I think I might be a grown up now

Yup.
It's true.
I think I am indeed officially a grown up now.
Because...

 ...on Wednesday I defrosted the first chuck roast I have ever purchased...
and this morning,

 along with the help of P-Dub, and a couple (alright maybe 6) phone calls to my mother,

I think I have successfully prepared my first pot roast!

Look at that hunkin' piece of meat.  How can it not be intimidating?

I was nervous about making sure I defrosted it properly.

(and I will fill you in on the fact that I had a slight dilemma with the defrosting procedure.  You see, I bought a two pack of chuck roast at Sam's Club on Monday and stuck it in the freezer because I wasn't cooking it until Thursday.  When I took them out to defrost one and keep the other in the freezer, they were frozen together.  Solidly frozen together.  And I had already opened and destroyed the packaging, and the double wide chuck roasts would not fit into a large ziploc, so if I couldn't get them seperated what was I to do?!

I called my mother, that's what I did.  And she said well, you have quite the dilemma.  I eventually seperated the two pieces by chiseling through the frozen tundra of meat with a knife while carefully and skillfully not chopping off my arm.)

I browned the onions and carrots first.

Like my mother does.

Then I took those out of the pot.

Then I stuck my seasoned and floured piece of meat in the hot pot and I seared it on both sides.

Like my mother does.

P-Dub does this too, but I used the flour which she doesn't use,

because,

well, because, my mother does.

 Then I put the carrots and onions back in.
Sprinkled in some rosemary all chef like.
Poured in some beef stock.
Put the lid on, and stuck her in the oven.
I was quite proud.
I. Have. Made. Pot. Roast. (meant to be said just as Tom Hanks says "I have made fire" while pounding his chest in the movie Castaway.) 

Then I scrolled back through P-Dub's directions on her blog and after searing the roast, she took it out of the pan and poured in a little bit of red wine and beef stock and scraped the yummy goodness from the meat off the bottom of the pot.
Uh oh.
I didn't do this.
So with my roast in the oven, I called my Mom.
Again.
And said, "Mom, should I have done that? Scraped the yummy bits off the bottom before putting everything back into the pot???"
She said yes.
Woops.
Then she said it's not too late, do it now.
So ...

I made a mad dash for the wine rack.

Grabbed the first bottle that made sense (mad housewife tries to make her first pot roast).

I pulled my roast out of the oven,

lifted the meat up, and scraped the yummy bits off the bottom as best as I could,

poured a bit of vino into the pot, and back in the  oven she went.

 Please turn out good.

Please turn out good.

Please turn out good.

Pray for my pot roast? 

:)

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On another food note,  I was flipping through my HG book and a recipe jumped out at me.

It's called, I can't believe it's not sweet potato pie

the recipe calls for butternut squash as the main ingredient.

no sweet potatoes.

This is what it looked like at one point.

And this was the end result...

 And it was goooooooooood!
I loved it.
Next time I will try to make the top prettier.
I'm an amatuer at browning marshmallows ok.
It was also super easy.
113 calories a serving and 5g of protein.
Here's the recipe if anyone is interested:

1 large butternut squash seeded and diced (I bought two bags of chopped butternut squash from TJ's)

1/2 c. liquid egg substitute

1/3 c. light vanilla soymilk

1/3 c. sugar free maple syrup (I used organic pure maple syrup)

1/4 c. splenda (I used stevia)

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup miniature marshmallows

preheat oven to 350.

steam squash in 1/2 in ch of water in micro for 8 minutes.

drain water and mash thoroughly (i threw it in the food processor, but still left it a bit lumpy).

Put in baking dish.

Add in all ingredients except for marshmallows and mix together.

Bake for 45-50 minutes until solid and not liquidy.

Top pie with marshmallows and return to oven for five minutes or until marshmallows begin to brown.

Try it!

It's yummy!

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And since this post has been all about food,

a picture of the items I used to put together such an easy meal on Monday night... 

I toasted the buns.

Added a little mayo,

heated the cooked pulled pork in micro and added to buns.

Topped with cabbage and it was drip down your arms good.

Served with sweet potato fries and honeycrisp apple slices with nutella for dippin'.

SO simple and yet SO good.

I bought these today.

Yikes.

That picture makes my mouth water.

Okay, that's it for now.

I'll fill you in on the pot roast results.

So far it smells AHHHH-mazing.

What have you been cooking lately????