SC - recipe trading (was: theme menus)

[david friedman]

My first attemp at redacting the roast beef recipe came out fairly 
well.  I had a 1.5 pound beef shoulder roast, about 2 inches thick.  I 
coated it with 2 TBS kosher salt, 2 TBS crushed black pepper, 1 
TBS fennel seeds, and a large minced garlic clove.  I covered the 
meat with plastic wrap, weighed it down with cast iron skillets, and 
left it in the fridge for 4 hours.

I preheated the oven to 325F.  I quartered an onion, and separated 
it into individual layers.  I put the onion pieces in the bottom of a 
roasting pan, then put a rack over them.  I roasted the beef for 1.5 
hours.  It was medium-well done, and not overly dry, but there were 
very little drippings and some of the onion pieces blackened 
instead of cooking in the fat.

I made a sauce with 1.5 cups red grape juice (not Concord) boiled 
down to 3/4 cup, 1.5 TBS red wine vinegar, and a sprinkling each of 
black pepper and mixed sweet spices (cinnamon, clove, nutmeg, I 
think).  I poured the juice mixture into the roasting pan when it 
came out of the oven, so it would mix with what drippings there 
were.  I strained the sauce before serving.

Results: the meat was a touch more cooked than I cared for.  Next 
time I would cook it to medium.  The seasonings were delicious, 
but a bit too intensely spicy, and I found the texture of the whole 
fennel seeds annoying.  Next time, reduce seasonings, and 
possibly used ground fennel instead of whole seeds.  Maybe a 
fattier chuck roast would produce more drippings?

Conclusion: certainly worth trying again.  The flavor combinations 
worked much better than I would have guessed.


Lady Brighid ni Chiarain
Settmour Swamp, East (NJ)
mka Robin Carroll-Mann
now at a new address: rcmann4 at earthlink.net