crock pot pot roast.

It's officially fall and that's the beginning of my cooking season! By now you must have realized I have a slight obsession with my crock pot. Tonight I made a pot roast, complete with all the veggies and homemade gravy. I prepped it all the night before and put it in the fridge overnight; this morning I set it to low and left it for the day.  I was a little nervous about it, but it was actually really good and basically effortless. One great thing about this meal is that it has a lot of root vegetables which are coming in to season.

Pot Roast (serves 4-5)
3-3 1/2 lb lean roast, trimmed (I used top round roast)
1/3 cup flour plus 3 tbsp flour, divided
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
2 tsp olive oil
4 carrots
3 potatoes
3 small turnip
2 small yellow onions
2-3 celery stalks
1/2 cup mushroom gravy
1/4 cup water

You may want to prep everything the night before as this is a 10 hour cooking process.  First start by giving all of the veggies a coarse chop. Peel the carrots and cut them into thirds, peel the potatoes, onions, and turnips and quarter them, slice the celery into thirds and add them to the crock pot.

In a skillet, heat the oil. Add 1/3 cup flour, salt and pepper to a plate. Pat the meat dry and roll in the flour to cover it, shake off the excess. Add it to the skillet just to brown it. This will help seal in the flavors of the beef.

1) flour it

2) brown it

Once browned, add it to the crock pot on top of the veggies. Add the 1/4 cup water to the empty skillet to transfer the drippings and excess flour to the crock pot.

Top the beef with 1/2 cup mushroom gravy. This will prevent it from drying out over the long cooking process. If you are prepping the night before, this is the stopping point. You can place the lid on the crock pot and stick it in the fridge until you're ready. When you're ready, turn the crock pot on low heat and cook for 10 hours.  Set the crock pot to high for the last hour to ensure that all the veggies cook through.

When it's ready, you can remove the meat and veggies from the pot. You can make gravy with the drippings and juice from the vegetables.  Transfer the liquid into a small pot and set on medium heat. There was barely any visible fat in the juice because the cut of meat was very lean. If you do see a lot of fat in the juices, you can ladle it out before you start your gravy to keep it healthy. While stirring constantly with a whisk, add flour 1 tbsp at a time.  It will thicken up into a brown gravy-- I thought this was a necessary addition as the meat was a little on the dry side by itself. I was pleasantly surprised by how this one turned out. I hope you enjoy it too!