Mississippi Roast

My husband is a big carnivore.  Yours probably is as well.  My mother-in-law loves to tell the story of when he was about 5 years old and declared that he "didn't trust nothing green!"  I, on the other hand, am just as happy eating a vegetarian meal as I am eating a well-prepared steak.  This recipe, however, knocked my SOCKS off.  I want to eat it every. Single. Day.  I beg you - please make it as written the first time and don't balk at the peppers.  It is NOT spicy.  You can discard those little peppers at the end and pretend it never ever touched your food, I promise.

Props to Table for Two for sharing this.  It's awesome.  The leftovers are even better, and I get skeeved out by eating leftover meat.  I called dibs on the leftovers, the hubs wanted to fight me for them.

Ingredients:  

3 lbs. chuck roast

1 envelope dry ranch dressing (1 oz)

1 envelope dry au jus mix (1 oz)

6 Tbsp. butter

1/4 C. water

5-6 jarred pepperoncini peppers

Add water to crockpot.  Place the roast on top.  Sprinkle the dry ranch dressing on top of the meat, then the dry au jus.  Dot with butter.  Place peppers around the roast.  Cook on low for 6-8 hours.  When it's done, it will fall apart.  Proceed to swoon. 

You could also shred this with two forks and make the BEST drip beef sandwiches out of it!

Crockpot Beef Stew

Baby, it's COLD outside.  Iowa winters suck.  I tend to make a lot of soups and stews in the winter, but I'm really picky about my beef stew.  I've tried a million recipes, none of which I've been ecstatic with.  I came across this one on Pinterest and doctored it up.  I was very pleased with the results, I hope you will be too! 

Ingredients:

2 lb. beef stew meat, cut into cubes

1 lb. carrots, peeled and cut into chunks

4 medium potatoes, cut into chunks (I like to leave the skin on)

1 onion, diced

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 (8 oz) container fresh mushrooms, sliced

1 bay leaf

2 envelopes dry brown gravy

1 envelope McCormick beef stew seasoning

1 C. red wine

2 tsp. Kitchen Bouquet

3-4 C. beef broth

Mix meat, veggies, and seasoning ingredients into crockpot insert.  Pour in enough beef broth so that everything is submerged.  Cook on high 4-6 hours or low 6-8 hours.  To thicken, make a cornstarch slurry by mixing 2 tsp. cornstarch with 2 tsp. water - pour into stew and stir occasionally until stew has thickened to desired consistency.