over the steaks before serving.

It’s a very easy recipe to use. A couple of notes about cooking the steak. If you’re using larger steak and have more than one, cook only one at a time. Crowding them into the pan won’t sear them, it will only boil them and you won’t get a nice crust on them. Make sure you get your pan REALLY hot before putting the steaks in. If the oil smokes when it’s in the pan, it’s hot enough. Also, make sure you pat the steaks dry before you put them in the pan. If the steaks have been sitting in their own liquid before they are cooked, their exterior won’t brown nicely; they are just going to steam. Finally, use a conventional surface skillet for this one to make sure you get the nice browned bits for the sauce.

Now that the steaks are done, let’s move on to the shrimp. I love shrimp, made just about any way, and scampi is one of my favorites. This is great as a meal on its own served over white rice, but today we are using it as an accompaniment to the steaks.

Shrimp Scampi

1 pound large shrimp, peeled and deveined

Salt and pepper

1/8 teaspoon sugar

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 tablespoons butter

2 garlic cloves, minced

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

1 tablespoon fresh minced parsley

1/2 tablespoon dry white wine or vermouth

Pinch of cayenne pepper

Pat the shrimp dry with paper towels, then season with 1/4 teaspoon salt, 1/8 teaspoon pepper and the sugar. Heat the olive oil in a nonstick skillet over high heat until smoking. Add half the shrimp to the pan in a single layer. Cook until the shrimp are curled and pink on both sides, about 2 minutes. Transfer the shrimp to a bowl and cover with foil. Repeat with the remaining shrimp.

Add 1 tablespoon of the butter to the skillet and melt over medium heat. Add the garlic and cook until fragrant, about 15 seconds (garlic burns fast, you need to watch it!) Off the heat, stir in the lemon juice parsley, wine and cayenne. Whisk in the remaining butter. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Return the shrimp with any accumulated juice to the skillet. Toss the shrimp until they are well coated with the sauce.

The shrimp takes next to no time to cook, so you could do this while your steaks are resting. Don’t cook the shrimp too long, they will be rubbery and you’ll regret it. Also, I often buy shrimp in the shell and save the shells when you are peeling; they can be used to make some fish stock for future recipes.

Okay we have our steak and our shrimp. We have made mashed potatoes before, but if you missed them, here’s my technique for making them from a past blog. Now we can move on to our other sides for the day. The first is sautéed mushrooms. They aren’t hard to cook, but take a little longer than the steak or the shrimp, so you may want to start them earlier.

Sautéed Mushrooms with Shallot and Thyme

1 tablespoon butter

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 shallot, minced

1 pound white or cremini mushrooms, halved if small, quartered if large

1/2 teaspoon minced fresh thyme, or 1/8 teaspoon dried

Salt and pepper

Melt the butter in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add the oil and the shallot and cook until the shallot is soft, about 2 minutes. Add the mushrooms and thyme and cook, stirring occasionally, until the mushrooms have released their liquid and are lightly browned, about 12 minutes. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Leave the mushrooms in chunks instead of slicing them thin, They give you a more meaty, substantial texture this way and don’t dry out like the thinner slices can.

They are lots of ways to cook asparagus (steamed, sautéed, boiled) but I am going to broil them today. I like the way they taste, and frankly I don’t have room on the stove top today with all the other dishes going on, so it works out well. You can serve the asparagus fresh from the oven, room temperature, or even chilled if you prefer.

Broiled Asparagus

1 pound asparagus, tough ends trimmed off

1 tablespoon olive oil

Salt and pepper

Fresh lemon juice (optional)

Adjust an oven rack 6 inches from the broiler element and heat the broiler. Toss the asparagus with oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Lay the spears in a single layer on a rimmed baking sheet. Broil the asparagus, shaking the pan occasionally, until they are tender and lightly browned, about 10 minutes. Sprinkle with lemon juice (if using) before serving.

You could dress these up if you want with some Balsamic Vinaigrette like we made in an earlier recipe or sprinkle on a little Parmesan cheese or fresh herbs instead of the lemon juice. Even just tossing with some sesame seeds and a little soy sauce would be good.

Wow, we made a lot of food today and none of the recipes were difficult. I don’t normally make dessert, and it is Sunday, when we usually have dessert, but Julie is bringing dessert over today and she is a much better baker than I am, so whatever she brings would be better than what I could put together. At some point I’ll post dessert recipes on here if anyone asks for one, but I know a lot of family members who are much better at baking, so maybe they would like to provide us with some good dessert recipes (subtle hint). Enjoy your Sunday dinner and relax before the rest of the week begins. Have a glass of wine or a martini and kick back, listen to some music and start thinking about all the snacks we’ll make for Super Bowl next week (I have some good recipes I will post on Thursday!) Have a great day!

2 Comments

Posted by MikeG on January 29, 2012 in Beef, Cooking, Dinner, Potatoes, Produce, Sauce, Seafood, Vegetables

Tags: asparagus, beef steaks, mashed potatoes, mushrooms, pan sauce, pan seared steak, potatoes, red wine sauce, ribeye steak, ribeyes, shrimp, shrimp scampi, steak

(Meat)Loafing Around

25 Jan

I love meatloaf. It is probably one of my favorite things to eat, and not just for dinner. I love a nice meatloaf sandwich for lunch the day after, either cold on some rye bread, or warm as an open-faced sandwich with some gravy on it. Either way, it’s good with me. I was really looking forward to making this meal of Meatloaf, Mashed Potatoes with Gravy, and Corn.

