Alton Brown’s temperature technique may work fine if the roast is covered, like he does. Uncovered, you need higher heat; at least 250, or you’re gonna be there all damn day. The high heat at the end worked out well for having the Yorkshire pudding and the roast done concurrently.
Au jus rescue: This roast produced no drippings. Zero. Nada. The only thing in the pan was fat. I had already sauteed the shallots, and added the beef stock and cognac and reduced it, so NOW what? Well, hell, I still had fat, so added a bit of flour (not enough to really thicken it), browned it a bit, then added the stock/cognac liquid. Heated until it just started to thicken, then removed it from the heat. While the roast was sitting on the counter, it finally leaked out some drippings, which I added to the gravy. Damn, but that was tasty on the pudding.
I got a choice 11lb-er from Sam’s yesterday (cut-and-tie). I slathered some butter on the cut ends and added over the whole roast a nice coating of kosher salt, pepper, and good Croatian sage. I did that last night, btw, then let the roast sit in the cold oven overnight to come up to room temp. I have a shitty roasting pan (more like a cake pan) and no rack so I improvised: sliced an onion into 1/4" slices to prop up the roast. I seared it at 450F for half an hour then reduced to 325 until the center reached 130F.
Wrapped it in foil to rest, deglazed the pan over the stove with Two-Buck-Chuck Shiraz (including the onions, which I later strained out). Reduced by half, added some chicken stock (no beef, as I was out of the country until Mon. and couldn’t prepare), reduce again by half. Salt and pepper to taste, whisk in some butter for body. Magnifique.
(Best Yorkshire Puddings ever this year too, I was pleased.)
I got a 9.3 pound roast from Costco. I followed the directions and almost cut off fat cap and bones, leaving them attached by a “hinge”. Rubbed the meat with EV olive oil, fresh gound pepper, and kosher salt, then tied it all back together with string. I grilled it on my Weber on a roasting rack inside a drip pan, starting at 400F for 20 minutes, then reduced to between 275 and 300F.
The roast finished at 120F earlier than I expected, around 2 hours total, so unfortunately I had to let the roast rest until all my guests arrived and the sides were done, about an hour. Unfortunately, most of the pink was gone by that time, but the roast was still very good and everyone loved it.
We got a crust on ours. My husband likes to experiment. He used homemade horseradish, seasoning salt, and olive oil flavored with chilis. It was awesome.
But it was just us for dinner and we have leftovers. We’ve never had leftover rib roast before. What now? French dip sandwiches?
Our roast yielded no drippings either. I tried adding flour to the fat in the pan and browning that abit (I had deglazed the pan with a little wine) so the result was nice and brown… but I tasted it and it was VILE. We did without gravy.
The meat was tasty though. I’ve got a bowlful of bones with some meat attached, which will be soupified in the next day or so.
Oh yeah: I roasted it for something like a total of 2.5 hours at 350 degrees. My meat thermometer was reading 150 (I know, horrors!) but I tried the instant read and it read 140, so I gave it more time until the one I left in read 160 and the instant-read read 150. There was still plenty of pink in the middle - only the outermost slices were “well done” (which I personally like).
Next time, saute some shallot (or a little onion and garlic), add and boil a can of beef stock with 1/3 cup of cognac until it reduces to about a cup or so, then add that to the flour/fat. Just don’t use a lot of flour. I think I added about a tablespoon to what was left after removing what fat I needed for the puddings.
We traditionally have prime rib roast for Christmas, but of course this year our oven completely died on Christmas Eve. (I had to back the sugar cookies in a toaster oven - they took forever.)
What would have happened if I had to resort to using a microwave? Fortunately the mother-in-law offered her oven (and yes she was previously invited), so it worked out well, but I wonder how the microwave would have worked. Would it be a disaster?
Well, my dry-aged roast was delicious and everyone declared it a Christmas success.
However . . .
I took it out of the fridge an hour before I wanted to put it in the oven to let it come to room temperature. I stuck the thermometer in to monitor it, and after 1 1/2 hours on the counter, it still read 35 degrees. I figured it would reach 65 in another day or two :rolleyes:, so I manned up (which is hard for a girl) and stuck it in a 475 oven. Turned the heat back after 40 minutes. (At that point, everyone was salivating over the smell of the roasted garlic and herb rub I’d slathered on it.) It seemed to take forever for the internal temp to start rising, but it eventually did, and I pulled it at 133 degrees. The slices were medium on the ends and medium rare in the middle, so the doneness was perfect.
I had it on a rack and put about half a cup of red wine and the same amount of beef broth under it. Had to add broth once during cooking to keep it from burning on the pan. I ended up with some fat which was easily skimmed and a lot of browned bits which I deglazed with more beef broth. I am the gravy queen and knew how to use the fat and juices and more broth from the box to make an awesome sauce.
I do not think the dry-aging added to the flavor enough to justify the extra effort. Next year I will buy my roast later, will pull it from the fridge earlier, and will either line my pan with foil or buy a disposable one since it took considerable soaking time and work to clean my roaster.
All in all, I’d call my first attempt at a rib roast a success.