Pot Roast – fall apart beef, tender flavour infused vegetables and potatoes smothered in a rich gravy. It’s mouthwateringly good, yet simple to make, especially if you use a slow cooker. However, this beef pot roast recipe can be made in an instant pot, oven OR crockpot – pick which method works best for you!
Pot Roast
Confession: I wasn’t a fan of pot roast for most of my life. I just didn’t get it – the beef and vegetables were fine, but typically they are braised in just liquids that aren’t thickened in any way so the end result is like a watery broth.
Plenty of flavour in it, but when you pour it over the beef and vegetables, it doesn’t cling to it at all because it’s watery.
So I decided to change it and thicken the sauce using a touch of flour. So it’s more like a gravy. Now THAT’s a pot roast worthy of company, in my humble opinion!!!
If you love meltingly tender, slow cooked roast beef and deeply flavoured gravy, this pot roast recipe is for you!
How to make Pot Roast
Season beef well with salt and pepper
Sear beef aggressively – this is KEY for flavour in the broth and the beef!
Sauté onion and garlic, then deglaze* the skillet or pot with red wine (or water or broth);
Tip everything into a slow cooker, instant pot / pressure cooker or casserole pot for oven along with beef broth, carrots and celery;
Sprinkle with dried rosemary and thyme then slow cook 8 hrs low, 55 min pressure cook on high, or oven 4 hours at 300°F/150°C;
Add the potatoes partway through cooking and by the time the potatoes are cooked, the beef will be meltingly tender!
* Means simmering liquid and scraping bottom of pan to release the flavour stuck on the bottom of the pan from searing. It adds a ton of flavour into the cooking broth!
Best cut of beef for pot roast is chuck roast
The best beef for pot roast is Beef Chuck Roast. It’s an economical cut of beef that’s marbled with fat that needs to be slow cooked to breakdown the tough connective tissues so it becomes ultra tender to eat.
Chuck roast can be purchased in large pieces that are or aren’t rolled. You want to use rolled chuck roast for this recipe, otherwise the beef ends up all warped. Supermarkets and butchers should carry chuck roast that’s already rolled, otherwise, you can roll it yourself and tie with kitchen string or ask the butcher to do it for you.
It’s essentially a slow cooked Roast Beef!
The key point of difference with this pot roast recipe is that the braising liquid is thickened so it comes out like a deeply flavoured gravy rather than a watery broth which is how most pot roasts are made.
So it’s essentially a slow cooked Roast Beef that’s fall apart tender that comes with a gravy and tender flavour infused vegetables. Complete meal in one pot!
Because the beef needs to be mostly submerged in liquid while it slow cooks, you end up with lots and lots of liquid in the finished dish.
Which means, in my Pot Roast, you end up with lots and lots of very tasty gravy.
This is a sensational “problem” to have. Keep leftovers, drown your potatoes with them, toss through pasta (oh yes!!), serve it as a sauce for tomorrow night’s dinner. – Nagi x
PS Bread to mop your bowl clean wouldn’t go astray. Try these No Knead Dinner Rolls, a quick No Yeast Irish Bread or these moreish Cheese Muffins.
Watch how to make it
Note: My slow cooker looks like a pressure cooker because it’s a multi function slow cooker (but no, it’s not an Instant Pot!).
This pot roast recipe was originally published January 2018. Updated for housekeeping matters. No change to recipe – I wouldn’t dare! 🙂
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Pot Roast
Ingredients
- 2 kg / 4 lb beef chuck roast , rolled (Note 1)
- 1 tsp each salt and pepper
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 onion (large), cut into large dice
- 5 garlic cloves , peeled and smashed (Note 2a)
- 5 carrots , peeled and cut into 2.5cm/1″ pieces
- 3 celery stalks , cut into 4 cm / 1.5″ pieces
- 1 cup (250ml) dry red wine (sub with beef broth)
- 3 cups (750ml) beef broth , salt reduced
- 1/3 cup (50g) flour (plain / all purpose) (GF – Note 2b)
- 1 tsp dried rosemary
- 1 1/2 tsp dried thyme
- 750g / 1.5 lb potatoes , peeled and cut into 2.5 cm / 1″ pieces
Instructions
- Pat beef dry with paper towels. Sprinkle generously with salt and pepper all over.
- Heat oil in a skillet over high heat. Brown aggressively all over – a deep dark brown crust is essential for flavour base! Should take about 7 minutes.
- Transfer beef to slow cooker.
- In the same skillet, add onion and garlic. Cook for 2 minutes until onion is browned.
- Add wine, reduce by half. Transfer to slow cooker.
- Mix together flour and about 1 cup of the broth. Lumps is fine. Pour into slow cooker.
- Add remaining broth, carrots, celery, rosemary and thyme into slow cooker.
- Cover and slow cook on LOW for 5 hours. (45 min pressure cook on HIGH, Note 3a for Oven and Stove)
- Add potato, slow cook on LOW for 3 hours. (10 min pressure cooker on HIGH, Note 3b)
- Remove beef. Rest for 5 minutes, then slice thickly.
- Adjust salt and pepper of Sauce to taste.
- Serve beef with vegetables and plenty of sauce! Bread also terrific for mopping up sauce – try these No Knead Dinner Rolls, No Yeast Irish Soda Bread or these fabulous Cheese Muffins.
Recipe Notes:
Nutrition Information:
More slow cooked beef recipes
Because nothing beats the flavour of beef cooked long and slow until it’s meltingly tender….
Life of Dozer
When the homeless man at the dog park isn’t at his car (usually off tending to the park grounds – best groundskeeper EVER!), I tie food to the boot of his van. Pot Roast, in this case!
And this is Dozer, trying to figure out if he can reach the bag. #SHAMELESS
Can you cook this in the instant pot?
