If you're here as part of the Let's Eat blog hop, welcome! You should have arrived from Hootings of an Owl. If you've just happened upon this post here, you're welcome too! We've hopping blogs and talking food, yum :-) You can get all the details on Amy's blog (she's our hostess with the mostest today) or scroll down to the end of my post for the full list of participants and details of who to visit next - and if you'd like to read my post along the way too, that would be lovely!! ;-)
Roast dinners are probably my favourite meal to prepare for my family. They're also one of my favourite meals to eat! All the peeling and chopping may feel a little like a chore sometimes, but on the whole I quite like the legitimate reason to shut myself away in the kitchen with my own thoughts, or possibly with some music on so I can dance around
like nobody's watching....
Now I've mentioned many of my roast dinner tips already in various posts, but I thought for this blog hop I'd gather all these ideas together in one place - right here :-)
I'm not going to say much about cooking the meat. The sad truth is, I get mine from the supermarket - I don't actually have a local butcher any more - so the cooking instructions are printed on the packaging and I just follow them. We have chicken most often (because it's good value for money and we usually get plenty of leftovers to make another meal or two from) but we really like the flavour of gammon, and sometimes we'll have a piece of beef or pork to vary it up. The general rule though seems to be to cover with foil for most of the cooking time then remove the foil for the last 30 minutes; also, allow the meat to rest for 20 minutes or so before carving, so that the juices can penetrate back into the meat, making it juicier. I make use of this time to turn the oven up to cook the Yorkshire puddings and give the roast potatoes a final crisping - of which more later!
So, having worked out how long the meat will need and when to switch the oven on, I turn my attention to the rest of the meal, starting with the potatoes. We like our roast potatoes crispy and with lots of flavour, and plenty of them! I use King Edwards or Rooster potatoes or sometimes Maris Pipers. To help get them crispy, after peeling and cutting them to size, I put them into a pan of cold water, bring it to the boil, then cook them till they start to soften - longer than just 'parboiling' them. In fact, often the potatoes are pretty much fully cooked before I start to roast them. Then I'll drain them, return them to the saucepan, and shake to rough up the edges.
A couple of minutes before I want to put the potatoes in the oven I put a slug of olive oil and a spoonful or two of butter (or buttery spread) into a roasting tin and pop it in the oven to get it nice and hot. I don't usually roast my potatoes round the meat - except when cooking gammon, because you get a lot of extra flavour from the gammon juices, yum :-) When the fat is hot I tip the potatoes into the tin and turn them over so that all the surfaces have come into contact with the buttery oil. Then they go back into the oven for about an hour (including the extra 20-30 minutes while the meat is resting).

But a roast dinner also requires vegetables, and one of our favourites is roasted carrots - they just need to be topped and tailed and peeled, and popped into the roasting tin with the potatoes. Large carrots kept whole will need about an hour, or you can halve them to reduce the cooking time to 30-40 minutes - or if you're really in a hurry, cut your carrots into sticks and give them 20 minutes in the oven!
Butternut squash or pumpkin can be cooked in the same way - peel, remove the seeds and strands, and cut into wedges.
We also like to have a fresh green vegetable, which I just steam for about 10 minutes - broccoli, or green beans, for example - or maybe some shredded cabbage.


Sometimes I'll boil or steam some thinly sliced leeks or some cauliflower florets, which are fine as they are, but also taste good in a simple white sauce - melt a spoonful of butter (or buttery spread), stir in a spoonful of plain flour and cook for about a minute; gradually stir in some milk and bring to the boil so it thickens, and season lightly.
And this isn't all! Perhaps Yorkshire puddings are traditionally served with beef, but we have them nearly every week, because we love them so much :-) You can find the recipe I use
here; I turn my oven up after taking the meat out and cook the Yorkshires while the meat rests. The potatoes and carrots can stay in the oven to finish cooking during this time, too.
But we're still not quite there - a roast dinner isn't complete without the gravy! Now, at risk of puncturing the image you may have of me as a domestic goddess (as if...) I have a confession to make.... I don't make my own gravy. I use gravy granules. Shh, don't tell!!! (Actually I do make my own gravy for Christmas dinner, just not every Sunday. Granules are fine for us.)

And then, you just need to carve the meat and dish up! Enjoy :-) Will it be chicken this week? Or maybe beef? Or perhaps pork?
One more thing though, before I finish.
Deb commented a few days ago to ask if The Children were good eaters. Oh Deb, if you could have heard the hollow laughter..... The Girl will basically eat about 4 different meals, and I rotate them through the week. The Boy is practically vegetarian, but is great at eating vegetables - however, he hates cheese and can be fussy about various other foods. And then there's me and The Doctor - we have very different tastes, too! The food pics I share as part of my Project 365 are just what I eat, and often the rest of the family is having something completely different. What I try to do is coordinate the meals so we're all having pasta or we're all having potatoes, and vary the other ingredients, sauces etc to suit....
Roast dinners are an example. The Doctor and I will generally have the full meal, but The Boy doesn't have the meat - he has extra potatoes and veg; The Girl has a bit of meat if we're having chicken, gammon or pork, but the only vegetable she'll eat is carrot. And it has to be raw carrot. And she doesn't like gravy. *sigh*...
Next we're off to
Jennifer's Jumbles to find out what treat she's cooked up for us! If you get lost, or if any links are broken (which may happen, due to time differences and Blogger's peculiarities!) you can pick up the trail from this list of links:
Over At Our Place
Be Glorious
Captured On Film
Chatty Crafty Arty Pig
Cupcake Queen World
Curly Scrapbooker
Deb's World
Diane's Everyday Moments
The Linar Studio
Everyday Life Of A Suburban SAHM
Faith Hope & Cherrytea
From High In The Sky
Gallo Organico
Helena's Creative Maven
Hootings Of An Owl
I Speak Melsh <- You are here!
Jennifer's Jumbles
Liberty Cottage
Life Behind The Purple Door
Life In General
Paper Turtle
Random Reflections
Scrap Dreams
The Quiet Life
Bon appetit! xx
This is my post for the 24th day of Blogtoberfest - 24 days and still on track!