Merry Christmas!… I mean Belated Christmas!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! I know, it’s a little late, but better late than never! I am really excited to share my Christmas Day meal with you. Usually my boyfriend and I make the big trip across the country back to Boston to spend the holidays with our family. This year we decided to stay here in LA and I was super pumped to make my first big Christmas dinner. Even though it was just Matt and I, I made a 6 pound Prime Rib Roast, with Garlic Mashed Potatoes and Garlic Sauteed Asparagus. Dessert was one of Matt’s traditions, A Classic Apple Pie. But before I dive into the roast, check out my tree! It was perfect— short, fat and plump! And sparkled with White, Gold and Silver Ornaments!

Onto the roast. I did my research prior to making my decision on how to make a roast. There are so many different ways to cook and prep them. Slow roast on low heat, cook it fast on high heat, or even cook them in a clay pot in your oven (yes, my sister tried this method!) I found this recipe here by Ida (Barefoot Contessa) that got rave reviews on FoodNetwork.com. Since this was my first, I stuck to the recipe instead of making any significant alteration. This was a high heat- fast cookin’ recipe, so before I did anything, I scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed my oven to make sure I would not get any smoke or fire from the 500 degree oven. Scrubbing your oven is a must prior to cooking anything at such a high heat!

So I rub her (the roast of course!) down well with lots of salt, pepper and fresh crushed garlic, put her in a glass pan and into the oven she goes. The first 30 minutes or so was no issue. She was cooking up well and I had no smoke… awesome! Then a little bit of smoke billowed from the oven… no need to worry, I must have just missed a spot… okay time to turn the oven down… fab.. smoke stopped… and she looks beautiful! Fab! 45 minutes later I up the heat again to 450… and oh god… the smoke… it wouldn’t stop! I had 2 fans going, had to temporarily take out my smoke detectors, open all the windows in our little LA apt and smoke was just seeping out of every crevice of the oven possible… there I as panicking that I was about to set my kitchen on fire and I just couldn’t figure out what had happened or where all this smoke was coming from!

After a frantic 30 minutes, the roasts internal temp finally hit 145 degree and she could come out a rest. That’s when I found the smoke culprit… my glass roasting pan had cracked through the center and all the wonderfully tasty drippings were slowing flowing there way to bottom of my newly cleaned oven. Bummer! Luckily I did not burn down my kitchen and was able to save what was left of the drippings in the pan for a delicious gravy! And, I learned a valuable lesson— never use a glass roasting pan with an oven heated to 500 degrees!

Despite a smoky mis-hap, the roast was D-E-L-I-C-I-O-U-S!!!! (Had a bit of a smokey flavor too!) The whole meal was fab! I was super full after one serving— but my BF went back for seconds and thirds (and going back for more is always a good thing!) My first Christmas Dinner= A tasty success!

Dessert, as I mentioned above, was a traditional apple pie. Believe it or not, I am not a huge pie fan. I like it from time to time, but I’ll take a layer cake over a pie any day. My BF, on the other hand is the complete opposite of me. He could eat pie for every meal and not even give a cake a second glance. For him its not a Christmas without a pie- so I stuck to apple. (I have to say his mom make a kick-ass apple pie, so I have some kind of idea why he likes it so much!) I have to admit I cheated a little bit too… usually I would have made my dough for the crust from scratch, but as I was more concerned with the success of my prime rib, I bought the Pillsbury Ready Made Pie Dough. I prepped the pie earlier in the day, that way when we were ready for dessert, I could pop it in and we could have warm pie fresh from the oven—mmmm— that’s the kinds of pie I like! I made it a bit festive too by using Christmas Tree Cookie Cutter on top for ventilation, instead of just scoring with a knife. I love adding those little touches to make food a bit more exciting!

Anyway… we ate pie (which was gone in under a 24 hours!), drank Hot Totties and fell asleep by 7:30 on the couch watching a Christmas Story… It was a perfect LA Christmas!

Hope all your holidays were wonderful and bright!

Happy Baking!

-Kristy

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Sunday, January 10th, 2010, by admin and is filed under "Don't try this at home!, It's Delish!, Main Meals, Super Easy Recipe!, apple pie, Food Network, Prime Rib Roast ". You can leave a response here, or send a Trackback from your own site.