Mama's Pot Roast

Fork-tender chuck roast recipe with potatoes and carrots slow-roasted with beefy gravy made with Lipton onion soup mix. 

I've cooked roasts six ways from Sunday but my all-time favorite is the way my mama cooks it... with Lipton Beefy Onion Soup Mix. You just can't beat it. It's easy and ALWAYS turns out perfect.

If your goal is a fork-tender roast that falls apart if you look at it hard, always go with a chuck roast. The marbling and cut is what yields the super tender results.

Mama's Pot Roast
1 3-lb chuck roast
2 tablespoons olive oil
Salt & pepper
2 envelopes Lipton Beefy Onion Soup Mix
2 cups water
4-5 medium potatoes, peeled & halved
2-3 cups baby carrots
2-3 onions, quartered
2 tablespoons cornstarch

Season roast on both sides with salt and pepper. Heat olive oil in a large skillet on high heat. Sear each side of roast (and sides if thick enough) in hot skillet about 2 minutes or until nicely browned on each side. Place roast in a large roasting pan.

Combine both soup mixes with water and stir well. Pour soup mixture in roasting pan (not on top of the meat). Cover with a tight-fitting lid or tightly with aluminum foil. Bake at 300 degrees for 2 hours.

Note: If you're roasting in the same pan you seared the meat, remove the roast and set it aside before you add the liquid. If you put the liquid in a hot pan it could start to boil which will "seize" the roast and make it tough. For more on that and some of my other tips, click here.

Remove pan from oven and ladle out 1 cup of broth; set aside. Add potatoes, carrots and onions to pan surrounding the roast. Cover pan tightly again and continue baking for 1 hour. Remove pan from oven. Move roast and vegetables to a serving platter and cover to keep warm.

To make gravy, place roasting pan on the stove (to cover 2 burners if using an elongated pan) and heat on medium-high heat. Add cornstarch to a small bowl and whisk in reserved 1 cup of broth. Whisk cornstarch mixture into pan juices and heat until simmering. Simmer for 3-4 minutes, whisking continually, until thickened.

PRINTABLE RECIPE

Hamburger Steaks with Brown Gravy

The BEST recipe for Hamburger Steaks made from fresh ground beef with an easy, homemade brown gravy.

JUMP TO RECIPE

Can you think of many things that are better than brown gravy? I would, honest to God, choose a plate of rice and gravy with a side of black-eyed peas and fresh sliced tomatoes over filet mignon. I’m not even kidding.

And, ummm... I'm  not trying to brag or anything but... if there's ONE thing I'm great at, it's making gravy. If they had a cooking competition for gravy, I could win that sucker blind-folded and drunk with one hand tied behind my back.

Making biscuits? Negative. Cooking a steak to the perfect temperature without cutting it to peak inside? Dumb luck if I do. Decorating beautiful cakes with hand-piped icing? No way. But making gravy? Oh yeah, that's my jam.

You can make brown gravy from just about any kind of meat that’s cooked to yield pan drippings. I guess that’s why we just call it “brown” gravy because you can’t really pigeonhole it into just beef, pork or chicken gravy.

Sometimes I add onions to this but the white onions I had on-hand were wicked strong and I didn't want to overpower the taste of the gravy. If you want to add onions, just slice a medium onion into rings and add to the pan while you’re searing your hamburger steaks.

If you love gravy, double the recipe below. I always eyeball my roux when making gravy like this. I add enough flour to the pan drippings to make it about the consistency of ketchup, cook the four until light brown then add broth or water, while constantly whisking, until it's the thickness that I'm after.

Recipe for Hamburger Steaks with Brown Gravy

Here are some of my favorite sides to serve with Hamburger Steaks & Brown Gravy:

• Southern Style Potato Salad - Classic potato salad with boiled eggs, mayo, a dab of relish and a touch of mustard.
• Slow Cooker Pinto Beans - Tender, saucy, slow cooked pinto beans perfect with a little diced onion on top.
• Green Beans & Potatoes - Southern style slow cooked green beans cooked with bacon, onions and potatoes.
• Southern Style Mac & Cheese - Custard style baked macaroni and cheese with eggs and evaporated milk.
• Black-Eyed Peas - Slow cooked black-eyed peas cooked with ham or bacon until saucy and tender.
• Fried Cabbage - Chopped fresh cabbage sauteed in bacon grease seasoned with simple salt and pepper.

Hamburger Steaks with Brown Gravy

Yield: 4 Servings

Author: Mandy Rivers | South Your Mouth

Prep time: 10 MinCook time: 20 MinTotal time: 30 Min

The BEST recipe for Hamburger Steaks made from fresh ground beef with an easy, homemade brown gravy.

Ingredients

Hamburger Steaks:

• 1 pound ground beef
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil

Brown Gravy:

• 1/4 cup pan drippings
• 1/4 cup flour
• 2 14-oz cans beef broth
• Salt & pepper to taste

Instructions

Make the steaks:

1. Crumble ground beef in a medium bowl and add salt, pepper, onion powder and garlic powder; mix by hand until seasoning is evenly distributed taking care not to over-work the meat. Shape ground beef into four thin hamburger steaks (about 1/2 inch thick).
2. Heat vegetable oil in a frying pan over medium-high heat. Once the pan is good and hot, cook steaks on each side for 4-5 minutes or until nicely seared. Remove steaks to a plate and set aside (do not worry if they are cooked through, they will finish cooking in the gravy).

