Bloody Mary Beef Barbecue
Tuesday, February 28th, 2017This is a super-easy recipe and it works with any cut of braising beef. I usually use chuck roast, but have done it with brisket, rump roast, and shanks as well.
- 1 (3-ish pound) chuck roast
- 2 (28-ounce) cans tomato product: I like 6-in-1 Ground Tomato Product, but crushed, diced, or sauce will all work fine
- 1/2 small jar prepared horseradish. Not the creamed stuff.
- Herbs and Spices to taste: salt, pepper, aleppo pepper, oregano or marjoram, basil, thyme, +/- other spices depending on your mood and tastes; plus one dash of cloves
- Seasoned salt for seasoning the meat
- Rub the meat on both sides with your favorite seasoned salt mix (I make my own each time and finagle it to taste).
- Choose a pan that you can cover. I usually use a cast iron pot, but lately have been using a 6-inch deep 1/2 hotel pan because I’ve been making double or triple batches.
- Pour a little of the tomato mix into the bottom of the pan, put the meat in that, and then cover with the rest of the tomato mix.
- Put in a 250-degree oven for about 6 hours or until it shreds easily.
- Pull the meat from the sauce and put the sauce on the stove to reduce and thicken while you shred the meat.
- Shred the meat (removing any bones, fat, and/or connective tissue).
- Toss meat with sauce. Use any leftover sauce as a delicious soup base.
This meal is the start of Radiatore Angstromi Pasta! It takes very little time, and because the meat can so easily be cooked from frozen, you only have to plan 6-7 hours in advance of when you want to eat (assuming you’ve got some sort of a pot roast in your freezer to cook).
Caveats: Thicker cuts of beef may take longer to cook. It’s ok to bump the heat up to 275 or 300 if you want to decrease the cooking time. You can use this same concept with any sort of liquid sauce; the important part to understand here is using long, low, moist heat on cuts of meat that have more connective tissue (here is a card I did for Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank that shows which cuts of beef these are). As the Beastie Boys once said, “Let it flow, let yourself go, slow and low: that is the tempo!”
