Oct 26 2014

Crock Pot Italian Style Pot Roast

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For me growing up Sundays were typically a huge pot roast dinner. This is one of those recipes that I can really only ever remembering my Dad make though I’m sure Mom was there with him adding stuff while he wasn’t looking. While Dad never wrote down recipes, heck Mom almost never did, I had to recreate this all from memory and taste. This recipe took me FOREVER to get to near perfect like his. I still think I’m missing “something” but for the life of me I can’t figure it out however I’m persistent. Or if all else fails I’ll take some to my sister and brother and see if they can recall.

I’m sure you can recall (unless you’re brand spankin’ new to the site – if so, welcome to the TKW Family!), growing up we had a big household/big eaters. 4 older brothers, my sister, parents and at least 3-6 friends were at every meal. These people ate a lot. I mean A LOT! This recipe is made in a standard crock pot (actually one of my favorite crock pots) but when Dad made it he made in Mom’s HUGE 21.5 quart blue pot that she used for canning (like this one!). No for real, he made 21.5 quarts of pot roast for dinner!

In this pot would easily be 15 pounds of pot roast, a 10lb bag of potatoes, 2-3 pounds of carrots and a whole bunch of other stuff. We almost never had leftovers either from all of that. Yes they were big eaters but honestly it was so amazing! The roast would just fall apart as soon as your fork touched it. So incredibly juicy and tender. And the flavor it took on from the liquids, herbs and seasonings… oh lord! There were Sundays when literally all I would put on my plate was a huge chunk of pot roast that I covered in ketchup.

Shush.. don’t judge me. Yes I like ketchup on my steak as well. I know, I’m weird but yet you still love me so you’re weird too. Weirdo *wink*! This would slow cook all day which made the house smell unbelievable. Now this dish, while made in a single pot, was really 2 full meals in one. This one, the amazing pot roast with carrots and potatoes, plus also it made beef red soup, which be in an upcoming recipe post.

If I can, let me tantalize you for a moment about that soup. Think of truly rich tomatoey beef broth packed with herbs and seasonings, shards of shredded beef, carrots and perhaps a rogue potato chunk or two all over extra wide egg noodles. It was hearty and a meal unto itself however in my house, this was the dish served BEFORE you ate the roast and veggies. Let me ask you when it comes to soup noodles do you have a preference? Growing up we were a house divided when it came to egg noodles. One half loved the extra wide ones while the other half (including me) loved the extra fine thin ones that were maybe an inch or so long. Mom would always make two types and put a huge colander of each in the sink (we had a double well sink).

But enough about soup… have to keep something for next time. Right now I want to focus on this pot roast. Traditionally when you think of pot roast most think of it in a brown type gravy, cut up into chunks. That’s great and I make that often but this one, this I wanted to recreate a childhood favorite. See it was a couple of weeks ago I was on Facebook when my Sister from another mother’s (SFAM), Mother posted that she made a huge pot of red soup. Now this is one dish she has always raved about of her Mom’s.

I asked her Mom to describe it and as she did it immediately triggered my Dad’s beef soup. It brought up such amazing memories and immediately put a smile on my face. I just had to make my Dad’s soup. As I said earlier normally he would make his in that huge canner pot but for me I wanted to go more updated and use my crock pot. Plus it allowed me to truly set it and forget about it. Leaving to me to tend to more important stuff… like working on my blog and editing photos. Oh yeah… and spending quality time with Mr. Fantabulous. Can’t forget about the man… lol

Now the trick to cooking fall-apart-roast beef is low and slow. You want it to cook for hours on end in the crock pot. If you don’t, it’ll be tough. Pot roast should NOT require a knife. Ever! If it does then you didn’t cook it long enough. And please I implore of you, while you cooking something, anything, in a crock pot do NOT open the lid until it’s done. Every time you remove the lid, you let all of that precious built up heat escape. To regain that heat and temp again takes up to 30 minutes which in turn extends your cooking time even longer. So please, refrain from removing the lid until the very end.

As this cooked all day I couldn’t help but have a constant smile on my face just thinking about to various childhood memories. Since Halloween is coming up I started thinking back to when I was in 4th grade and we got to wear our Halloween costumes to school. I went as a Barbie Princess (some surprise there huh? lol) only this costume was kinda cheesy. My Princess robe/cape was made out of this blue plastic type material that was more like one of those plastic table cloths. The skirt was I swear made for Barbie as it was RIDICULOUSLY small. So small that the whole butt portion didn’t close up so my Mom had to extend the strings to tie it around my waist. Yes I was a fat child but trust me, this was teeny.

I had some fake plastic jewelery and a tiara. But the worst… THE WORST part of the costume was that it had a mask. Yes, a mask that went over my face. It had that gum band type thing that you’d put behind your head that always, ALWAYS got tangled in your hair and would hurt like a S.O.B. when you took the mask off. And it was HOT! Like it had the ends cut out along with the nose holes and mouth but it was HOT. And the look of it… oh sweet Jesus! I looked like a plasticized-face-melted hooker! I’m talking about some back alley livin’ on skid row nasty raggedy one. No seriously it was bad, real bad! However that’s how the costumes were back then.

What was cool is that our teachers then took us around the neighborhood to go trick or treating and put on a parade for the houses. I think everyone felt bad for me as I got the most candy. It was either they felt bad for me because I looked like an 8-year-old hooker with a melted plastic face and her butt hanging out with a plastic table-cloth cape or because I was the fat kid. Either way SCORE for me with the candy. haha

God I had forgotten all about that costume until now. I love when food triggers memories, don’t you? For this year I have no clue what we’ll dress up as but I do know it will not be Barbie. LOL So anyway, after 9 hours in the crock this was ready to eat. As I lifted the lid all those amazing aromatics hit my nose and immediately I got so super excited. You know how you just know something is going to taste amazing? Yeah, I just knew it with this one! Using my large slotted spoon I scooped out the potatoes and carrots. Since I knew the roast was going to be super tender and fall-apart I took 2 very large spatulas and scooped it out. As soon as I put it down on the plate and touched it with a fork the meat just seemed to shred itself.

I *may or may not have* snuck a few (5) bites while I was plating it. God you want to talk about AMAZING!!! It was so incredibly tender and full of rich beef flavor. I couldn’t wait to finish up the photo shoot as I needed this in my belly! And just like my childhood I plated it the same way…. slice of roast that I rough chopped with my fork and loads of ketchup. For the potatoes and carrots it’s always the same way. I take the back of my fork and mash them down. Top with lots of butter, some salt and pepper.

To me this is the perfect Sunday supper. It’s old-fashioned comfort food for me. Not only does it warm the tummy but it warms my soul and always brings a smile to my face.