Posted on 05/05/2010 11:27:55 AM PDT by StopBigGovt
Pot roast so tender it falls off the fork...try this crockpot recipe with no dried soup mix needed; only spices, veggies and a little vino to add to the roast!
Okie dokie.
Even a tad easier is the Joy of Cooking Beef Bourguignon recipe.
You can use chunks of beef rather than a roast, so no need to coat with flour, prior to browning. Add a little anchovy paste for the umami “savory”, and you can use sliced, butter sauteed large cap mushrooms and sliced onions with crushed garlic.
A real trick is the blend of fats: bacon, beef, butter, and even some olive oil to brown the beef.
It can take its time in the crock pot, producing a parsley gravy which they’ll want every drop. I’m of mixed minds about cooking the unpeeled red potatoes separately, but you should cook them with the rest if a particular flavor or salt is too strong.
worcestershire sauce was called Garen in Roman times.
Wow, you’ve got a small crockpot! It’s too bad there isn’t room for potatoes, or even carrots. Come Christmas time, there are always really great deals on crockpots. I have a 4-inch deep oval (Rival brand) crockpot that’s about 2 years old (which I got at a big box store preceding Christmas).
Yes, this recipe definitely would work with a chuck roast. :)
Oh, great idea! I love Yukon gold potatoes, and we occasionally have white wine in the house. Good to know yams and sweet potatoes work well, because my kids love those more than white potatoes. LOL.
Same here—7-bone roasts rock!
When there’s a boneless chuck roast on sale, I’ll get it, BUT the 7-bone roast is my hands-down favorite. You’re right....the bone really flavors the roast so much better than a boneless one.
Wow, no wonder the 7-bone roast is so good! :)
Sounds delish! I guess I’m so used to seasoning, flouring and then searing the meat it’s no biggie to me. Honestly it just takes me an extra five minutes to do it. To each his own though....I’ve tried making the Joy of Cooking Beef Bourguignon and it just wasn’t my thing. I prefer dealing with a big roast over little chunks of beef. Parsley gravy...now I’m getting hungry! I love your observation about bacon and butter. Mmmm. :)
Isn’t that the truth? Love the chuck, cross cut, with lots of marbling when you’re aiming to cook it long and slow. Yum!
Try using beer with your roast. Combine a can of beer..with a few swigs for the cook..with a package of dry onion soup mix and 1T brown sugar. Put peeled potatoes in the bottom of the crock pot, then the roast and then pour the beer/soup mix over the top. Cook on low 6-7 hours. Remove roast and potatoes, raise the heat to high and thicken the juices with 2T of flour mixed with a little cold beer..stir cook until gravy is thickened.
An English roast is a perfect candidate for braising, which is what pot roasting is.
When a roast is braised, the fibers contract at first, as the collagen is dissolved into the liquid. After much time cooking, the fibers relax and reabsorb the liquid , producing a moist, flavorful meat which falls apart easily. So you may be serving the roast too soon. 8-9 hours in the crock pot on low would probably not be too long.
Another possibility is that you may be using too little liquid. Dry cooking will make tough cuts of meat tougher. I prefer a couple cups of beef broth and a cup of dark wine. (More liquid is okay). I thicken the juice afterward to a thick sauce and it tastes as good as that served in a fine restaurant.
When the English roast is done, cut it into thin strips across the grain. It will be very tender.
LOVE that idea—beer is great, since that’s usually on hand in our house! :)
I’ve used Beefy Onion soup mix for when I do a pot roast on the stovetop in my Dutch oven.... but have recently wanted to reduce the high sodium which is contained in those dry soup packets....hence the use of a number of different spices instead.
I’m going to have to try out your gravy idea....my family loves gravy, and your technique sounds awesome. Thank you!
Jeff,
I’ve always seen the chuck roast spelled out that way at our grocery stores (3 lb. chuck shoulder roast, or chuck roast, or 7-bone chuck roast) but after researching on the ‘net, I’ve found English roast is a chuck roast. (Learned something new, cool!) :) So, absolutely, since English roast=Chuck Roast, it’s a great cut of meat for the crockpot. I still maintain that the 7-bone chuck roast is the best cut to use for the crockpot pot roast, though. :)
A couple years ago, I got a cut of meat that had the word English in it, can’t quite recall the exact words on that beef package, LOL, but the butcher assured me it would work for a pot roast. I cooked it on the stovetop in my Dutch oven using my tried and true pot roast recipe and it was awful. Used 3 cups of liquid, too. Very disappointing.
I will say that my experience with crockpot cooking is that generally you don’t want to add a ton of liquid (unlike stovetop, Dutch oven cooking)....this, coming from someone who years ago added too much liquid while changing up a crockpot recipe...LOL. :)
Jeff, thanks for alerting me to the definition of an English roast. :) Do you do your English roast in the crockpot?
I’ve seen “English Cut” roast defined as a cross rib roast, and yes, we use a crock pot, but sometimes we just use the same electric frying pan that we brown it in.
Maybe you just got a particularly tough cut of meat? If that’s the case, serving it by cutting it diagonally across the grain in quarter inch thick strips would save the day-it would seem tender and easily chewed. It also makes a nice presentation having several thin slices with sauce drizzled across them on your plate
We most often use a “London Broil”, which is a flank steak, but we pot roast it and it comes our great. London Broil goes on sale all the time for under two dollars.
For decades we would use onion soup mix in the pot roast, but Mrs. Chandler has gotten a lot fancier with her cooking lately, and uses broth with dark wine such as a merlot or sirah. WOW! The sauce is amazing, and we have the rest of the wine with the meal.
My mother-in-law, God rest her soul, used to pressure cook 7-bone chuck roasts, and I agree it most definitely tasted the best of all and was as tender as could be. It would produce a wonderful glaze which coated the potatoes, onions, and carrots. Unfortunately, I’m the only one who likes the fatty bits in the roast; everyone else goes for lean meat.
I’m getting hungry.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.