I’ve always wanted to own a farm. I don’t know wheeerre that came from because I grew up in Laguna…(a city in Orange County, California.) I don’t know anybody there with a farm, and I really never think I went to a farm until last year when I went to Many farms scouting for possible vendors to supply Bestia.
But, I wanted that farm. The last few months have been a blessing on the barnyard and getting me closer to the cockadoodledoos at 5am and smells of manure!!!!!!
Today was pretty cool – I got a delivery of 30 pounds of grassfed beef from MY FARM that I’m a part owner in. yeahhhh 🙂 It’s a stepping stone, and at the farm they do things right. The animals see the sun on their backs, and the farm raises both 100% Free range Grassfed beef, along with grassfed then grain-finished beef. One of the competitive advantages is we’ve developed a way to harvest grassfed beef every month, whereas most grassfed operations harvest only during “green grass” months (june-october). If you’ve ever seen Bourdain’s Livingston, Montana episode (very scenic and chill), it’s right by there in Bozeman, MT.
Anyway, for the last 24 hours I’ve been mulling and turning my head over recipes for this chuck roast, mainly surprised by the lack of fat. Outside of wild game, I’ve always cooked with the fattier beef – grainfed. But this is how cows were meant to be , and as Marco Pierre White (the original gangster 3 star Michelin Chef in England says) – “Most cooks when they are young tend to overwork their food to hide their lack of confidence and appreciation for Mother Nature. In time they learn that she is the true artist – we’re just the cooks.”
The challenge that I saw was to try to compensate for the lack of fat, so I used a thicker homemade beef broth and grilled onions and San Marzano canned tomatoes to insert umami meaty flavors and mouth feels without introducing excess fat.. . From there, it’s basic since you already have a good product and want the meat to be the highlight. So all I did was make some really nice tacos (I prefer flour to corn), a guacamole with lots of jalapeno and the meat was hydrated in the sauce, to be topped with cilantro and cotija cheese.
Chuck Roast, delivered
Browning the 100% Grassfed Beef chuck Roast
pretty simple, I had a beef stock made from beef bones, marrow bones, beef ribs, and oxtails, skimmed of the fat, added some roasted onion and cooked, covered for 2 hours. Went hunting for wild boar, came back, and cooked it for 2 more hours with san marzano tomatoes. The reduced stock was thick and meaty, without the fat.
Guacamole- lime, cilantro, red onion, Avocadoes, roma tomatoes, jalapeno.
Erik