Home Style Roast Beef (Plus, How To Make Perfect Gravy Every Time!)

I realized yesterday that I've been just a little bit hung up on the idea of "Sunday Dinner" types of meals recently and I suppose that could be because the typical late Fall weather here in the Northeast has been insanely cold, rainy/snowy and just plain old... yuck. The weather in November is always a bit touch and go around here and there are always a few days at the beginning of the month that tend to hint at snow, as a way for mother nature to remind us that her daughter Winter is on her way to this part of the world. To be honest, up here in my neck of the woods, it isn't too far-fetched to expect a November blizzard (and this year we've already come close) and by mid-December, it's definitely beginning to feel a lot like Christmas. But... I digress.

At any rate, this recent food obsession has led to some very hearty and pretty tasty weekend meals and what (in my opinion at least), is a fair amount of seasonal (and yummy) content for me to share here on the blog!

I'll be posting the recipes for the sides that we had with this roast, not long (hopefully) after this goes live and as usual, I'll add the links to them at the bottom of this post, once they're up.

Home Style Roast Beef

• 5 to 6 Lb Top Sirloin Roast, tied
• 3-4 Lg Carrots and/or Parsnips, washed and cut into halves/thirds
• 2 Med Yellow Onions, peeled and quartered
• Kosher Salt
• Freshly Ground Black Pepper

You'll Need:
Large Roasting Pan
Roasting Rack  (optional)

The gravy ingredients and instructions will follow the roasting directions.

1. Season the roast with salt and pepper on all sides. You can lightly dust it with a bit of flour if you like, but it isn't necessary if you don't want to take the time.

2. Preheat your oven to 350°F and place the roasting pan on the stovetop (spanning one or two burners) over medium-high heat. Place the roast in the pan and brown it well on all sides, turning it often to prevent burning. You can also use a large frying pan for this step, but I see no reason to dirty extra dishes.

3. Once the roast is well-browned, remove it from the pan and place the roasting rack (if using one) in the pan. If you don't have a rack, you can add your aromatics (the cut-up onions, carrots, parsnips, etc.) directly to the pan and they'll act as it's "natural" counterpart. If we'd had both carrots and parsnips, I would have used them both. Love me some roasted root veggies!!!

4. Place the roast on the rack and add all of the aromatics around the perimeter of the roast. (Obviously, if you're using your vegetables as your rack, you'll place the browned roast directly on top of your veggies)

5. Place the pan in your preheated 350°F oven and roast it until the center reaches your desired temperature of doneness. (see chart below for temperatures)

DON'T FORGET ABOUT CARRY-OVER COOKING!! (see last chart below)

[Illustration by Elizabeth Kurtzman]

Graphics Sources: Google Images

The Gravy

• Beef Drippings, drained of any excess fat
• 2 to 3 Tbls *AP Flour (heaping)
• Water, roughly 1 Cup (for the **slurry)
• 3 to 4 Cups Beef Stock (or Broth)
• 1/2 Cup Red Wine, to deglaze the pan (Dry Vermouth will work fine too)
• 2-4 Tbls Butter
• Kosher Salt
• Freshly Ground Black Pepper

  * All-Purpose
** Click HERE if you are not familiar with making a slurry)

What would a luscious plate of juicy roast beef be without a drizzle (or more) of a rich golden brown and of course, beefy gravy? Well, around here, we'd say that was a sacrilege! (or at the very least, b-o-r-i-n-g!)

So, this is where I share the hubber's tried, tested and true method for making a perfect gravy with you. It's basically the same process whether you're planning to drizzle (or pour) it over beef, chicken, pork, turkey or basically just about any other roasted or pan-seared protein you can think of.

1. While the roast is resting, it's time to make the gravy! I love the veggies that are left over in the roasting pan, but they're usually not the prettiest thing to look at. They get a bit mushy, but the caramelization on them is gorgeous and adds the most lovely depth and richness. Oh dear. I digress yet again...

2. After removing the meat and the veggies, you'll see a lovely brown stickiness left on the bottom of the pan. This is called the fond (primarily in fancy French culinary circles). But, we can just call it "pan drippings" if you prefer. This lovely little gift that your roast leaves behind serves the very important purpose of being a rich (and in this case beefy) base for an exceptional gravy.

