Italian Pot Roast

Have you ever made something in something in your slow cooker that the aroma had you salivating for hours?  Have you ever made something sooooo good that when you finally ate it  you amazed yourself at its sheer deliciousness?  And it was so good that you thought about it for hours and days afterwards?  And the leftovers were squabbled over?  Well, this Italian pot roast was just that for us.  Steel yourself.  This was fabulous.

I had bought a just-under-three-pound chuck roast and then didn't know what to do with it.  It was on sale for half price and I just can't resist a good sale when it comes to meat.  I was expecting to fall back on my favorite New England pot roast, toyed with the idea of trying a homemade steak ranchero (we had just gone out for Mexican and my Sweet Pie had ordered it out so that was a no) so at the last minute I decided to venture out and try something new.  This may have been new to us but it will soon become an old favorite.

I made a couple of substitutions based on what I had on hand, but they are substitutions I would've done anyway.  I'll share my changes in COOK'S NOTES.

ITALIAN POT ROAST

1 three-to-four pound boneless chuck roast, excess fat removed
1 eight-ounce package fresh mushrooms, coarsely chopped  **
1 large onion, coarsely chopped
1 14-ounce can low-sodium beef broth
1 one-ounce envelope dried onion soup mix **
3 tablespoons tomato paste
1 eight-ounce can tomato sauce
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1 teaspoon dried Italian seasoning **
1 teaspoon black pepper
2 tablespoons olive oil

Place mushrooms and onion in the bottom of a 5-to-6 quart slow cooker.

Heat a fry pan over medium-high heat and add the oil.  Sprinkle pepper on the pot roast and then sear the beef on all sides.  Remove meat to the slow cooker.

Pour beef broth and tomato sauce over the beef .  Add the dried onion soup packet.   Cook on LOW for 5 to 6 hours or until meat shreds easily with a fork.

Somewhere in that time frame you're going to have to use your good judgment.  About thirty minutes or so before you think it's going to be done, remove the meat to your serving platter.  Add the tomato paste and the dried Italian seasoning to the gravy fixings that are in the slow cooker.  Make a slurry with the cornstarch and two tablespoons of water and stir into the gravy.  Continue cooking the remaining amount of time on high, until gravy is thickened.  You can add the roast back to the pot for a couple of minutes to reheat it, if you want.  Serve roast on a platter with some gravy; additional gravy can go in a separate bowl.

COOK'S NOTES:  Rarely do I ever have packaged dried onion soup mix on the pantry shelf.  I have way too many spices, herbs, and dried vegetables on my shelf not to make the best dried onion soup mix from what I have on hand. It is far superior to the prepackaged mix, in my opinion, and a couple minutes of my time is worth the result and big flavor.

I think white mushrooms would be nice in this, but I bought a package of cremini mushrooms.  They have a bolder flavor, in my opinion, and just stand up better with the rest of the ingredients in this recipe.

Dried Italian seasoning--nope, not happening.  All that is is a mix of Italian herbs expensively mixed and sold in a bottle for your convenience.  For this recipe, I added a good pinch of oregano, basil and thyme, and a bit of garlic.  Done.

I did NOT remove the meat to a separate platter while I made the gravy.  I like a thicker gravy so I know that two tablespoons of cornstarch is not nearly going to be enough, especially when I saw how much liquid there was in my slow cooker.  I made a slurry of 1/4 cup of cornstarch and 1/4 cup of water and just dumped it all in and it worked perfectly for me.  Of course, if you are timid about such things, you cook the roast until fall apart tender, remove all the liquid to a sauce pan and make gravy from there.  Add the meat back and serve.  No judgment from me, smiles.  You have to do what's right and comfortable for you.

Tortellini and Spinach Soup

Tortellini and Spinach Soup

Monsoon season in Arizona means sideways, blinding rain and loud cracks of thunder fill the sky.  The days can look a little gray, threatening but not always following through.  When the torrents do come, they don't last for long, but our three cats vanish under the bed or in a closet, and those few brief hours can turn even a human heart to look for a spot of comfort.  This tortellini and spinach soup is just such a soup—warm and filling and satisfying.  It was so good and easy and was even better the second day.

Simple, simple, simple.  For us the only "exotic" ingredient was the tortellini, easily found at our local market with the other fresh pastas and cheeses, or can be found in the frozen food section.  We chose the fresh tortellini filled with chicken and cheese, and it worked deliciously here.

