Keto Pot Roast
A meal for the family
I’m bringing in more comfort food, more recipes for the whole family to enjoy. Today it’s a Keto pot roast. This is classic comfort food. Slow cooked beef with vegetables. Normally these have carrots and potatoes in them, they are thickened with flour and not ideal on Keto. However today I’m making mine with mushrooms and zucchini. I’m also using the vegetables like onions, celery and mushroom stalks to thicken the sauce. It’s a rich and thick gravy that rivals anything you’ve ever had before. So anyway enough jibber jabber, let’s cook!
Do Indians eat beef?
Living in India my access to beef is limited. And when I say that I just mean the cuts of meat and the quality that is available to me. First let me tell you where I’m coming from. Indians eat meat and that includes beef. However in our cuisine meat isn’t really a central point like in the west. It’s not a piece of meat with veggies around it. We have either kebabs or curries or a dry fry which is part of a larger meal that includes veggies, rotis, rice, lentils etc. Hence the meat is produced in a certain way, it’s one of the reasons we don’t eat chicken with skin.
Also Indians don’t use ovens to cook, except a tandoor which is something you’ll find in a restaurant, not a home. Of course over the years with more western influences these things change but largely Indians still eat meat as part of curries and kebabs and we cook on the stove and use pressure cookers.
The beef!
The animals used for beef are not really bred with the intentof slaughter. They are normally working animals which are sent for slaughter when they get old. Also the breed of bovine creatures used are not the particularly the best for their meat. All the good animals that are bred for their meat are slaughtered and exported. India is the 3rd largest exporter of beef in the world. So what this all boils down to is that we get 3 options when it comes to beef in India.
We get ground meat, which is mostly used for kebabs, we get tenderloin which is used for steaks and we get ‘just beef’ which is all other assorted meat of the animal. We don’t know which part it’s even come from.
What we do know is that it’s tough and chewy and because it’s all muscle meat from an animal that’s been working for most of it’s life it’s never going to be tender since there is no fat or marbling. Hence I avoid using or even eating that because it’s just not pleasant most of the times. It’s passable in a few dishes like my Kerala beef fry.Â
What should you use?
When you cook this dish you want to use a nice slow cooking cut of beef. Ideally something nice and fatty that can break down with the slow cooking. Now each part of the world has a different name and labeling for everything. But you should be able to use chuck roast, stewing meat (seen this in the UK), brisket and short rib. I do believe there is a rump roast or round roast available as well. In terms of cooking time I remember in the UK each package gave you cooking time instructions. I would definitely use those as a guide while cooking this dish.
Nutrition Info (Per serving)
Nutrition Info (Per serving)- Calories: 218
- Net Carbs: 3g
- Carbs: 4g
- Fat: 13g
- Protein: 22g
- Fiber: 1g
This recipe makes 10 servings. Get this recipe on myfitnesspal.
Macros Breakdown
I wanted to keep this recipe fairly traditional so I didn’t add any cream to it. You can add double cream at the end to make the sauce even more rich and add fat to the dish. You could even add more butter to the sauce as well for the good fats. In terms of carbs you can reduce the amount of vegetables used if you are particular. I personally don’t care about carbs from vegetables so I am generous with them and it doesn’t bother me. For my macros I’ve used ‘chuck’ as my cut of beef so the macros will vary depending on what cut of beef you use.
Keto Pot Roast
Ingredients
Instructions
- Start by prepping the vegetables. Separate the mushroom caps from the stalks. Chop the caps into nice big chunks. Cut the onions and zucchini into nice chunks as well. You can leave the garlic whole or just smash it with the knife. Tie the bay leaves, rosemary and thyme together to make a bouquet garni.
- Then season the beef with salt and pepper on both sides. Heat the avocado oil in your dutch oven and sear the beef on all sides on a super high heat. Once seared set it aside.
- Turn the heat down to low and add in half the butter (30grams) and also the onions and celery. Also season with some salt. Sweat the vegetables down for 4-5 minutes till they turn nice and soft and start to get some colour.
- Then add in the garlic, the mushroom stalks and bouquet garni and cook for another couple of minutes. Then add the beef back in the pot along with all the juices it would have released while resting and also top it up with the stock. If you feel there isn't enough stock then add some water to the pot as well.
- Now cover with a lid leaving slightly open and cook till the beef is tender. You can do this on the stove top or pop the dish into your oven at 190C for a couple of hours. Cooking time is going to vary depending on what cut of beef you used. So check the packet for instructions. More often than not you are looking at 3-4 hours in the oven and maybe 2 hours on the stovetop.
- Once done remove the chunks of beef and also the bouquet gari from the pot. Then using an immersion blender or a regular one blend the vegetables and leave over liquid from cooking to make a nice thick sauce. Pour the sauce through a strainer and set it aside.
- In the same dutch oven ad the remaining butter and sautee the mushrooms and zucchini. Make sure to season with some salt and pepper. Once they soften a bit pour in that sauce that you strained and then add in the beef as well.
- Finish with the chopped leaves from the celery. You can also save some of the thinner parts of the stalks and add that in now so you get some crunch with the stew as well.
- Serve with some cauliflower mash. Enjoy!
Hey man,
first of all – THANK YOU! Please keep doing what you are doing, every recipe I tried is just awesome. Plus you seem like a really nice guy 🙂
Question: please how do you recommend to store it (fridge or just out in the kitchen) and reheat it? Since making one portion of this on keto diet just doesn’t make sense. And is the meat still good after reheating?
Thank you very much!
With kind regards,
DM
Hi Dan, yes I recommend storing it in the fridge for upto a week. Any longer and you want to freeze it. This is one of those dishes that actually tastes better with time so go ahead and portion it out for as many meals and then just reheat and eat it whenever you want. It will freeze well too for upto a month.
I don’t have fresh rosemary and thyme. How much of the dried spice should I use? I also only have green zucchini which I’ll try. The recipe sounds great. I love gravy without flour. I’ll try it on cauliflower rice, I think.
that’s fine just add about a tsp of each