Cook's Note: Most grocery chains in America now carry both broth and stock and each of these serve their purpose. But, in our humble opinion, using stock whenever possible for making a meat gravy is always the better option. Don't get me wrong... broth will still make a delicious gravy, sauce or soup, but because it's made by slowly simmering the roasted bones along with any remaining meat that is left on those bones, a stock has a certain depth of flavor that you just can't get from a broth.

3. Place your roasting pan on a burner (or burners) set at medium to medium-high heat.

Cook's Note: Now... if you've used a glass or thinner ceramic baking dish, I would suggest using some kind of diffuser with a gas cooktop or with one that has electric coil elements, in order to protect it from cracking or shattering from the direct heat. If you don't happen to have a diffuser lying around, alas, do not despair... 

You can just use the heat that's left over in the pan from the roasting process. This will allow you to bring the drippings to the point where they can be poured into a heat-safe pot. While the pan is still hot, pour a small amount of liquid (stock/broth, wine, water, etc.) into it and stir it quickly with a whisk or spatula, just long enough to loosen the fond from the bottom. As soon as you've achieved this, carefully pour the contents into a nice heavy saucepan, making sure to scrape up every last bit of that goodness you've just freed from the bottom. Et voila! You are now ready to commence with the gravy making!

4. Pour about a quarter cup of stock/broth into the pan and using a whisk or a heat-safe spatula begin stirring and gently scraping the bottom of the pan as the stock comes up to a steady and robust simmer.

5. Add in your wine (or vermouth) and continue to stir as it simmers. You'll notice that the liquid in the pan will begin to thicken. This is exactly what you want to happen.

6. Put your flour in a large glass, plastic bottle or jar that has a tight-fitting lid.

7. Add in the water and give it a bit of a stir with a long fork or a skinny whisk to loosen the flour from the bottom. Place the lid on the container and make sure it's on there tightly. Now, shake the dickens out of it, until you can no longer see any lumps or pockets of dry flour. (we recommend doing this over the sink, just in case the lid gets loose and the slurry goes flying all over the kitchen - trust us - we know about this from personal experience!)

Cook's Tip: A proper slurry should be roughly the consistency of a "heavy" or "whipping" cream. (I think that'd be known as "double cream" to our European friends!)

7b. While this next step is optional, I would highly recommend doing it. We like to add a good tablespoon or two of butter to the pan at this point and stir it in until it has melted completely. It's just one more little flavor booster that you might not realize is in there, but your taste buds will definitely recognize it!

8. Now you can slowly pour the slurry into the briskly simmering base, whisking vigorously as you go.

Cook's Tip: Please keep in mind that you might not need all of the slurry that you've mixed up, so please be patient and resist any temptation to pour every last drop into the pan at once.

9. When the contents of the pan reach the thickness of a standard pancake batter or a pudding or custard that hasn't reached its full setting point, it's time to add the rest of the stock/broth to the pan.

10. Continue slowly adding more stock/broth to the pan while whisking, until it reaches the thickness that you prefer. Some people like a very thick gravy and others might like it more on the thin side. This is truly one of those areas of cooking that come down to personal preference, so adding the stock/broth slowly will help you to reach your desired gravy consistency.

11. Season the gravy well with salt and pepper. And if you happen to be the adventurous type, you can experiment with some additional herbs and/or spices. Maybe just a pinch of onion or garlic powder, a little bit of chopped rosemary or possibly some freshly chopped thyme. The only limit is your imagination!

12. Finally, at this point you should have your sides all prepared and ready to go, so go ahead and have at it - and I sincerely hope that you enjoy every last bite!

I'll be posting the recipes for the side dishes we had with this roast very soon and I'll be sure to link them here at the bottom of this post when they're up on the blog. But...

If you want to be sure not to miss those posts (or any of my future recipes), why not pop over to the sidebar on the right, or just below this recipe and subscribe!

This roast ended up being just a tad over-cooked for our tastes. I was busy making the potatoes and mushrooms and I left it in the oven a little longer than I normally would. We prefer a roast beef like this to be more on the medium rare side and this was a bit more in the medium range. The internal temperature was already about 128°F and (as you can see in the charts above) I really should have taken it out when it had reached 120°F.  It was still quite delicious, though! And it was even better the following night when we had hot roast beef sandwiches for dinner!

Enjoy!

