A Weekend of Dinners

Wow am I behind in posting!  It is mostly because Rob has hijacked the computer to analyze all of his NCAA stats in order to do his brackets (I hope I said that all right).  Now that he has like 50 brackets and all of his spreadsheets printed I finally get the computer back.  =)

Two Sundays ago we had Rob's parents over for dinner and they got to see our new kitchen.  I made a roast which turned out very good.  Rob agreed!  It is also another recipe I developed myself which I am trying to do more of.  I mixed together the following ingredients and spread it all over the roast.

garlic powder
brown sugar
onion powder
salt
pepper

I used my famous celery "rack" to keep the meat from sitting on the bottom of the pan and added some carrots and onions to the pan as well.  About 20 minutes into cooking I added 1/2 cup red wine, 1/4 cup marsala wine, and 1/4 cup beef broth to the bottom of the roasting dish.  While the meat was resting I put all the stuff in the bottom of the pan into a pot and added some more beef stock.  I boiled the liquid for about 15 min and let it reduce.  It made a great gravy.

I always have trouble cooking roasts.  I usually blame it on the cut of meat if it comes out bad.  I have searched times and cooking temperatures, looked at all the charts and I still just basically cook it for a while then feel it to see if it's done.  This time it only took about 45 minutes (it was about 4lbs).  However, the thicker end, which I would think would be more on the rare side, was more done than the thinner side!  I don't know how that happened but it was good.

I only have a picture of the dinner all plated.  I used the left over meat to make steak sandwiches with onions and cheese during the week.  I love when I can make a meal and use it over again.  =)