Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Pot Roast??

I come from a long line of non-cooks, of which I am also one.  My mother made non cooking famous with her pot roast.  My father loved it so she made it often because she didn't know how to cook anything else.  He liked alot of things like canned yellow wax beans, peas and lima beans all of which were cause to spend time alone at the dining room table staring at my plate long after everyone else had left. More than anything, he loved the pot roast.  He cleaned his plate while the rest of the family picked at it only enough to be excused from the table.

I don't remember much about the pot roast itself, only that my siblings and I dreaded pot roast night.  So when my own husband asked me to make pot roast for him, the uncook side of me had to turn into a cook.  That is not an easy task.  I thought about if for awhile and figured how hard could it be?  A slab of inexpensive meat, a few potatoes, an onion and maybe a couple carrots, throw it all together in a pot and... Voila! Dinner.

Over the years, Richard ate the pot roast without complaint so it couldn't have been that bad.  So the other day when he brought a bowl of something in from the freezer, he thought was pot roast, one look at it brought all those childhoods memories flooding back.

The bowl of whatever looked disgusting with little cold dabs of fat congealed on top.  Thawing it didn't do it any favors.  The meat had taken on an unrecognizable pallor.  A few remaining carrots had turned brown and lifeless.  I heated it up and dished it onto our plates.  I swirled the meat through the gravy with my fork.  Slowly I lifted a piece to my mouth and chewed it.  One swallow and I could eat no more.  I watched Richard clean his plate and then mine.

Growing up with four kids, we never had leftovers.  I know my mother never served any that had spent time in the freezer.  The freezer didn't do the pot roast any favors.  But maybe that's the beauty of pot roast.  It's meant to be over cooked with the meat, potatoes and vegetables all touching each other in a big soupy mess. A pot roast is comfort food and we shouldn't analyze it too much.  Or maybe it's a guy thing and I need to make myself something more girlie on pot roast night.  Like a Lean Cuisine.

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