Now first a caveat.  I used the entire bag of fresh tortellini (I don't recall how many ounces it had now), which was too much for the amount of liquid.  By end of day two, there really wasn't much liquid left.  It was still tasty, of course, but I would have preferred more broth.  Next time I'll buy frozen tortellini, and reduce the amount I use, and save the remainder for soup for another day.  Bonus!  Secondly, this made a lot of soup.  It filled the slow cooker up to the brim (probably due in part to the generous amount of tortellinis, grins). I reheated it at work for lunch and was happy, happy.  Anyway, I think for the most part, this soup is quite forgiving and there is no real right or wrong, just whatever pleases your palate.  That's how good soups are made.

Tortellini and Spinach Soup

1 bag of frozen tortellini

1 small bag of frozen spinach

2 cans of Italian style diced tomatoes (I didn't drain the cans)

1 eight-ounce block of cream cheese, cut into chunks
4 cups of either chicken or vegetable stock

Put all ingredients together in a slow cooker.  Cook for 5 or 6 hours.  

I'd check this at 4 hours to see how this is going and check maybe every 30 minutes or so thereafter. Give it a nice stir to make sure that the cream cheese is melding with the broth.  I think 6 hours of time for pasta would turn this into mush, but then again I started with fresh tortellini.

 

Charros Frijoles and a Little Food Lore

Charros Frijoles

Did you know that beans were one of the Three Sisters—the sisters being corn (maize), beans, and squash?  Squash shaded the roots of the corn, cornstalks provided support for the climbing beans.  All rather endearing I think.  Together they provided a nutritional foundation.  I ran into that little kernel of knowledge while reading a romance novel of all things some while back and it stuck with me.  Apparently, Native Americans combined the three to provide a complete nutritional foundation.

Since moving across country from our beloved little New England Victorian home to our now beloved desert home in Arizona, we've learned about new foods and flavors, and among those are pinto beans.  It's taken a while to develop a taste for caliente and piquante foods, but we've now started to appreciate and crave the flavors of heat and spice.  By some measure I'm sure we're still on the mild side in comparison to true natives, but hot sauce is a stable in our pantry along with some chilies, grins.  It's all good.

So, let me share a nice hearty pinto bean soup.  It's spicy good, though you can make it more or less spicy depending on your taste, it's inexpensive, and pretty much hands off once you get it in the slow cooker.  These are not refried beans, though similar in make up, as they have the addition of tomatoes and meat.  Also charros frijoles is soupier, served with a spoon.  Nice thick squares of cornbread is a tasty side to this.  Mmm mmm!  This reheats like a dream and freezes very well.  And if possible, it's even better on the following day when the flavors have had a chance to get acquainted with each other and develop a companionable flavorship.  It makes a potful, so unless you're feeding a small community or have a crowd of hungry eaters, you're probably going to have leftovers.

I put together several recipes, choosing those ingredients that were the most appealing to me, so the soup is quite versatile and forgiving.  This is how I made mine.

Charros Frijoles (a/k/a Cowboy Beans, and who doesn't love cowboys?)

1 one-pound package of dried pinto beans, picked, soaked overnight, rinsed, drained

1 small onion, roughly chopped

3 garlic cloves, minced

3 1/2 ounces bacon, chopped, cooked and crumbled (I used the bacon grease to cook the onions in—only until translucent)

1 can Rotel tomatoes, undrained

2-4 cups of chicken broth or make broth using chicken bouillon

Enough water to bring liquid a coupe of inches over the beans

1 teaspoon (or more) cumin

1 teaspoon (or more) chili powder

3 1/2 ounces cooked ham, chopped (or chorizo)

salt and pepper to taste (be careful of the salt if you're using bouillon)

a little chopped jalapeno is nice, added at the end

1 cup of cilantro chopped (added at the end, maybe 30 minutes before)

Cook the bacon, crumble, toss in the slow cooker.  Use the grease to cook the onions until translucent.  Toss everything in the slow cooker except the cilantro and the jalapeno, reserving those to add towards the end of cooking.  Set the slow cooker on low, and let it cook for about 6 hours.  I start testing the beans at 4 hours to see if they are soft enough to eat.  Keep an eye on the liquid level, adding water as needed to keep the beans covered by an inch or so.  Depending on the freshness of your beans it may take shorter or longer to cook them. Taste the broth for seasoning, adding whatever you think will make it perfect for you.  At the end I take a potato masher and give 'em a couple of good mashes to thicken the soup up a little. 

Cook's Note:  This can get too salty very easily, considering the bacon, chicken broth and/or bouillon.  I use low sodium bacon and don't add additional salt until I taste for seasoning.  When I've tasted it and the broth was too salty, I added additional water.  The other choice is to add a potato, cut in half, to absorb some of the salt. Just remove the potato before serving.