Off-Oven Roast Beef
- Total Time
- 2 hours 30 minutes
- Rating
- Comments
- Read comments
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Ingredients
- 1beef roast, like top, eye or bottom round, approximately 3 pounds
- 1tablespoon kosher salt
- 1tablespoon freshly ground black pepper
- 3cloves garlic, peeled and minced
- 1tablespoon olive oil
- Red-pepper flakes to taste
Preparation
- Step 1
Remove roast from refrigerator. Preheat oven to 500 degrees.
- Step 2
In a small bowl, mix together salt, pepper, garlic, olive oil and red-pepper flakes to create a kind of paste. Rub this all over the roast. Place beef in a roasting pan or cast-iron skillet, fat-side up, and put in oven. Cook undisturbed for 5 minutes per pound.
- Step 3
Turn off oven. Do not open oven door. Leave roast to continue cooking, undisturbed, for two hours.
- Step 4
After two hours, remove roast from oven. Slice and serve alongside, ideally, a watercress salad, some skillet-fried potatoes and a small tureen of Henry Bain sauce.
Private Notes
Comments
I call this Magic Meat and make it almost every week. (In fact, I made it just last night). Here’s the trick: you must follow the recipe EXACTLY. Take the roast out of the fridge right before you turn on the oven. This means the roast is COLD when it goes in. (If you start with room-temp meat, it’ll be too done in the middle.) You roast at 500 for EXACTLY 5 minutes per pound. I ask Siri: “How much is 2.85 times 5?” Then I roast for 14.25 minutes, using a timer. Timer for the 2 hrs. oven off too!
We like our roast beef rare so I left in the oven for one hour instead of two. Perfect!
Leave it off!
One of the elements that I felt confused about was what constitutes my medium rare ideal temp. I thought it would be straightforward but saw everything from 125-145 when I googled, and it was unclear as to which was the pull out temp or the temp it would rise to after cooking. For anyone else in this spot, just an FYI, I used an electronic leave-in thermometer and pulled my 3.84 pound top round roast out at 125°F, which took slightly over an hour in the off phase. It rose on the counter to 136°. It was still rare for at least 3/4 of it (the ends were very slightly more well done), so I’d say if you want med-rare to pull it out at 130-135°F. (57°C)
I have a modern self-cooling Miele oven. Will this method work the same in this type of oven?
I have done this with a pork loin roast. It takes a little less time in the oven. I leave a 1.5 lb roast in the oven for just an hour after I shut the oven off. It is perfect. A great option to deli meat!