The Pioneer Woman's Prime Rib--Cope Style

Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas! I hope all of you are enjoying this time of year and not too stressed out or overwhelmed yet :) There are a lot of great memories attached to this time of year for many of us! Seeing friends we haven't seen in awhile, spending time with our families, and more often than not, gathering around in the kitchen sharing stories and laughs with those we love! The kitchen seems to be a gathering place for many households! I can remember many mornings spent in my Mema's kitchen watching her cook breakfast for the family, while the smell of bacon cooking, and biscuits in the oven would wake up and bring the rest of the household in to see what divine breakfast we were all about to eat! Over the holidays, as a little girl, my job was always to taste test her dressing! It was by far my favorite job I've ever had! She would get everything mixed together in a big bowl, add all the seasonings and then let me take a bite to see if I approved! I was always the one who could eat about 1/2 the pan of dressing, it was truly my favorite. With that being said, I guess she figured if I wasn't happy with the way it tasted, she would tweak it until she got it just perfect and then pop it in the oven and we would move on to fixing something else! Lot's of memories made it her kitchen for sure!

Some good friends of ours, The Copes, had a family get together at their house not too long ago! They worked hard to get their table ready and sit with their loved ones to talk and laugh and make a new memory for the holiday! Although we were not present, they sent me pictures of their time together and lots of delicious looking photos of how they prepared the Pioneer Woman's prime rib dinner! So let's get started on this dinner that I'm sure many of us will want to try after hearing about what a successful evening they had!

You can find the recipe on her website, or by clicking here. They told me they followed her directions, and it turned out great. So let's see what ingredients you're going to need:

Ingredients
1 whole rib-eye roast (should weigh in at about 14 pounds)
4 TB olive oil
1/2 c Kosher Salt
4 TB tri-colored peppercorns
3 sprigs of Rosemary
3 sprigs of Thyme
1/2 c minced garlic

Get your oven pre-heated to 500 degrees.

You will take your oil, and add to a pan and heat the oil on high heat! Cut the rib loin in half, then sear both sides of the loin until it has a golden brown color to it! You will want to make sure the heat is on high to make sure you get both sides seared!

Getting the Roast ready to go

Ladies....he's already a married man! Don't get jealous with a good looking man workin'

hard in the kitchen! (He makes some really EXCELLENT food too!)

The Roast...Looks fantastic!

Now take the peppercorns, and place them in a bag. Take a rolling pin and crush the peppercorns with the rolling pin! Take the leaves off the thyme and the rosemary and add  it with the salt and garlic to your crushed peppercorns! 

Then take your olive oil and pour over the roast and then pour on the rub mix! To get the mixture to stick to the roast you will lightly "pat" down on the roast! Sometimes if you try and "push" a rub onto meat you will find that it sticks more to your hands than what you want it to stick to!

Now with your oven set to 500 degrees, you set a timer for 20-30 minutes for the roast. Reduce your heat back down to 300 degrees and cook another 20-30 minutes or until the internal temperature of the meat is reading 125 degrees (this is medium/rare...but no worries...your roast will continue to cook once it's been removed from the oven!) Once you pull the roast from the oven, let it stand for 20 minutes to ensure that it continues cooking! If you like your roast a little more "cooked" then just leave it in for a little longer at first! But you don't want it to go over medium/rare for proper cooking!

In the oven it goes

Finally out of the oven...and looks DELICIOUS!

Now all that's left to do is sit down at this beautiful table and enjoy

the good food, great company, and good laughs!

From word-of-mouth, this roast looked delicious and I've been told tasted even better than it looked! I have yet to find something from the Pioneer Woman that I don't like! She not only has great recipes, but her blog over all is fantastic! We also love her blog, because my sister home-schools (as does she) and she always has great tips and funny quips about her life! 

The professional photos are courtesy of Full Feather Photography. Tara does excellent work, and specializes in children and family photography! You can also follow her blog here. Her business comes to you from Claremore, OK (she does travel to Tulsa frequently). Be sure and check out her work, or even find her on Facebook if that's easier! 

I hope everyone had a safe holiday season, and is gearing up for bringing in 2013! 2012 has been such a blessing for us! Our Christmas was one for the books!! My sister adopted 2 beautiful children from the Congo, and they made it home Sunday evening!! It has been truly amazing to get to know these two angels, and love on them and learn with them!! You'll have to stay tuned for this Aunt to go picture crazy!!! We already have SOOOO many, but they all need to be filtered through! Until the next happening from my kitchen to yours.....

~Happy Eating~

Venison Roast and Potatoes

So, I don't know if I wished on enough shooting stars the other night or if it was just a plain old lucky day, but we found more venison!! I'm sure for those of you who don't have venison or like venison you're probably saying, UGH! right about now! However, you can substitute beef/turkey/chicken whatever you like into these venison recipes to fit your liking! With that being said, I defrosted a great looking venison roast and threw it in the crock-pot, left it overnight, and by the time Dee Jay was home from work the next day we had a FANTASTIC venison roast with potatoes! It was so easy I almost felt ashamed that it tasted so good. (That is why you will see to keep it easy, we used paper plates instead of the real deal!) HaHa! So, just for kicks I looked up some better nutritional facts about venison! You can find it here at Self Nutrition Data (know what you eat)! Here is everything I did to make this melt in your mouth roast and potatoes.

I started with about 5 to 6 small potatoes and sliced them into thin rounds. I cut enough to cover the bottom of the crock pot (leaving room for the roast in the middle) and stacked them about 3 layers high! Next I poured about half a container of beef broth into the crock pot. I added the venison roast after we salt and peppered both sides. Next I added chopped red pepper, red pepper flakes (for a little spicy kick), a whole white onion, and 2 cloves of garlic minced! Left all of the ingredients in the crock pot on low overnight until the next day for lunch! When I woke up, there was no problem getting me out of bed, the smell alone made me want to eat the whole roast before DJ even got home! Good thing I didn't, I would have be in
T-R-O-U-B-L-E! I added some Brussel Sprouts for a side and we had a very lovely little lunch!
Side Note: There is not a lot in this picture because I seriously was so anxious to try it, then couldn't stop eating it, that I forgot to take a picture. Luckily I had a little extra at the end of the day, so I snapped a quick photo! :)

I'm sitting here thinking about it, and getting in the cooking mood so I think I'm going to head to the kitchen and make something delicious to share with you next time! I'm thinking some sort of cupcake so DJ can take them to the guys at work! Hope everyone had a wonderful, safe Labor Day weekend. Until we meet again... ~Happy Eating~ 

A little funny for your afternoon

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