Pioneer Woman Perfect Pot Roast

Here we are again...about to talk about the Pioneer Woman or rather her pot roast.  For whatever reason, I decided I wanted to make a pot roast a few days ago.  Mark supplied the chuck roast via Sam's Club, and I found the recipe via Google.  It was a good day.  The question is...was it a good recipe?

Let's start with the gathering of ingredients and tools.  Ree suggests using a large stock pot or a Dutch oven for the cooking.  Would you believe that I don't have either of those?  Well, I do have a huge stock pot type pan, but since it is coated, I was worried about whether or not it would work.  As such, we went on the great Dutch Oven Adventure!  Yesterday, we went to both Target and World Market and opted to buy the Lodge brand cast iron Dutch oven.  Today, Mark calls me from Sam's Club to tell me all about the awesome Dutch oven they have there; it's bigger and coated for the same price.  Needless to say, I went about returning and buying a Dutch oven again today.

The ingredients were pretty simple.  Carrots, onions, fresh thyme, and fresh rosemary were all waiting for me at BiLo.*  I also bought the red wine there because you can do that in South Carolina.**  As I previously said, we got the roast itself from Sam's Club because they meat they sell is quite good.

Once I got everything back to the condo, it was time to get organized.

This is me being organized!

After washing my new Dutch oven, I set it to heat.  See, I had to sear the onions, carrots, and meat before they went into the oven.  Let's just say that Ree made it sound much easier than it was.  That oil was hot!  The onions didn't want to stay together.  The carrots didn't want to sear.  The steak was unwieldy.  It had to be seared on each side, and I struggled to do that.

Not pictured: my struggle.

I'm sure it would have been hilarious to anyone watching.  By the time I was done, I think I had used four different utensils.

Seared!

Once the searing was done, I deglazed*** the Dutch oven and started assembling everything in the pot.

Avengers, assemble!

It fit nicely, and I'm glad I upgraded to the larger pot.  I already had the oven ready to go, so I put the pot in and wandered away.  I was given warning not to mess with it, so I didn't.

A little over three hours later, I had put the finishing touches on my amazing mashed potatoes****, and it was time to pull the roast from the oven.

Food!

It smelled great, and both Mark and I were excited.  Would it taste great?  Was it going to be worth the cost?*****

Don't be distracted by the taters.  Focus on the roast!

It was.  It was very, very good.  Mark loved the carrots, while they weren't my favorite.  They were cooked very nicely, but I don't like my carrots cooked with meat.  I'm weird; I know.  The roast came apart beautifully and tasted very good.  The only change I would make would be to listen to Ree more.  She said to salt and pepper the meat a lot, but I got nervous and pulled back.  More salt and pepper would have worked well when I seared the meat.  Still, the roast was great.

After this experience, I'll be checking the Pioneer Woman site for more recipes.  The recipe was easy to follow, expanded my horizons a bit, and was a success.  I won't be making anything else this exciting this week, but I think one cooking adventure a week is enough.

*I got to use one of the cute little carts!  I love them!

**Since I'm not much of a drinker, I wandered around for quite a while trying to find the cheapest acceptable wine.  I knew we wouldn't drink any that was left over, so I found these cute little wine bottles that contained about a cup of wine.  They were shaped like a Guinness cup!  I did have to look it up to make sure the type I was getting was a red wine.  Don't judge me.

***I had heard of the word glaze, but deglazing was a new term for me.  Thanks, Ree!

This is what deglazing looks like!

****They just are.  Trust me on this.

*****After buying the ingredients and the Dutch oven, I figure this whole thing cost around $65.  Granted, most of that was the Dutch oven, but that is still a lot of money.  We do have enough roast to last another five or six meals.