Cook’s notes
“Pot roast” is more of a cooking method rather than the name of a specific dish. Pot roast covers an array of dishes where tougher cuts of beef — stewing beef, in other words — are simmered in a pot, often with vegetables, until tender.
In this recipe, beef brisket is browned in butter and slow cooked with spices and herbs rather than traditional root vegetables such as potatoes and carrots.
(Our herb and vegetable garden is in full bloom and it was just a perfect time to use the tarragon which had grown so much that the sprigs are starting to bow down with the weight of the leaves.)
The reduced cooking liquid, deliriously aromatic with a deep rich flavor by the time the beef is tender, is strained and thickened into a gravy.
The sliced beef is served alongside mashed potatoes with gravy poured over them.
Beef brisket and gravy
Ingredients
Pot roast
- 1 kilogram beef brisket (2.2 pounds)
- ¼ cup butter
- 6 cups chicken bone broth
- 2 sprigs tarragon
- 1 sprig oregano
- 2 bay leaves
- 4 cloves garlic pounded
- 1 onion halved
- ½ teaspoon peppercorns
- 1 ½ tablespoons rock salt
Gravy
- ¼ cup butter softened to room temperature
- ¼ cup all-purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
- salt
- pepper
To serve
- mashed potatoes
- salad greens (optional)
Instructions
Cook the pot roast
- Rinse the beef brisket and wipe dry with paper towels.
- Melt the butter in a heavy pan.
- Over high heat, brown the beef brisket in the butter, turning the meat every few minutes for even browning.
- Pour in the broth and add the rest of the ingredients under "pot roast".
- Bring to the boil, lower the heat and cover the pan tightly.
- Simmer the beef brisket for two to two-and-a-half hours or until fork tender.
- Scoop out the cooked beef and move to a plate. Cover the plate loosely with foil.
Make the gravy
- Strain the liquid in which the beef brisket was cooked.
- In a sauce pan, dump the butter and, as it melts, add all the flour.
- Cook the butter and flour, stirring, until amber colored.
- Ladle in the strained cooking liquid slowly with one hand while stirring with a spatula using your other hand.
- When the liquid has been incorporated, ladle in more, stirring to incorporate after each addition.
- Keep adding cooking liquid until your desired consistency is reached.
- Stir in the Worcestershire sauce.
- Taste, and add salt and pepper, if needed.
Assemble your pot roast and gravy
- Thinly slice the beef and arrange on plates (optionally lined with salad greens) with mashed potato on the side.
- Drizzle gravy on the sliced pot roast and mashed potato, and serve with more gravy on the side.
Mapo tofu
