The Best No-Name Dinner

I remember walking into our former babysitter’s house to pick my boys up on a few occasions and smelling the aroma of something wonderful for dinner.  Come to find out it was roast.  Now this wasn’t your typical potatoes and carrot roast.  It was roast—Mexican style.  You see her mother-in-law is Hispanic, and this was a recipe she taught to my sitter. So, based on the smell and the rave reviews she gave it, I had to make the roast. 

And that was what my family had for dinner tonight. The only word I can think of to describe it is PHENOMENAL. No exaggeration.  It was easily one of the best meals I have ever cooked.  And it gets even better. It is also one of the easiest meals I have ever cooked. Score!  The only downfall is it takes all day to cook, so you have to babysit it a little bit.  But if you are going to be home all day anyway, you might want to need HAVE to make this for dinner.

Note: I’m sorry I have no pictures of this.  I was too excited about making it and then way too excited about eating it to remember to take pictures. Next time I make it, I’ll add some shots to this post.

Here is how simple this is.  Get a roast ( I don’t think the type of roast really matters, but you might find one cut is better than another.  I don’t even know for sure what kind I used tonight; I think it was a rump roast.) Put the roast in a Dutch oven and cover it with water. Chop 4 or 5 or 6 garlic cloves and add to water along with a healthy amount salt and pepper.  Put the Dutch oven on a  burner set on medium-low-ish heat. You kind of, sort of cover the pot with a lid.  Don’t put the lid on all the way; put it on kind of crooked-like.  Leave it so that some of the steam is able to escape. Hope that makes sense.

Now you babysit it.  Let it simmer for 5-6 hours adding water to the pot every so often to keep the roast covered throughout the process.

Isn’t this difficult so far? (Hope you sense the sarcasm there.) Now here come the hardest part. Get ready. You might need a nap after this part. Here we go…

After the 5-6 hours (or when the roast is tender and done) take the roast out and shred it. Pour off some of the water. Put the shredded meat back into the pot. Slice up onion and bell pepper—as much as you like—and add it to the pot .  You should have just enough water to cover the meat and veggies.  Do the kind of cover the pot thing again and let it simmer for 1-2 hours longer.

Make sure you have a margarita while it is cooking because you know you have been slaving away over this meal all day.

When ready to eat, serve in tortillas (We liked the corn best.) with guacamole.  We had sour cream, cilantro, and lime juice with ours too. Yummy!  Go crazy and figure out what condiment-type things you like to serve this meal that doesn’t have a name with.  What should I call this meal???