Mar 18, 2011
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How To Make Perfect Roast Beef


 
By Gabriella Gershenson
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How To Make Perfect Roast Beef Enlarge Image Credit: Todd Coleman
Roast beef cold cuts should be tender, flavorful, paper thin, and rosy pink throughout. While testing recipes for this issue, we discovered how to cook roast beef at home just the way we like it. First, because it should be served rare, buy top sirloin, a full-flavored cut that doesn't require long cooking to be tenderized. Get a five-pound piece and ask the butcher to tie it—this helps it to cook evenly and makes it easier to slice once it's done. Next, season the roast with salt and pepper, then sear it in a skillet on the stove. Finally, place it on a rack in a roasting pan in the oven and cook it at 200° for 3 hours 20 minutes, until a thermometer inserted in the center reads 130°. This is what sets this method apart: slow cooking at a very low temperature, the key to achieving a uniform pink color from center to edge. Once the roast beef is cooked, chill it in the refrigerator, then slice thin and pile it on your bread of choice. 




How To Make Perfect Roast Beef

This article was first published in Saveur in Issue #137

Comments (2)

noAvatar
Perfection! Now please post a ways and means to cook perfect turkey breast for sandwiches. I got the turkey breast, I purchased a tilted slicer, but when I cooked it? Terrible. Please come to the rescue Saveur. If I could get away with it in my family, I would eat nothing but sandwiches. Love 'em!!!
noAvatar
The low temp method of roasting is my standard for any beef roast and it really does work. One question on this recipe - when you call for top sirloin, do you mean the sirloin section that can also be used for grilled steaks, or do you mean the 'sirloin tip' section that is too tough to do anything but braise? I find that butchers have different opinions about what the top sirloin cut really is.
Thanks.

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