From the chef’s corner….

Thistle Hill Farm communicates with its friends, neighbors and customers (generally everyone falls in all three groups) not only with this website and blog, but with Facebook and an occasional newsletter to those who ask to be put on our mailing list to be told when beef and pork is about to become available.

The other day, our daughter-in-law, Barbara, cooked a roast for her family using Thistle Hill beef, of course.  It was a big success and she emailed us the recipe and we shared it with our meat customers.  The recipe provoked quite a bit of interest so we thought we’d bring it over to our Blog. As you know, in the summer we tend not to put roasts in our packages but now that it is Fall (well, almost) we will resume including top round and eye-of-round.

Grass bed beef can be a bit tricky to prepare….easy to overcook….and that’s why we recommended coating all cuts with olive oil….turning after two minutes and then baking to desired doneness…usually not more than a few minutes more. Roasts can be seared but generally need to be slow-cooked….and that’s where our Barbara comes in.  She and grandson David prepared a top round roast just last night and her family was ecstatic.  She’s a good cook so she generally “wings” everything.  But here’s her email:

I am on my way out but before I forget what I did last night here is the recipe I kind of made up as I went along.

2 cups water

2 beef bouillon cubes (Knorr)

1 medium sweet onion sliced

6 cloves garlic whole

1- 2 cup baby carrots

2 small potatoes cubed

Thistle Hill top round roast

 olive oil

garlic salt

fresh basil

1/4 cup Marsala wine

I browned the garlic and onion in a dutch oven on the stove, added the beef on med high heat to brown on both sides. Added the carrots and potatoes. Add the water and bouillon and wine- turning meat every 20 minutes.  Turn the heat to simmer after 45 mins (adding more water if necessary).  After 2 hours turn heat to medium and add the basil, garlic salt.  David used that broth to make the gravy (which we kept separate) from a Knorr beef gravy packet.  By the time I got home, it was almost like a shredded meat but not as stringy and it melted in your mouth, but still had a nice texture.    Oh and the potatoes did not keep form, they kind of mushed into the broth, which we liked, carrots were fine.

As I said, we circulated the recipe to our meat customers and that triggered some further ideas.  From Sue B:

Another trick which we have used on Venison ~ after cooking as you like (as per recipe) inject some Knorrs Au Jus, heated & dissolved, and still warm/med hot. (I have access to needles and syringes from my veterinarian husband, but there are “meat injectors”)  allow to rest before carving ~ the hotter the Au Jus is the more it will “cook” the beef, so keep this in mind.

And then from Linda M:

Thanks so much for the recipe.  I’ll have to try that.  I usually use recipes developed by Barefoot Contessa (Ina Garten of FoodNetwork fame).  Her rib roast is perfect every time! 

I’ll let you know how we like this recipe.  One thing I’ve found gives the roast a much richer flavor and better depth is to use sherry in addition to Marsala or a good dry red wine and to use beef demi-glace.  That’s a concentrate of beef stock that has the consistency of dark brown molasses but lends a wonderful beefiness to the dish.