This sounds heavenly. I desperately want to make this for my sister and her family, tonight (and leftovers for me for work tonight). It doesn’t need to be done until about 6:00 PM.
BUT, I’ve never made pot roast before. I don’t cook a lot. When I do, I mostly make stews and soups - in the crockpot. And I bake. I like to bake.
I have no clue how to cook a pot roast, how to brown a pot roast, or even what kind of vessel I should be using to cook a pot roast. What size pot roast should I buy?
Can someone please dumb down that recipe for me? I’ll be eternally grateful. Can I cook this in my crockpot? If I can, that would be wicked awesome. Last time I had to work a Saturday, someone brought a crockpot of chili for us poor unfortunate souls. It was wonderful. I’ve been wanting a good recipe that I could make to treat them, next time I have to work a weekend and this sounds like just the thing.
Long ago I used to make my own toaster-oven nachos. Smear some canned bean dip on each corn chip with a knife; place on baking pan; top each chip with a jalapeno slice; top the whole bunch with grated cheddar cheese; bake/toast until cheese is thoroughly melty; take out of oven, top with salsa and eat. Filling, greasy, really hot if the jalapeno is fresh rather than pickled; great for eating in front of a 10" B&W TV.
Oh, have I got what you wanted, congodwarf - my Mom wrote this out for me and it’s just what you asked for:
3-4 lb thawed meat, could be pot roast, chuck roast, beef round, bottom, anything that is too tough to broil;
Enough vegetable oil to cover the bottom of th epan;
2-3 large onions
Enough flour to coat both sides of meat;
About 2 tbs of Kitchen Bouquet (no substitutions on this)
Garlic (any form)
Salt
Pepper
Other vegetables that you have on hand, i.e. halved or quartered potatoes, coarsely chopped carrots, halved onions, broccoli, cauliflower, celery, just about anything
Preparation and cooking time: about 4 hours
(truly, she wrote this out as a For Dummies version for me)
Pour oil into pan on medium to high heat.
Add coarsely chopped onions and cook until they become transparent; don’t be concerned if they scorch or burn a little, that adds to the flavor.
After thoroughly washing beef, lightly pat dry, trim fat slightly, and drag both sides through flour.
Place on top of onions and sear until brown before turning; meat should be turned only once - be careful of the hot oil and/or splashing.
After browning, add enough water to cover the meat completely (or within 1" of the top of the pan)
Add Kitchen Bouquet. Can also add garlic if desired (fresh or powdered, doesn’t matter).
Bring to a boil and lower heat to high simmer and cover. If the meat is less than 3 lbs, prep time will probably be less than 3 hrs.
Check the water level every hour. Don’t let it fall below half the depth of the pan.
During the last hour of the simmering time, clean and prepare the vegetables. After cutting the potatoes, put them in a container and cover w/water to prevent browning.
Check meat every hour to make sure the simmer level is active - i.e., bubbling around the edge, but not to the level of a full boil.
After the third hour, check the thickest depth of the meat for tenderness. If it is tender to the point of falling apart, remove the meat to another container and cover, allowing the meat to rest.
Then, add the vegetables to the pot and bring to a boil. Lower heat to medium, cover, and cook until tender. I usually add the potatoes first for about 5 minutes, then the carrots, wait another 5, then add the rest of the vegetables.
After 15 minutes or so, remove the cover and let some of the liquid cook off for the last 5 minutes if desired - this also deepens the color of the vegetables.
Curry is your friend. Buy some curry spices from the local Indian store, fry them with some garlic and onions, and then throw in whatever you have. Eat with plenty of rice.
My favorite way to do lentils is to cook them with Indian spices and stir in some plain yogurt (amazingly simple to make if buying it is too pricey) at the end.
Something similar to this was going to be my suggestion as well. Indian food is astonishingly cheap if you have a local ethnic market. I usually do dahl makhani or some other type of lentil dish. All you need to do is fry some onion and garlic (ginger if you have it/it fits into your budget), toss in some lentils, a can each of tomato sauce and chopped tomatoes and a cup or two of water, then spice to taste with bulk spices found at the ethnic market. If you’ve used split lentils (split urad dal), let it simmer 20-25 minutes; if you’ve used whole, you’ll need to soak overnight and pre-cook the lentils. Either way, you’ve got an entree for six to go over rice.
You can also buy a large sack of durum wheat flour for flatbreads (chapatis or puris, depending on whether you want regular tortilla-like bread or deep-fried, respectively) to eat instead of rice. All you need to do is mix two cups with enough water to make a firm dough and roll it into balls, then roll thin with a rolling pin. Heat on a flat pan on each side until brown bubbles start to show and you’ve got a perfect, edible utensil, too. Indian grains like semolina and beaten rice are also remarkably versatile, cheap and usually quite healthy, too. Plus, many Indian food spices are sold in bulk in pre-mixed spice packets so all you have to do is put some in to your taste.
Another staple at my place is whole roast chicken - it’s something my son loves and you can shred the meat off and put it in anything. We eat quesadillas at least once a week. Plus if you want a crunchy snack you can heat tortillas at 400 degrees F in the oven for 8-10 mins with a drizzle of olive oil and some salt.