I’m sure everyone has their own meatloaf recipe that they swear by. I actually have 3 or 4 different recipes that I use, depending on what I feel like having. Sometimes I wrap the meatloaf in slices of bacon, sometimes I use sautéed vegetables in the ingredients and sometimes I hollow out a loaf of Italian bread and bake the meatloaf inside it. Any of them are good recipes to use, but for today I am just going to make the standard meatloaf that I make. There’s nothing hard or fancy about it, it doesn’t take very long to make and you could even double the recipe if you’re feeding a crowd.

Meatloaf

1 pound meatloaf mix (this is a mix of beef, pork and veal that you can get at most grocery stores)

1 teaspoon dry mustard

1 teaspoon celery salt

2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce

1/4 teaspoon dried oregano

1/4 teaspoon pepper

1 teaspoon onion powder (or you could use 1 onion, chopped fine and sautéed)

3/4 cup fresh breadcrumbs (or dried, if you’re using store-bough)

1 large egg

1/2 cup ketchup

Tomato paste

Adjust an oven rack to the middle position and heat the oven to 350 degrees. Mix the meatloaf mix, dry mustard, celery salt, Worcestershire, oregano, pepper and onion powder until evenly blended. Add in the breadcrumbs and egg and mix again until blended, then add in the ketchup and mix again (I mix this all by hand to really work things in. It’s messy, but the results are worth it). Form the mixture into a free-form loaf onto a foil lined baking sheet. Coat the mixture with tomato paste (as much or as little as desired. I use more to get a nice coating on it). Bake the loaf for 45 minutes to 1 hour, until an instant-read thermometer inserted in the center reads 160 degrees. Let cool 10 minutes before slicing and serving.

I have found that baking the loaf free-form results in a crustier exterior all around and tastes better than the sogginess that happens when you bake it in a loaf pan. As I said before, everyone has their own take on what they add to meatloaf. Some people use saltines in the mix with breadcrumbs, some make it spicier with Tabasco, some add bacon inside and out, some add cheese, the choice is really yours. i would love to hear how other people make meatloaf. I am always looking for a new recipe for it to try out.

Now on to another great part of having meatloaf – having the mashed potatoes with it. Nothing else seems to go better (although my Dad would tell you that french fries go better, but he ate fries with everything). Mashed potatoes, like the meatloaf, are very easy to make and don’t take a lot of time.

Mashed Potatoes

2 pounds russet potatoes (4 medium), peeled, quartered, and cut into 1-inch chunks

8 tablespoons (1 stick) butter, melted

1 cup milk, hot (or half and half, whichever you prefer)

Salt and Pepper

Cover the potatoes by 1 inch of water in a large saucepan. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and cook until the potatoes are tender and a fork can be slipped easily into the center, about 20 to 25 minutes. Drain the potatoes in a colander, tossing to remove any excess water. Wipe the saucepan dry. Add the potatoes back to the pot and mash to a uniform consistency (or process through a food mill or potato ricer back into the dry pot. Using a flexible rubber spatula, fold in the melted butter until just incorporated. Fold in 3/4 of the milk, adding the remaining 1/4 as needed to adjust the consistency. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

I always used to mash the potatoes by hand or use a mixer until I started using the potato ricer and I am glad I did. The potatoes don’t get the air into them that they would get with a mixer and they become finer than mashing by hand. The result is a much denser puree that tastes better, in my opinion.

The gravy recipe I am using is the same one I used earlier in the week for the turkey meatballs. Actually, I am just using the same exact gravy since we have it left over, so that makes it simple for me. I’ll post the recipe here again or you can check out Monday’s blog if you would like to see the whole thing.

All Purpose Gravy

3 tablespoons butter

1 carrot, peeled and chopped fine

1 rib celery, chopped fine

1 onion, minced

1/4 cup all-purpose flour

2 cups chicken broth (used canned, box or your own. I am using my own because I have it. otherwise, use low sodium)

2 cups beef broth (same as the chicken. i don’t have my own right now, so I am using Swanson’s low sodium)

1 bay leaf

1 teaspoon minced fresh thyme, or 1/4 teaspoon dried

5 whole black peppercorns

Salt and pepper

Melt the butter in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add the vegetables and cook until softened and well browned, about 9 minutes. Stir in the flour and cook, stirring constantly, until thoroughly browned, about 5 minutes. Gradually whisk in the broths and bring to a boil. Add the bay leaf, thyme, and peppercorns and simmer, stirring occasionally, until thickened, about 20-25 minutes, skimming off any foam that forms on the surface.

Pour the gravy through a fine-mesh strainer (or gravy separator) into a clean saucepan, pressing on the solids to extract as much liquid as possible. Discard the solids. Season the gravy with salt and pepper to taste.

You can make the gravy ahead of time and refrigerate it in an airtight container for up to 4 days, or freeze it for up to 2 months. Just re-heat it over low heat, stirring to recombine, until warm and smooth.

That just leaves the corn for tonight’s dinner. I am just using frozen corn kernels tonight, since you can’t get good corn here this time of year. The frozen kernels taste fine (better than the frozen cobs do, I think. Sean disagrees with me and loves the frozen corn on the cob) and take no time at all to make. Nowadays, you can but the steamer bags for your microwave and cook them that way in about 5-7 minutes.

Gee, we’ve really gotten good at making these easy dinners, haven’t we? Nice, simple dinners make the weeknights so much better after a long day of work and an afternoon of doing homework. it’s great that there are so many meals we can make either ahead of time or in practically no time at all. I’d love to hear some input or ideas on some other quick meals that can be made. if you have any, please feel free to share. Tomorrow is supposed to be fish day if I can get to the market to check out the fish. If not, we’ll be substituting the Warm Chicken Salad into tomorrow. It’s Michelle’s pick and one that we like to make often (another quick, easy meal, or lunch for that matter). Until then, enjoy your evening and see you tomorrow!