Make the gravy:

1. Reduce frying pan temperature to medium. Pour off pan drippings into a cup or bowl, measure 1/4 cup of the drippings then add back to the pan (the hamburgers should yield 1/4 cup of pan drippings but if you’re short, add vegetable oil or butter).
2. Add flour to pan then whisk to incorporate. Continue cooking and whisking for about 3-5 minutes or until roux is medium brown.
3. Add beef stock and continue whisking for 2-3 minutes or until gravy starts to thicken a little (gravy will be thin). Add salt and pepper to taste.
4. Add hamburger steaks to gravy, reduce heat to medium-low then continue cooking, uncovered, for 15-20 minutes or until meat juices run clear and gravy has reduced and thickened.
5. Serve with white rice or mashed potatoes.

https://www.southyourmouth.com/2012/09/hamburger-steaks-with-brown-gravy.html

Images and text © South Your Mouth LLC 2012

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Ranch Dressing with Greek Yogurt

um. what?

There are two things that occasionally happen to me while stalking Pinterest that cause me to feel like I’m going to throw up or either go bang my face in a wall. Well, three if you count all the pictures with various people saying things in the "ERMAHGERD" voice. And maybe four if you count all the ridonkulous crock pot recipes (seriously, don't you look at some of them and think but why??). OK, five. Maybe there are actually five because I reeeally can't stand the cutey pie animal photos (usually kittens) with the intentionally misspelled captions. Anywho...

One is when I see a wildly popular recipe that’s JUST LIKE something I make but have never blogged and I know that when I do finally get around to making it and blogging about it people are going to be like, “You know that hooker just saw that on Pinterest and copied it.” I spent y e a r s perfecting my pound cake recipe to find an almost identical (and of course, uber popular) recipe on Pinterest.

The other thing is when I have an idea I want to try but before I can get to it, someone else does it and blows up the interwebs with it.

This is one of those times. I have fallen in love with Greek yogurt this year. I’d been thinking about using it to make ranch dressing… thinking that the twang from the yogurt would represent the buttermilk beautifully. And since we use ranch a LOT, this would be a great healthy alternative.

And then I hopped on Pinterest one day and saw that someone had beaten me to the punch. And made it exactly like I’d been thinking. DANG IT!

The recipe I saw online called for 1/2 cup of milk but I only used 1/4 cup. Different brands might yield different results so start with 1/4 cup and add more if you want. I expected mine to “set up” and that I might have to add more milk but it didn't. If yours sets up thicker than you want, add more milk if necessary.

I won't try to tell you that this tastes and feels exactly like traditional, fat-filled ranch dressing, but it's pretty dang good. The difference in fat content more than makes up for whatever differences there are in flavor. This is going to be a staple in our house from now on.

Ranch Dressing with Greek Yogurt
1 cup plain, strained Greek Yogurt
1 envelope Ranch Dressing mix
1/4 cup milk*

Whisk together yogurt and dressing and mix until thoroughly incorporated. Add milk and whisk until combined. Pour into a jar or plastic bottle and refrigerate for 4 hours. Store in refrigerator.

I honestly don’t know what the shelf-life is, but I would use the expiration date of the milk as my “use by” date.

*omit milk for Ranch Dip

PRINTABLE RECIPE

Whipped Nutella Cream Pie

I’ve been toying around with ideas for a creamy Nutella pie for a while now. Like a peanut butter pie, but with Nutella.

In theory I’d just whip some cream with the Nutella and call it a day. But I wasn’t sure if that would work so I searched online to see if anyone else had done that because I really didn’t want to waste an entire jar of Nutella on a failed pie attempt.

I couldn’t find anything with just whipping cream and Nutella. All sorts of things were running through my mind... Will it be sweet enough? Will the cream whip? Will it set up right?

All the recipes I found online called for cream cheese and sugar (which I’m sure is divine) but I really just wanted to keep it simple. So I finally just said to hell with it and gave it a shot. Because I’m ca-razy like that y’all… I’m a regular thrill seeking freak show living on the edge. WAAAHOOOOOO!!! Or something like that.

Are you ready for THE EASIEST PIE RECIPE in the history of EVER?

Whipped Nutella Cream Pie
1 13-oz. jar Nutella
1 pint heavy whipping cream*
1 deep dish 9” pie crust of choice

Add Nutella to a stand mixer or large bowl and whip with whisk beaters on medium speed until very fluffy (about two minutes). Slowly add whipping cream and continue mixing until thoroughly combined, stopping to scrape down the sides. Increase speed to high and whip until soft peaks form (about 3-4 minutes).  Pour filling into a prepared pie crust and chill for 6-8 hours or until set.

PRINTABLE RECIPE

You can build on this recipe in so many ways. I wanted to show you the base of it and give you the freedom to dress it up how you want. Some ideas that I will likely try on are:

Crust Options
-Crushed Oreo Crust
-Brownie base
-Hazelnut shortbread crust

Additional Options
-Melt Nutella and pour a thin layer in the bottom of the crust before adding filling
-Top with whipped cream, chopped hazelnuts, chocolate drizzle or chocolate curls

*You also want your whipping cream to be very cold – I place mine in the freezer for about 45 minutes before whipping.