Mary

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Classic Chicken Piccata

I remember my first experience with "piccata" and I'm sad to say that it wasn't a very good one. It was a veal piccata dish, made by an old friend who had invited us to dinner back in the late 70's or very early 80's. It wasn't because it was veal. I like veal. To be totally honest, I have a love/hate relationship with it. I enjoy it immensely (when it's prepared properly) and ground veal also happens to be a very integral ingredient in my meatball recipe. The only "down" side to veal, is that I have to take my emotions completely out of the equation whenever I eat it. It's kind of like the whole venison/Bambi thing. I only get it in certain restaurants and I have to trick my mind into not thinking that I'm eating, well.... you know. Let's just let it go at that, right? I think we'd all have a better rest of the day. 😳

Now,  don't get me wrong... I'm not saying that my friend was a bad cook. On the contrary, I think she did a good job with the meals that I'd had before at her table. This time, however, was a bit of a disaster. The oil and butter that she cooked the meat in, never got up to the proper temperature and whenever you cook with fats or oils, that just isn't a good thing - especially when it's been coated with flour or breadcrumbs. The coating just soaks up the oil like a sponge and unfortunately, I don't think she knew it would continue to do so, because she just kept adding more. The veal became quite tough and chewy and the normally lightly browned outer coating was... well, not.

We were all very polite that night and tried to act like we loved the meal, but I found out from other friends who were dining that night, that I wasn't the only one who was clandestinely spitting each bite into my napkin. I've often wondered if she noticed and just let it go, to avoid embarrassment on all sides.

I suppose I should have thanked her really, because I learned something from that experience about what not to do. The result of that dinner (or maybe I should call it a lesson) ended up being two-fold. A) I learned to never add meat to a pan that hasn't come up to temperature and B) when it comes to piccata, I decided that I'd just stick with chicken.

I promise that my recipe will come out just right every time, because I've made it many, many times over the years and perfected it in the process. It's a very lovely Northern Italian staple and it also happens to be one of our favorites.

*The recipe I'm giving you will serve 4 people, but I had only two chicken breasts in the freezer the day that I decided to photograph the meal for the blog and I cut one rather large breast in half to facilitate even cooking, so you'll see only three pieces in the photos.

Classic Chicken Picatta
Serves 4 - (can easily be doubled)

• 4 Boneless Chicken Breasts, thinly sliced or pounded
• 3/4 Cup All Purpose Flour
• 2 Tbls Capers, rinsed
• 4 Tbls Butter, divided
• 2 Cups Chicken Stock or Broth
• 1/2 Cup Dry Vermouth
• 1/4 Fresh Lemon Juice
• 2 Tsp Kosher Salt
• 1 Tsp Fresh Ground Black Pepper
• 1 Tsp Italian Seasoning
• Zest from 1 Lg Lemon (2 Tbls)
• Light Olive or Vegetable Oil
• Fresh Chopped Parsley, for garnish

If you're using whole chicken breasts, you'll need to butterfly them, cut them in half or pound them down to about a quarter of an inch thickness so that they'll cook evenly and quickly. *See my note above.

As I say in all of my recipes, it's important to have as much of your "prep work" done before you start to cook. I don't do it just for the photo op. It really makes the entire cooking process go much more smoothly. So, take a few minutes to zest and squeeze your lemon(s). Have all of your seasonings and flour ready to go in a container that will fit the size of the meat you're dredging in it. If there are wet ingredients like the vermouth and chicken stock in this dish, have them all measured out as well. Also rinse things like capers and drain them, so that you can just toss them in when the time comes. You get the drift.

I will often mix my dry seasonings together and put them into a tiny prep bowl or one of the funky little spoons that I collect. (like the one shown in the photo above)

As you can see in the photo, I make sure that the flour or breadcrumbs being used to coat or to dredge meats or vegetables is always seasoned, even when I've seasoned the food itself. Seasoning is all about layers, my friends!

Capers are one of those ingredients that's kind of an acquired taste and if you know from experience that you just don't like them, you can leave them out. That being said, if they're something that you've never tried, please do give them a chance. They're an integral part of piccata and they get a bad rep because many cooks don't take the time to rinse and drain them before adding them to a dish. They usually come packed in jars filled with a salty and/or vinegary brine and that can add a bit too much pungency to a dish if they're just dumped in straight from the jar.

Season both sides of the chicken liberally with the salt, pepper and Italian seasoning mixture.

