Pot Roast - It's What's For Dinner

Let's just start with the good stuff, shall we?  Look at that.  Many adjectives come to mind but the only one that just keeps popping out is YUM.  A Sunday dinner should be comforting, it should really just be the final compliment to your weekend and the best way that I can find to do that is with a huge chunk of meat. 

Most everyone probably has their own special way of doing 'their' pot roast.  This is simply mine.  For many years pot roast was very intimidating to me.  Most men will be able to rave about their mother's pot roast and now, here you are cooking for him and you want to be able to measure up.  Let's just say, we women/wives/girlfriends will never make that pot roast taste like his mom's but we sure can be a close competitor.  They do say the quickest way to a man's heart is through his stomach.  I myself am a firm believer in that concept. 

So, the first thing you want to do is go to the store and really look at the meat selection.  You need to decide if you want to do a beef or pork roast.  Of course, either one is equally delicious in their own right.  Today I found a cut of beef that I just couldn't resist; so beef won out this round.  I like to find a cut with some great 'body' to it, if you will.  I want a cut that is going to give me the most flavor. 

Now of course comes the most sweetest smell of it all - searing the meat.  I have a ton of Scentsy scents in my home as I'm an Independent Consultant, however, the day that Scentsy comes out with a Seared Meat scent - I'm all in.  There is nothing that compares to this smell.  Of course to attain this you need to get your pan scorching hot.  I add a drizzle of olive oil to my pan, turn up the heat and prepare myself for that sizzle. 

 You want to make sure that you sear all sides of the cut - so place your meat in the skillet and allow it to sizzle for a few minutes on each side.  Warning: the smells will be intoxicating, you probably shouldn't operate heavy machinery while doing this.

 Flip to both sides until you get that nice crisp crust to your meat. 

Don't for get the sides ....

Now that we have really gotten a good sear, set your meat aside to rest.  You want the juices to remain inside the meat and not spread out.  I usually will tent it with some aluminum foil until I'm ready to place in the oven.

Then we move on to the veggies.  Onions, potatoes, carrots, zucchini, leeks, celery - feel free to use whatever veggies you like.

Prepare your veggies and then comes the moment of beauty, putting it all together.  Place your seared roast in your baking dish.  Surround it with all the lovely veggies you have selected. 

Now add your beef broth to the dish to give it all a lovely bath to cook in.  Ahhhhh.  Place it the oven to roast.  I cook mine at about 425 and will initially set my timer for about 30 minutes.  Keep checking along the way, you don't want to burn your veggies, but you want a nice, long cook so your meat becomes nice and tender.  To help this process go in and baste with the juices in the pan. 

I like to serve some roasted garlic mashed potatoes with mine so to give you a quick peek - roasted garlic.  Almost as good as the seared meat.  Take a head of garlic and simply cut it off across the top.

Place in a large square piece of aluminum foil.  Then drizzle some canola oil over the top.

Simply wrap up like a present and your little bundle of love is ready for the oven.

You can toss this in right next to your roast and allow to cook for about 30 - 45 minutes.  Then just take the head of garlic out and the roasted garlic will simply fall out.  Add this to your mashed potatoes and mix in.  Instant and amazing flavorful mashed potatoes. 

These are my favorite things on a Sunday ....

Cheers!