Classic Pot Roast

Ingredients

• 4 pounds boneless beef chuck roast
• 2 teaspoons Morton kosher salt
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• olive oil
• 2 large yellow onions (chopped into 1″ pieces)
• 4 large carrots (peeled and sliced into 1″ pieces)
• 2 teaspoons dried thyme
• 12 ounces beer
• 1 cup low-sodium beef broth
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste
• 4 small Yukon gold potatoes (cut into 1" pieces)

Instructions

1. 1

   An hour before starting to cook, remove roast from the refrigerator. Pat it dry with paper towels. Place on a plate and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Let stand at room temperature.

2. 2

   Preheat oven to 350° F. Place a 5 to 7-quart Dutch oven over medium-high heat. When hot, add enough olive oil to create a thin film over the bottom of the pot. When the oil is shimmering, add the beef and let it cook, without moving it, until it is deeply browned on the bottom and lifts easily from the pot when turned. This should take about 8 minutes or so. Continue to brown all sides of the meat, turning as needed. Transfer meat to a plate and set aside.

3. 3

   Add the onions and carrots to the pot and cook, stirring and scraping the bottom of the pot with a wooden spoon, until veggies are a bit softened, about 5 minutes. Add the thyme, beer, and broth. Stir and scrape the bottom of the pot to release any tasty browned bits.

4. 4

   Stir in the tomato paste. Let mixture come to a boil, then return meat and any accumulated juices to pot.

5. 5

   Cover pot and transfer to the oven. Halfway through cooking, flip the roast and add the potatoes, sinking the potatoes into the liquid. Cook until meat is tender and pulls apart easily when prodded with a fork - about 2½ to 3 hours total, depending on the size and cut of meat.

6. 6

   There are a couple of different ways you can finish up this beautiful pot roast: 1) For a simple weeknight meal, just break apart the meat with a wooden spoon while it sits in the juices in the pot. This is personally my favorite way to eat the roast, all loose and juicy and tender. 2) For a sliced look, remove the meat from the pot after it has been in the oven for about 2 hours. Then slice it against the grain and return it to the pot, along with any accumulated juices, nestling it back into the veggies and juices. Return the pot to the oven and cook for another 30 to 60 minutes, or until fork-tender.