Perfect Roast Beef Recipe - Redhead Can Decorate (2024)

FAQs

What is the secret to a perfect roast? ›

The secret to making tender roast beef:

It's all about cooking low and slow. With a cut of meat like this, a longer cook time will give you better, more tender results. Ideally, all roasted meats would be seared on all sides in a hot skillet to develop a golden, delicious crust.

Beef muscle not exposed to oxygen (in vacuum packaging, for example) is burgundy or purplish in color. After exposure to the air for 15 minutes or so, the myoglobin receives oxygen and the meat turns bright, cherry red. After beef has been refrigerated for about five days, it may turn brown.

Besides keeping your roast beef cold and tightly wrapped, you can add a salt brine. Other than that, your best choices are to freeze it or scarf down what you have as quick as you can. If you keep it cold and the oxygen out, you can keep it a week. Rare beef will lose it's redness.

If you don't have a meat thermometer, check your beef is roasted by piercing it with a skewer. The juices should run red for rare, pink for medium and clear for well-done. Also, a meat thermometer should read 40C for rare (it will rise to 54-56C, medium-rare, as it sits) or 48C for medium (it will rise to 65C).

Parsnips and potatoes round out the vegetable portion of the roast, while the addition of garlic, tomato paste, and vinegar in the sauce add an incredible depth of flavor.

Myoglobin breaks down during cooking and causes meat to be brownish in color when cooked to well done (170+ F). Meat at lower degrees of doneness such as rare (140 F) and medium rare (145 F) has not fully denatured and still provides some red or pinkish red color to the cooked meat.

Meat that is bright red in color is very often sourced from younger animals that were freshly slaughtered. And while this freshness may seem ideal, it doesn't necessarily indicate flavor or quality. See, the meat of a younger animal has not developed enough muscle or fat to yield much in the way of flavor.

Oxygen from the air reacts with meat pigments to form a bright red color which is usually seen on the surface of meat purchased in the supermarket. The pigment responsible for the red color in meat is oxymyoglobin, a substance found in all warm-blooded animals. Fresh cut meat is purplish in color.

When cooking a roast in the oven, keep it uncovered until roasted to the desired doneness. After removing from the oven, tent with foil and let stand 15 minutes before carving. This allows the juices to redistribute, preventing them from draining out during carving—and preventing dry, disappointing meat.

How do you keep beef moist when roasting? ›

While the beef is cooking, lift it out of the oven from time to time, tilt the tin and baste the meat really well with its own juices – this ensures that the flavour that is concentrated in the fat keeps permeating the meat, and at the same time the fat keeps everything moist and succulent.

Bring roast to room temperature one hour prior to cooking. Preheat oven a half hour before putting the roast into the oven. Use the time chart as a general guide. Check the roast before the minimum time recommendation because each oven is different, and times will vary.

You'll notice our chart selects low to moderate heat, in the range of 325 or 350 degrees, for larger roasts and higher heat, above 400 degrees, for smaller, tender roasts to produce the best results.

When roasting meat and poultry, set the oven temperature to 325°F (163°C) or higher. Explore the charts below to learn how to get great results every time you cook.

Generally, fattier roasts come from the animal's forequarter, or front end, Gathy said. Or think of it this way: The most tender—and expensive—roasts come from the parts that move the least (think rib roast and tenderloin).

When cooking a roast in the oven, keep it uncovered until roasted to the desired doneness. After removing from the oven, tent with foil and let stand 15 minutes before carving. This allows the juices to redistribute, preventing them from draining out during carving—and preventing dry, disappointing meat.

8. Low and Slow is the Way to Go. Whether you cook your pot roast using a stovetop, oven, slow cooker, or pressure cooker method, you'll always get the most tender and flavorful results if you use low temperatures over a long period of time.

Baste meat every 30 minutes while it cooks to keep it moist.

This should help keep it from drying out and make it more flavorful. This is especially helpful for larger selections of meat, like roasts, but you can also use it on steak, pork chops, or even a simple chicken breast.