What meal do you associate with home-cookin’? For me, it’s pot roast. Juicy, tender, and slow-cooked, a pot roast requires preparation and patience, but the end result is perfection.
When I began cooking, I had always been intimidated of making a pot roast – the danger of drying out the meat, the lengthy cook-time – but when I came across a recipe, about two years ago, with a title proclaiming to be “to die for” and after further examination, I saw I was completely capable of following the directions, I gave it a shot. And you know what? The title didn’t lie, it was the best-ever pot roast.
Speaking of best-ever, I’d give an award to Red Lobster for their biscuits. Cheesy, garlicky and buttery, their Cheddar Bay biscuits get my stomach grumbling just at the thought! I read an ABC News top secret recipe article several years back and it’s the only way I make biscuits now, copying the original.
It’s funny how, much like a song, a food can trigger a memory or a feeling. Pot roast, one of my favorite comfort foods, simply makes me nostalgic for home – I guess that’s the power of comfort food. Yet those biscuits remind me of a specific memory. My immediate family – Mom, Dad, my brother Robert – as well as my Aunt Karen, Uncle David and Aunt Kiyomi, their daughters and my cousins Holly and Becky, all went to Red Lobster for my grandma’s 80th birthday in Tulsa, OK. And I remember devouring Cheddar Bay biscuits. I am not sure if I had never had the biscuits there before. Or maybe the fact that I was NOT a fan of seafood at the time so they were about the only thing on the menu that I would touch, but these tasty delicacies always remind me of that day with the family, celebrating. And that’s a comfort in and of itself.
I decided to combine two of my favorite comfort foods for this week’s recipe: Pot Roast Sliders on Cheddar Bay Biscuits.
For the Pot Roast:
To Die For Roast
(adapted from the recipe on recipegoldmine.com)
1 beef roast (any kind)
1 envelope Hidden Valley Ranch salad dressing mix (Note: This is quite salty, so I typically use only half of the Ranch envelope.)
1 envelope brown gravy mix
1 envelope of Pot Roast mix
1 envelope Italian dressing mix
1 cup warm water
1) Place roast in crock pot.
Cheddar Bay Biscuits
(From abcnews.go.com, Recipe courtesy of Todd Wilbur, “Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2,” Plume Books.)
Ingredients:
2 ½ cups Bisquick baking mix
¾ cup cold whole milk
4 tablespoons cold butter (1/2 stick)
¼ teaspoon garlic powder
1 heaping cup grated cheddar cheese
Brush on Top:
2 tablespoons butter, melted
¼ teaspoon dried parsley flakes
½ teaspoon garlic powder
pinch salt
Directions:
1. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.
2. Combine Bisquick with cold butter in a medium bowl using a pastry cutter or a large fork. You don’t want to mix too thoroughly. There should be small chunks of butter in there that are about the size of peas. Add cheddar cheese, milk, and ¼ teaspoon garlic. Mix by hand until combined, but don’t over mix.
3. Drop approximately ¼-cup portions of the dough onto an ungreased cookie sheet using an ice cream scoop.
4. Bake for 15 to 17 minutes or until the tops of the biscuits begin to turn light brown.
5. When you take the biscuits out of the oven, melt 2 tablespoons butter is a small bowl in your microwave. Stir in ½ teaspoon garlic powder and the dried parsley flakes. Use a brush to spread this garlic butter over the tops of all the biscuits. Use up all of the butter. Makes one dozen biscuits.
For Horseradish Mayo:
Ingredients:
2 tbsp of mayonnaise
1 tbsp of prepared horseradish
Directions:
1) Mix together mayonnaise and prepared horseradish.
2) Cover and store in refrigerator until time to use.
To Make Pot Roast Sliders:
Ingredients:
To Die For Pot Roast
12 Cheddar Bay Biscuits
Horseradish Mayo
Muenster Cheese
Directions:
1) Take two biscuits (one will be the top of your slider, the other will be the bottom of your slider) and slather on horseradish mayo.
2) Add a couple forkfuls of pot roast to the bottom slider.
3) Add cheese and the top slider. Microwave for 20 seconds so that cheese is melty and bubbly.
4) Serve immediately. Yields 6 sliders.
If watching hockey players on the ice makes you chilly, try this comfort food recipe, sure to warm you up! Friday, the Nashville Predators and Phoenix Coyotes play Game 1 in their series or tune in on Saturday as the Los Angeles Kings play Game 1 against the St. Louis Blues.
