Classic Pot Roast p. 742

Yes, somehow after two years of cooking for myself I had not managed to cook a pot roast. I've done stews, which I consider similar, and briskets, but never a pot roast. Determined to change that, I held a family dinner at my house last week serving a classic pot roast. I had to wait to make it for company because there is no way Bryan and I would be able to eat a whole pot roast on our own.

This version of pot roast is cooked on low over the stove top. I always thought it was cooked in the oven, but I was wrong.

I won't go in depth about each step, but my main concern with this recipe is that there aren't nearly enough veggies. Mark Bittman calls for 2 carrots, 1 celery stick, and 2 onions. I intended to follow the recipe to a T since I was nervous feeding a crowd. But the onions were over powering. So I added at least on more celery stalk and 3 or more carrots, I forget now. I've made a note in my book so I remember to add more when I make it again.

The end product was delicious, flavorful, and tender. I served the meat and veggies over homemade mashed potatoes. The perfect causal dinner for a casual get together.

Beef Daube p. 738

Apparently this is a classic French stew. I had never heard of it before. Nor had anything quite like it. But its always excited to try new things. Especially things you aren't sure of how to pronounce. It makes me feel fancy.

Start off by cooking some bacon in a dutch oven until it is crisp and then remove, leaving the fat behind. To the fat add about 2 lbs brisket cut into cubes. Our brisket was seemed fatter than usual, and our end product had a lot of fat. I would suggest using beef chuck instead. Brown all the cubes, this might take a couple of batches to get them all done evenly. Remove once browned.

Next you are going to cook chopped onions, carrots, celery, as well as thyme rosemary, orange peel and salt and pepper. Let it cook for a few minutes and then add red wine and red wine vinegar as well as your browned meat. Let it simmer covered for about an hour. Add your bacon at that point and cook for a while longer.



Now I'm not sure if this is traditional, but we added some cooked shell pasta to our bowls. We had it on hand and the dish by itself seemed to need something. The flavors were amazingly delicious, but overall seemed really fatty. Again, it could be the cut of meat, or the bacon, but I found it difficult to finish. Also, I sliced my carrots pretty thinly. Cutting them thicker might be a better idea for next time.

Stir Fried Beef with Onions and Ginger p. 731

Ingredients: steak or tender beef cut, peanut oil, onions, garlic, ginger, stock, soy sauce.

This is a quick dish to put together and on the table, but I felt lacking in flavor. Perhaps it is one of those that tastes better the next day, but I never got the chance to eat it the next day.

Slice your beef thinly. I like to prepare all my ingredients ahead of time with stir fries because they cook so quickly. First cook your onions until they are soft and set aside. (I liked this because I could cook the onions and put them on my dish and not Bryan's!) Then cook your galric and ginger before tossing in the beef. After a minute or two add in your soy and stock. Let it cook for a few minutes before serving.

This dish needs veggies or something to go with it. It is not a stand alone meal. Perhaps a bag of frozen stir fry veggies would be a good side with it. I don't know. I wans't overly impressed.



Bryan and I added a lot of hot pepper paste to our beef and rice, which made it a little better.

Real Beef Stroganoff p. 739

Ingredients: butter, onion, mushrooms, sirloin, Dijon mustard, tomato sauce, stock, sour cream.

I don’t know the difference between this and “Fake” beef stroganoff… but this is a good dish. I know my mom made beef stroganoff a couple of times while I was growing up and I think it had ground beef, but I can’t be too sure. Maybe a can of mushroom soup.

This dish involved browning onions and mushrooms (Bryan was not a huge fan.) And then your beef. After a few minutes add in your mustard, stock, and tomato sauce. After cooking stir in some sour cream and serve over egg noodles.



Real Beef Stroganoff is a hearty dish. I know I would make more of it if Bryan wasn’t so opposed to onions and mushrooms.

Beef Stew p. 724

Ingredients: oil, garlic, beef, onions, flour, stock, bay leaf, thyme, potatoes, carrots, peas, parsley.

Bryan was sick with a cold last weekend and I offered to make him some chicken noodle soup. He didn’t want that… he thought stew would make him feel better. So I set out to make a stew.

I don’t really want to go into the how with this post. It’s a basic stew, but cooked over the stove. I must have let mine cook a little bit long because the potatoes were a bit mushy. But all in all it had a nice flavor and was very hearty, as a good stew should be. Bryan loved it, but it did not have magical powers to cure him of his cold. Oh well. That’s probably expecting too much.

Pan Grilled/Oven Roasted Steak p. 718

At the beginning of this recipe, Mark Bittman says that a gas grill will not do for grilled steak. This is unfortunate for us since that is all we have at this time. So I began to look at the other 4 ways to prepare a steak.

For this recipe its very simple. Heat an oven proof skillet over the stove for several minutes so that the pan is hot. Then put some course salt on the bottom of the pan, put on your steaks, and immediately put in a very hot oven.