Want to make this for dinner but didn’t take the meat out of the freezer in time for the slow cooker.
Wow! This was so delicious! My grocery was out of rolled roasts but it worked great with just a flat pot roast. As soon as dinner was over, I forwarded the recipe to several people.
Am anxiously awaiting February to arrive along with your book!
Prepared this for Thanksgiving and its the best roast beef recipe I have ever made! Another winner recipe. Thanks for sharing your brilliance, Nagi!
Another great recipe. Made this for dinner tonight and turned out very delicious. Tender yet beautifully cut when served. Your awesome Nagi!
Can I use an instant pot instead? If so, how long do you recommend I cook it for?
Moist and tender – Delicious!. Followed the recipe exactly using the oven method and the meat and gravy was perfect. A winner with the family. I find my slow cooker too watery so I use Nagi’s oven recipes for all slow cooked meat. The slow cooked rosemary and garlic lamb over 3.5 hours is also excellent. I will try the 12 hour lamb one day soon.
This was disappointing and I usually love Nagi’s recipes.
On my first (and only) try it turned out great!!!
I don’t know what happened for the others but my wife, who’s the real chef of the house was impressed! And loved it!
This was so delicious will be making again.
OMG. They couldn’t believe it and had to wait until the end of the meal to discover the secret. Thank you
Made this pot roast for dinner tonight and thoroughly enjoyed it. Didn’t have red wine so substituted non-alcoholic beer, and also rubbed the blade roast with Bengali five spice mixture (my husband’s favorite with beef). Cooked for longer than recipe and the meat fell off the bone. Delicious! Will definitely be making this version of pot roast again.
This recipe is great! It was just a bit confusing because the method in the video is different from the written method, so I didn’t really know which way to follow. I followed the written version, but feel like I should have stuck with my gut and followed the video because frying off the carrots and celery with the onion and garlic is usually how I do other similar recipes like ragu, I think it would have built more flavour. 🙂
Trying this out today, and looking forward to it. One question – no Bay leaf?
I have read through all these comments and it seems that everyone has had a successful roast. I have followed the instructions to a T and it has been on for eight hours and I don’t think it is ready. I have been using an internal thermometer and it is still sitting around 85° I read online that tender pull apart roast should hit 96° is this correct? Have I completely stuffed it up? I’m in Australia and used a bolar blade roast
Hi Kaylah! Keep it cooking. 🙂 Bolar blade is a leaner cut so it will take longer, and be prepared for the meat to be not quite as juicy as the video and photos you see as chuck is fattier. You are correct, meat is usually fall apart around the 95C mark. Hope you enjoy! N x
Hi. Can beef chuck cross rib steak be used for this recipe (pot roast)? I live in Colorado where one would think good cuts of beef would be in abundance but the contrary, at least in my experience. Usually tough results – seared, grilled, slow cooked, etc.
I followed this recipe exactly (and I came back and double/triple checked before writing this) but my gravy is more like soup, so I’m going to leave my slow cooker on high for a bit with the lid off. Has anyone else had this issue? Never found a single flaw in a Nagi recipe but this one just isn’t co-operating today
I learned a method for thickening broth/gravy. Take 2 tablespoons of flour and mix with 2 tablespoons of room temp butter. Smash it together till mixed then whisk it into your broth at the end of cooking. Much better than just straight flour. And no lumps if you whisk. I think this is a French method.
This exactly happened to me. I put the slow cooker on and went out for the day. We got home late and didn’t have time for reducing anymore (after cooking for 8.5 hours) I thickened with gravox as sauce was thin and tasteless. Better result probably in the oven. It felt like nowhere near enough flour.
I had the same issue. I used the low setting but it had way too much watery liquid at the end of the cooking period. The flour didn’t seem to thicken it up much at all, given the volume of liquid. But the roast was still delicious.
Hi Chris, I added a bit more flour than was in the recipe, and ended up with a thicker gravy but still had tender meat.
Oh 100%, the meat was delicious. What I ended up doing was scooping out some of the broth/soup and mixing it with more flour, stirring it on the stove and adding more liquid until I had basically made a gravy to add back in. It thickened somewhat but the flavour was sub par. A definite anomaly because recipetineats recipes are basically religious texts in my kitchen. No worries! This one just wasn’t for me 🙂
Can I add pumpkin to this recipe? At what point would you recommend adding it?
Yes you can – cut it about twice the size of the potatoes and do it when you add them in! N x
Hi Nagi love all your recipes! I have a TON of beets r.n. can I add them to this and when would you recommend? Thanks!
How can I make this without flour for Type 1 diabetics please?
You can use Xanthan gum or Guar gum to thicken instead of flour. It does not take a lot to thicken so, use 1/4 teaspoon at a time sprinkled lightly in broth or hand blended in broth set aside.
You can try smashing some of the cooked potatoes when they’re softened and keep cooking it away, the starch should thicken the gravy. Otherwise, cassava flour is another option, used in the same way as Nagi’s instruction. Alternatively you can also use xanthan gum and you’ll need much less of this but it is used a lot in keto cooking and is diabetic friendly. With that, I’d take some of the broth out and then mix in maybe 1/4 tsp to start. With all the above options, I’d still do the ‘boil it down to reduce liquid’ method so you don’t need to use too much or either substitute thickener. Hope this helps!
Thanks for the heads up.
Thanks for great ideas.
I made this pot roast for Passover and it was so delicious!! The meat was fall apart tender and the sauce was amazing. I love your recipes, Nagi! Love to Dozer!
I am thrilled that you liked the recipe Robin!! N x
My beef only weighs 1.152kg, should I adjust the timing?
See Note 1 under the recipe regarding this Claire! N x