January 1: Beef Roast with Dark Rum Sauce

Here is the first recipe from the Crock Pot Cook Book. First I gathered the ingredients. It was about 9:30 in the morning.

Then I added the spice mixture to the beef and seared it in a skillet on all sides:

After I added the beef to the crock pot, I added the rum/broth mixture along with garlic and bay leaves and cooked it on low for 1 hour:

After an hour was up, I added the rum/brown sugar/lime juice mixture and cooked on low for about 6 hours.

Then I removed the roast to a platter and sliced it.

 

As you can see, it was falling apart. I put the sauce in a gravy boat and served it with the meat.

I cooked up some potatoes and asparagus to complete the meal. Then I poured sauce over the meat and potatoes.

This may well have been the best meat I have ever cooked in my life. The meat was so tender, and the flavor was so rich! I never would have put those ingredients together myself... I'm not really that big on allspice. But when slow-cooked all day, they just blend together into something sweet and rich and heavenly!

Just a note about this cookbook: it is grouped into seasons and sub-grouped into categories in that season. I will be mixing it up this year, because I don't want to eat all meat or all seafood or all vegetarian 40 days in a row! This recipe is from Holiday Entertaining, and it was the perfect New Year's dinner!