The past several months I've kind of gone a different direction with meal preparation. I've just been using simple, basic, easy-to-source ingredients, most of which you probably already have in the pantry or fridge. I was getting so tired of seeing all of these professional chef inspired recipes loaded full of exotic, expensive, and difficult-to-source ingredients. They want you to go out and spend $50 for several different things that you're only going to use a very small amount of just to make one meal, then you're gonna have all this stuff left that you probably have no use for
Maybe I'm on a secret crusade (even unknown to me) to show that a really good meal can be prepared and served that also presents beautifully but doesn't require a bunch of weird stuff that the basic backyard Joe isn't going to have available. Yesterday however I decided to step things up a bit. Not so much with exotic ingredients, but certainly something a bit more upscale. I have a beautiful CPB eye round roast in the freezer i was gonna do but nope....Tracy is not having any of that. She declared that we are having prime rib. Far be it from me to refuse so I got on the horn and ordered the standing rib roast from Certified Piedmontese Beef. Here is the final menu I decided yo put together:
-Rib roast on the rotisserie of the Santa Maria grill cooked over mesquite
-Garlic mashed potatoes
-Burgundy mushroom gravy
-Grilled asparagus in Hollansaise sauce topped with mozzarella cheese and homemade bacon crumbles
-Homemade Au jus
-Fresh dinner rolls with butter
Here's how this came together. Started with the CPB roast. It's a 3-bone, 5# roast
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Time to light a fire!!
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Roast on the rotisserie spit and a liberal coating of my beef rub applied (2 pics)
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And we're off!!
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Slice the portabellas and let them cook down a bit in butter
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Build the burgundy sauce with the mushrooms and let it cook down a bit
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Bacon crumbles for the asparagus
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Roast coming along beautifully
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Asparagus with the Hollandaise sauce on the grill
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Top the asparagus with cheese and bacon crumbles
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Roast done and into the house to rest for a few minutes
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5#, 3 bones = 3 slices...each almost 2#. The dark color you see on the meat is from the juice left on the cutting board after slicing that I dribbled on the meat. No way was I gonna let that go to waste!!
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The full spread
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Money shot!! My plate, 2 pics
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At the end of the day, this was THE BEST rib roast or prime rib I've ever done. The quality of the meat was exquisite...so tender, so flavorful, and incredibly juicy. I ran a hot fire to get a nice bark on the meat that was to die for!! It was kind of a test to see if my beef rub would crust up, and it did. The flavor on that bark is unlike any I've ever had and the rich smokiness from the mesquite was simply amazing. This is the first time I've done asparagus like this but it's not going to be the last. This idea kind came together in my deviant little head and I couldn't let go of it so pulled the trigger. It was outstanding!! Of course you just cannot go wrong with mashed potatoes, especially when they are homemade as is that succulent burgundy mushroom gravy. Everybody said this was the best meal they have ever eaten that I've prepared, and better than pretty much anything they have had in a 5-star steak house. You just cannot get American beef that's of the same quality and flavor that the CPB has. A couple of new rules did come out of this however. Here are the new rules as mandated by Tracy:
1) We are to have a minimum of two of these roasts on hand at all times. This is in case we want to invite several people, we'll have the food for them
2) The way this roast was done in the ONLY way I'm ever to cook a prime rib or standing rib roast going forward. It was that good!!
3) We now have a new way to make asparagus (which we both love) and it's to be used _almost_ every time
These rules are set in stone, non-negotiable, and not open for interpretation. I'm fine with that though because it's the highest compliment I could ever get from her AND it keeps the money flowing for future endeavors
Heck, Rick, who was our only guest (his wife was hammered with cedar allergies and couldn't make it) said any time I want to cook one of these, he will happily pay for it. All in all I guess folks enjoyed this dinner. We did have apple pie for dessert but no pics. When I finished dinner I fell out of my chair, crawled across the family room floor, slithered through the doggy door onto the patio, and pretty much passed out. The last thing in the world I felt like doing was going back into the house to get my phone to take a pic of the pie. Please just use your imagination for this one
Well, that's it. I'm done for now but will probably be back some time in the near future
Robert
