Supper Simple Sunday Dinner #3
     Sunday dinners have ALWAYS been special in our family.  Going way back both Zach and I remember that Sunday meant something special in the food department.  I remember going to my grandma's house and a lot of cousins being there.  After I married into the Peck family I remember going to Zach's mom's house for big family Sunday dinners.  As the families expanded and people moved on and away, I still tried to keep Sunday dinner's special.  I know that people don't like to hear this but even when I worked, I tried to make dinner time special every day.  We all sat and ate together and rarely was it take out.  But on Sunday, I really tried to make a "fancier" meal. It has always been important to me to have the family gather around good home cooked meals.  Now Sunday dinner usually means a roast of some kind. I usually have Donnie, Nessa, Ellie and sometimes a random person or persons that Zach has invited. Although the meal includes a roast, I still keep the lid on the food budget.  The cooking of this cheap cut of meat appears a little tricky but it is not after you run it through your head a couple of times. So here goes, Supper Simple Supper #3. Notice that the salad is the largest plate.  I always make a salad with every dinner.AND it usually takes up half my plate.

Night before;
Take a cheap 2.5-3 lbs round roast and salt all sides.
Wrap the roast  in plastic and put into fridge.
Day of meal
 3 hours before meal; Preheat oven to highest temp. Take meat out of fridge and let come to room temp. Pat meat dry with paper towels.

Ingrdients for Rub
1/2 tsp dried rosemary
1/2 tsp. dried thyme
1 tsp. garlic powder
1 tsp onion powder
2 tsp fresh ground pepper
2 TBSP oil

1. Mix the herbs together in a small bowl.
2. Take 1 TBSP of the oil and put into a pan.  Wait until  the pan is almost smoking and brown all sides of the meat.
3. Let meat rest. When cool enough to touch, rub the meat with the rest of the oil and apply the herbs.
4. Put into the oven on a baking sheet that you have covered in foil.
5. Cook meat for 7 min. per lb.
6. Reduce heat to lowest oven temp. and continue to cook meat for aprox. 3 hours. After 1.5 hours with a meat thermometer check to see if meat is at least 115 internal temp. If not, crank oven up 50 degrees.  Try  not to  open the oven until the end of the cooking time except at the halfway point to check temp.

Salad Ingredients  (6+ servings)
6 med. tomatoes (from my garden)  thinly sliced
1 large English cucumber ( take a fork and after washing scarp down the whole length) cut into thin slices
juice of 2 limes
s/p
olives about 1/4 cup any kind
garlic chives (from my garden) can use scallions white and green parts sliced thinly
EVOO

1. Arrange tomatoes and cucumbers on a platter.
2. Squeeze the juice of 2 limes over the cucumbers and tomatoes.
3. Salt and pepper the veggies.
4. Add olives scattered around the platter.
5. Garnish with scallions.
6. Refrigerate.
7.  Just before serving. use just a spritz over the platter of EVOO.

Garlic Mashed Potatoes (8+ servings)
4 large russet potatoes scrubbed and cubed DO NOT remove skins.
8 cloves of garlic
4 bay leaves
1 tsp. salt
water enough to cover potatoes
1/2 cup non fat yogurt
1/2 cup + vegetable stock
s/p

1.  Cover potatoes with water. Add salt.
2. Add next 2 ingredients.
3. Boil until potatoes are soft.
4. Drain and remove bay leaves.
5.  In the same pan mash potatoes and add the next ingredients. Add veggie stock if it is too dry.

Roasted yellow squash and butternut squash (6+servings)
Preheat oven to highest temp.
4 yellow squashes
1 butternut squash oil to coat
about 1/4 or less EVOO
s/p to taste

1.Cut squash into as uniform a size as possible.
2. Arrange on a baking sheet and toss with oil. Make sure squash doesn't overlap.
3.  S/P toss again.
3. Put into oven and drop temp to 400.
4.  Bake for 20-25 min.