Recipe 4 U! Warning it's MEAT!

A break from my wordy meanderings today. A recipe for Pot Roast that I concocted on my own with just a wee bit of help from my mama & the Sober Kitchen Cookbook. But I pretty much winged it & it turned out to be one of the best pot roasts I've ever tasted. Now for all you vegetarians I'll post a recipe soon for delicious cottage cheese patties and one later for a vegan curry dish. I'm starting with the meat first because I can.

Fran's Frantastic Pot Roast

Chuck roast. About 4 pounds
1 1/2 cup coarsely chopped onion
2 tbsp butter
6-8 cloves of garlic minced
Celery salt
Sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Dried parsley -to taste
Dried Thyme -to taste
Pinch of dried Rosemary
1 or 2 bay leaves
2 tbsp flour
6-8 very coarsely chopped carrots
2-3 lbs red baby potatoes
water

Heat oven to 500 degrees. Put butter in roasting pan once oven is fully heated. Brown butter in pan and put the beef (I always rinse my meat before cooking) in the pan & put that in the oven. Sear the beef in the oven for 15 min. on one side and 10 min. on the other side of meat. Then turn the oven down to 325 degrees and add water until you have a 1/2 inch of water in pan. Also add 1 cup of the onion but not all. Let this all cook for 20 min, then baste roast and continue to baste every 15 to 20 minutes. After the roast has been in the oven for 40 min. or so add garlic, bay leaf, and rosemary to roast and juices. After 2 hours of cooking add thyme, black pepper & celery salt. After another half hour add sea salt and if you like more pepper. This would also be a good time to add 1/4th to 1/2 cup water.

I recommend cooking the roast for about 3 1/2 hours. In the last hour add the sea salt & more pepper if you like. In the last 40 min. add potatoes and the rest of the onion and put the lid on the roasting pan. 20 min. later add carrots and parsley.

After 3 1/2 hours remove meat & veggies to a baking dish and put in oven while the roasting pan will go on the stove top where you'll make the gravy.

Put the roasting juices in a glass measuring cup straining it through with a small mesh strainer on top. Put the garlic/onion/spice mush into the roasting pan. Next try to take off as much fat off the top of the juices in the glass measuring cup as possible without wasting the juices. Add 1/3 cup water to the roasting pan & turn the burner on the med-low. Cook the mush and water in the roasting pan constantly stirring until hot. Turn heat up to medium & slowly add the roast juices until fully blended. Then slowly add flour and any additional spices you want.

Then you'll have the honor of serving a Franastic Pot Roast!