A Really FanTAStic Dinner

Oh my goodness.  I had no idea dinner would be so very, very good tonight! I didn't take any pictures of the food, so it will probably bore any few readers I have to death, but I will tell you about it anyway.

I fixed a beef roast with gravy, potatoes and carrots, and a broccoli/cauliflower medley. The cut of meat was a small 2 lb eye of round from a locally grown, grass fed beef.  This particular cut of meat was very lean with no fat, especially since it was grass fed; grass fed beef is usually even leaner than grain fed beef.  The cut had been in my freezer for about 17 months, so what with the age of the meat and the leanness, I didn't have very high hopes.  I took it out of the fridge and let it sit on the counter for a couple hours which is best to do with grass fed beef.  I heated the oven to just 300 degrees and sprinkled the roast with pepper and a smokey mesquite seasoning I had.  Then I heated some olive oil in a cast iron skillet and browned the meat on all sides.  While it was browning, I very coarsely chopped a couple of onions and threw them in as well.  In my bean pot (I highly recommend this pot), I poured in 1 can of beef broth, a couple dashes of Worcestershire sauce, and 1 teaspoon of liquid smoke.  I added the roast and onions and cooked it, covered, for 3  hours.

I then added a few chopped potatoes and carrots and cooked it for another hour.  I didn't do much to the potatoes and carrots before adding them to the pot other than chop them; I sprinkled some salt, pepper, and garlic powder on the top layer of the veggies before putting them back in the oven, covered again.

For the cauliflower and broccoli, I just chopped them and barely steamed them.  The broccoli was still bright green and the stalks were still a tad crunchy which is just perfect in my book.  After serving them on the plate, I sprinkled the with shredded Monterrey jack cheese.   No salt, no pepper, just broccoli, cauliflower, and cheese. YUM!!!

After taking the roast out of the oven,  I took the juice and made a gravy out of it.  I used some hog lard and flour, melted the lard, stirred in the flour, then I added the beef juice.  It was too thick, so I added some chicken broth I had in the fridge.

The roast was SOOO tender, the potatoes and carrots were perfectly done, not too done and not too seasoned.  The gravy was exquisite.  The hog lard added so much flavor and the mesquite seasoning in the gravy made it quite peppery and perfect.  This dinner was similar to pot roasts in that it had gravy, potatoes, and carrots, but it had a completely different flavor than any roast I've ever fixed before.  I strayed away from the typical thyme, rosemary, oregano, cooking wine etc. that I usually do and it was SO GOOD.

I think I quite outdid myself.

Ok, I'm done.