I cooked my steaks, which were a bit less than 1” thick as the recipe called for, 3 minutes on one side and 4 on the other. They were done medium, they way Bryan likes it.


They were delicious, especially topped with Bacon Compound Butter.

Stuffed Flank Steak p. 737

This was probably my second biggest undertaking so far, second only to the tamales. And this round was much more successful than the other. It’s not a difficult dish to make, just a little time consuming. The time estimate given was at least 2 hours and I took about two and a half hours.



Ingredients: Flank steak (obviously), salt, pepper, oregano, cumin, garlic, cilantro (or parsley), carrots, eggs, red or white onion (I used half a red onion), spinach, and EVOO.

The most challenging thing to do was to cut the meat in half. I let Bryan do it and after a few expletives, our meat was cut and ready for stuffing.

Start with your spices and work your way up in consistency.

Here it is with everything but spinach.

Spinach goes on last. Then roll and tie. This was also challenging because I didn’t leave enough room on the edges, so things fell out. The recipe called for three carrots, and I ended up using only two. My steak was very stuffed.

Brown your meat on the stove for a few minutes on each side and then pop in the oven. The cook time is over an hour, which will give you time to clean your kitchen, watch a movie, or do laundry.





Its an impressive dish to serve guests. Prepare, clean up your kitchen, and welcome your guests. They’ll be impressed with the luxurious smell wafting through the house and then you can whip it out oven and they will begin to drool. And you can say, yeah, I cook and excellent meal and hardly even get the kitchen dirty… to their knowledge.

Steak au Poivre p. 730

Also called: Pan-seared steak with black pepper and red wine



Ingredients: tenderloin (I used a strip steak), ground black pepper, butter, shallot, wine, tarragon, salt.

This month I ordered Angel Food Ministries box. I’ve done it once in the past, but didn’t like the quality of meat, so I didn’t order it for quite a few months. This month’s box looked better and promised higher quality. Having taken advantage of perhaps one too many summer sales, I decided a week of cheap food was in order. In the box I received 4 New York strip steaks. I searched through the book to find something I could do with my meat and came across this recipe.

So, what initially drew me to this recipe was that I couldn’t pronounce it. I like it when something I cook is too complicated for me to even pronounce. It makes me feel all fancy. Plus it called for wine, which required a trip to the liquor store to stock up. And once I opened a bottle of wine, that would mean it would be open and some would be left, and I would just have to drink some, otherwise it would be wasteful. I’d hate to waste wine.

Back to the food, this is an easy and fast recipe which results in something tender and delicious. Sprinkle your steaks with some freshly ground pepper and then pan sear them for a few minutes on each side.



Then you cook some shallots (which I didn’t happen to have this time, but certainly would be delicious) with your red wine and tarragon, and reduce the liquid. When you serve your steak pour some of the red wine sauce over it.

I haven’t cooked much with tarragon before, I was actually surprised to find that I had it. But it is a flavor I definitely love and will try to use more of in the future. It’s perfect on steak. We, again, weren’t impressed with the quality of the meat, but we didn’t let that stop us from devouring it. Try this recipe today. It will change your life.


Served with baked potato and green beans

Roasted Tenderloin with Herbs p. 735-736

Tenderloins is my favorite meat of all time. As I explained in the Bearnaise Sauce post, it would be my last meal. I won’t get into it further, because I’m sure you’re bored with my love of tenderloin, just know that I worship at tenderloin’s feet. Not really, but close.

A couple of weeks ago we bought several pounds of tenderloin at the local farmers market from a local vender. We used half for the beef kebabs and put the other half in the freezer. Since it was a holiday weekend, I decided that maybe I would have the energy to put together a somewhat elaborate, more fancy-than-your-average meal. The tenderloin spent a day in the fridge thawing and then the afternoon of cooking, I threw the marinade ingredients in the bag: olive oil, balsamic vinegar, parsley, thyme, bay leaf, and garlic. It marinated for a couple of hours.

When its time to cook, rub off the excess marinade and herbs, and roast for about 20 minutes until the meat is around 125 degrees if you want it medium rare, which I and Mark Bittman recommend.


Here is my tenderloin, post marinade, pre roasting.

Serve with some béarnaise and you’ve got yourself the best meal ever… or at least in my opinion.

Tamales p. 488-489

I’m not going to attempt to do a description on this one. I’m just going to write this step by step. Partly because to fully understand tamales if you’ve never had it then that will help, and partly because I’ve just made them and am now waiting for them to finish steaming.

When I was little I remember a segment on Reading Rainbow, or was it Mr. Rodger’s Neighborhood, when they watched the making of tamales. My family loves tamales. Loves tamales. Bryan loves tamales too. Not too long ago he had his first real tamales. I mean the ones where you have to peal away the husk yourself.

To begin with you soak corn husks in water for a few hours or overnight. Where does one get dried corn husks? We tried the local supermarket in a predominately Hispanic neighborhood. They did not have it. So we cruised the Hispanic neighborhood and found a supermarket sign in Spanish. Bingo. We found the corn husks and masa.


