Here are two recipes for an alternative Sunday roast. The first for a Pot Roast using lean topside of beef and is cooked in the oven for a few hours. The second recipe uses a cheaper cut of beef: silverside, it’s cooked for 8-10 hours and comes from Justine’s Slow-cooker without the calories book.
Pot Roast Beef
This is an easy way to cut the calories in your usual Sunday roast and it is one of those all-in-one dishes you can bung in the oven and almost forget about for a few hours. Serve with freshly cooked green beans or shredded savoy cabbage.
Ingredients
- 1.2 kg lean beef topside, rolled and tied
- 1 tsp flaked sea salt, plus extra to season
- 1 tbsp sunflower oil
- 3 medium onions, each cut into 8 wedges
- 3 fresh bushy thyme spigs
- 1 large bay leaf
- 2 tbsp tomato purée
- 200 ml red wine
- 400 ml hot beef stock, made with 1 beef stock cube
- 500 g medium carrots, about 6, each cut into roughly 4cm lengths
- 6 celery sticks, cut into roughly 4cm lengths
- ground black pepper
- roughly chopped flat leaf parsley, to garnish (optional)
Instructions
- Season the beef all over with the salt and lots of black pepper. Heat the oil in a large non-stick frying pan and brown the beef over a fairly high heat for about 10 minutes, turning every couple of minutes. Preheat the oven to 170°C/Fan 150°C/Gas 3.
- Transfer the beef to a casserole and put it to one side. Add an onion to the frying pan and fry over a medium heat for 5 minutes, or until nicely browned, stirring regularly. Stir in the thyme and bay leaf and cook for a few second more, then add to the casserole and tuck around the beef.
- Stir the tomato purée and wine into the hot beef stock and pour around the beef. Cover the pan with a lid and cook in the oven for 1 hour.
- Remove the dish from the oven and take off the lid. Turn the beef over and nestle all the remaining vegetables around it. Cover with the lid again and return to the oven for a further 1 1/2-2 hours. or until the beef is very tender and yields completely to the pressure of a spoon.
- Lift the beef out of the dish with a couple of forks and place it on a board or serving platter. If you prefer a thicker gravy, reduce the sauce on the hob at this point. Cut the string away from the beef and carve it into slices. Serve with the poached vegetables and the rich cooking liquor for gravy. Garnish with parsley , if using.
