My Wife’s Pot Roast

As I mentioned before, as the weather begins to change and a chill hangs in the air, the savory smell of pot roast also fills our house. I don’t quite know why, but it seems we only make it in the fall and winter. Maybe that’s why I like those seasons. Pot roast is one of my favorite things my wife cooks.

Pot roast isn’t just my favorite. Now that we’ve cut the cable we’ve seen the “Beef – It’s What’s For Dinner” commercial far too often. It starts with an old man wearily bringing a fork full of some bland dish to his mouth. Then a small child in the next house asking what’s for dinner. His mom replies “pot roast” and he says it is his favorite and then leaves the table. Next we see him at the door with the old man in tow saying “It’s Mr So-and-so’s favorite too”. Then they all enjoy a nice pot roast. They give the tagline and then show the family next door asking where Grandpa is. There is just something about slow cooked beef.

She starts by seasoning the meat and tossing it on a cast iron pan to brown on all sides. Then she adds it along with water and more seasonings to the crock pot. She uses black pepper, Goya’s Con Culantro Y Achiote, and this time something called Instant Gourmet, and Goya’s Sazonador Total. She let’s it cook overnight. The next day as dinner time approaches, she adds potatoes and carrots. You can see the steam rising from the crock pot – filling the room with the most delicious smell.

It needs to cook around another 45 minutes so so with the added vegetables. While we wait, we prepared some rice orzo pilaf that we picked up at Trader Joe’s. It’s not one of those instant things you microwave. You boil it up and let it simmer for 20 minutes.

Once everything was ready we grabbed some bowls and filled they with rice, beef, potatoes, and carrots. Yes, I had carrots too. I don’t really care for them, but if I cut them up small enough they go down fine. The potatoes were good though. They tend to soak up a lot of the juices from the meat.

Even though I went back for seconds, there was still enough left over for a hearty lunch. I had the leftover pot roast and Linda had the leftover roast beef.