The next step is to make the filling. I poached some chicken breasts because I had them on hand… I’m lazy like that. Or resourceful. Whatever. For the other part of the filling you mix masa, stock, lard, salt, and baking powder. Now, I’m not sure what masa is. The recipe said you can use either 2 pounds of fresh masa or 31/2 cups dry masa harina. I don’t know what either is. I’m not ever sure I got the right thing. I purchased something a kin to corn meal, only finer with masa on the label. So I used 2 pounds of that. I mixed all this with my handheld electric mixer. I cursed several times and told Bryan that I need a 5 qt. KitchenAid electric mixer preferably in silver or light blue. He said okay. I will be anxiously awaiting my mixer now, but I have a feeling it won’t be coming anytime soon.

The recipe said to mix it until the dough is light and fluffy and it is ready when a ball of dough floats in water. I beat and beat that dough and added stock and it would not float. This is one of those times when a video would be helpful.

My ball of dough

Not floating.

I gave up and instructed my helper to start drying the corn husks while I assembled the assembly line.

Step 1: Set out your dried husks and put two big spoon-fulls of dough on the dusk and smush it down with your hands.


Step 2: Put a little meat on there in a line.


Step 3: Roll.


Step 4: Take a sip of a cool beverage, my beverage of choice was a moijito. It seemed to go with the meal.


Step 5: Tie it up.

After you make a ton of tamales you steam them for about 45 minutes.


The Verdict: I should have used some kind of seasoned meat. The poached chicken was very bland. I topped my tamales with some salsa. It needed some kind of sauce or spiced up meat. My suggestion is to make a slow cooked pork shoulder and use the left overs for the tamales.

Tamales served with Mexican Rice pilaf (coming tomorrow)

Braised Beef Brisket, p. 743

Brief description: Brown meat, cook onions til slightly browned, stir in garlic and tomato paste. Place meat on top and cook in the oven for a long time til tender.

The instructions said to cook in a dutch oven. I have one cute little red one I purchased at an estate sale. I didn't think that the meat wouldn't fit in. So I put the cute little pot on the stove and heated it, swirled in some olive oil and then attempted to put the beef in. Hmm... didn't work. Too big. Both Bryan and I tried shoving the brisket in, to no avail. So I grabbed a pan we had handy, forgetting that it needed a lid. Oh well, we improvised by putting a cookie sheet on top.



The beef browned alright, I guess. I'm not a browning expert. I usually skip this step if it isn't necessary. Then it was the onions turn. The recipe calls for two cups. Bryan hate onions, but I had a couple on hand, so I just chopped two small onions.


I dare you to tell me that doesn't look delicious. YUM!

We did the prep work, got it in the oven, set the timer, and retired to the living room for a while until it was time to see if it was done. (Actually Bryan flipped it every 30 minutes for two and a half hours, per instructions.)



Looks delicious! I cooked some egg noodles to serve the brisket on top.



There you have it, a hearty meal.

Broiled Beef Kebabs, p. 732

Part two of Mom’s Birthday Kebab dinner. Since I couldn’t decide between chicken or beef, I decided to do both so others could decide.

I strayed from this recipe a little more than usual. I marinated the meat for a couple of hours and left it separate from the veggies. I put different veggies (tomatoes, bell pepper, onion, squash, and pineapple) in bowls and let each guest skewer their own veggie kebab.

The tenderloin I marinated and skewered and then broiled them inside while Bryan grilled the chicken kebabs inside.

I think I left them sit a little bit too long in the oven because our timing was off. Otherwise they would have been to die for.

We split the tenderloin we purchased in half so be expecting a beef tenderloin recipe coming up in the future.

Meat Loaf p. 723

The husband doesn't like onions, of course, so I substituted an extra carrot for an onion. I think it was too much, should have just left it out. I also didn't have sage and didn't feel like buying it.



I felt it was a bit bland, but the boys said that the bacon on top gave it good flavor. Which was a fluke that I even had it around.

This is the first recipe to sort of disappoint. Good thing I had the asparagus and potato to make up for it.

Broiled Skirt Steak page 729

I started reading the beef section last week. As I was flipping through Saturday drinking my coffee I was thinking about making either a flank steak or brisket. I've made brisket several times and its been delicious. So that was how I was leaning. Bryan and I went to the farmers market and found a local vendor selling meat. He sells all his brisket to one of our favorite restaurants, so it was hard to be mad that I couldn't have my first choice. The seller recommended skirt steak and I thought I remembered skirt steak could be substituted in a flank steak recipe.

We brought it home and started the marinade. We weren't sure when we were going to eat it, either Saturday evening or sometime Sunday, but I wanted to go ahead and get it started. We ended up broiling it in the oven Sunday evening. I don't know if it was the meat itself (I've never had skirt steak before) or marinading it for so long, but oh my goodness, that was some of the best meat we've had in a long time. It was so tender and delicious. Definitely one of my new favorites.