Add any remaining seasoning to the flour. If you don't have any left after seasoning the meat, you can just add the seasonings one by one or make up another slightly smaller bowl of them and add them into the dredging dish or plate.

Give the flour and seasoning mixture a good stir to incorporate them well. You don't want any small pockets of overly seasoned flour and large areas that are not seasoned a all.

Using your very clean hands or a pair of tongs, dip each piece of chicken into the flour mixture, turning it over as needed until the chicken is nicely coated. Some people like to use a two step, or wet dry process here. This is when you dip or soak the meat in question in an egg wash or buttermilk, etc. before you add it to the dry ingredients, whether that's flour or breadcrumbs. (or both in some cases) I don't feel this is necessary this time, simply because I don't really care for a thick crust on my chicken piccata.

Try not to have any "bald patches" on the meat, so if you're making a larger batch and you run out of your dredge, just add an appropriate amount of flour and your seasonings to the dish and continue the dredging process. Put the coated chicken pieces onto a plate or sheet of waxed paper until you're done with all of them and your pan is ready to start cooking. You also want to make sure to hang onto any leftover flour mixture for later use in this dish. (**this is specific to this recipe, because it will be used in a way that it will continue to be cooked for a while after it's second use.)

**If you aren't going to be using a dredge mixture in a way that it will be cooked longer during the course of the recipe, do not ever save a mixture that raw meat has touched for later use. It has been "cross contaminated" at this point and would cause illness to anyone who ate food that was prepared with it.

Add about two teaspoons of light olive or vegetable oil to a large skillet that is preheating over a medium high flame.

Once the oil is distributed well in the skillet and is heated to the point where it is sizzling, you can start adding your chicken to it.

Cook the chicken, turning it frequently until it is nicely browned on each side and cooked all the way through. This shouldn't take more than about 3 (maybe 4) minutes per side when the chicken breasts are this thin.

If it looks like the flour is starting to get too dark, too quickly or it starts to smoke, turn the heat down a couple of notches to medium or even medium low for the remainder of the cooking time.

Once the chicken is cooked through, remove it to a clean plate and cover lightly with foil to keep it warm. Maintaining (or returning to) a medium to medium high heat, add in the lemon juice and stir it around with a spatula, scraping up any browned bits and thickened juices (called fond by the French) from the bottom of the skillet.

You'll see that the bottom of the skillet is "clear" of pretty much all of the fond.

Continue cooking and stirring occasionally, until the lemon juice has reduced slightly.

Add in the dry vermouth (or white wine) and reduce that by about 1/3rd.

Add in the 1/2 of the lemon zest...

...and the capers. Stir or gently swirl the pan to incorporate both.

If you aren't seeing small bubbles around the edges of the skillet, you'll need to turn the heat up a tiny bit until you do.

Take about a tablespoon of the reserved seasoned flour mixture and add it to the skillet.

Stir the flour into the liquid in the pan until it is the consistency of heavy cream. Keep stirring it for about a minute to cook out any "raw" flour taste.

At this point, slowly pour in about 2/3 of the chicken stock.

Set the remaining stock aside for a few minutes.

Return the chicken pieces to the skillet.

Make sure to get any juices that have accumulated on the plate. Those juices are pretty much "liquid gold" because they have a lot of flavor in them!

Continue to cook the chicken, turning it over from time to time to coat it in the sauce and heat it back through. (no more than 2 to 3 minutes)

The liquid in the skillet is going to continue to reduce and thicken during this time, so that's why you'll need that reserved 1/3rd of the stock.

Add the rest of the stock and continue cooking and turning the chicken in the sauce that's forming.

Next, add the second 1/2 of the lemon zest and stir well. This will add a nice kick of fresh lemon to the sauce that will have dissipated while it's cooked for a while.

After cooking for a about 2 more minutes and once the chicken is heated back through, remove it from the pan to a warm platter or individual plates and serve right away.

We love to have long cooking jasmati rice with this dish, but you can serve it with your own favorite type of rice, buttered noodles, potatoes - or whatever you like best. If you're avoiding or cutting back on carb intake, serve it over a bed of sauteed spinach or alongside your favorite veggies. No matter what you decide to serve it with, once you've tried it, I think you'll want to make it again and again. It's a bit addictive. 😊


Enjoy!

Mary

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