Prep Once, Use Three Ways: Pot Roast

Guarantee easy mealtimes by prepping one big-batch pot roast and putting the meat to work multiple ways.
By: Foodlets
Perfect Pot Roast

Photo by: Marshall Troy ©2012, Television Food Network, G.P. All Rights Reserved.

Marshall Troy, 2012, Television Food Network, G.P. All Rights Reserved.

Need a faster way to get dinner on the table? Give yourself a head start by cooking one hearty pot roast, then transform the leftovers into two more dinners, each with totally different flavors, later in the week.

Dinner #1: Start with Ree Drummond’s Perfect Pot Roast (pictured above). This easy recipe has more than 470 user reviews and a 5-star rating; how can you go wrong? It’ll take a few hours to make, but in that time your house will smell amazing. Bonus: If you tease your family with the delicious scent of dinner for this long, you can practically guarantee excited kids at the table when that roast is finally ready.

Dinner #2: Cottage Pie with Mashed Sweet Potatoes. (Know why it’s not shepherd’s pie? That is made with lamb, while cottage pie is traditionally filled with beef.) Saute a large onion, then combine with 2 cups of shredded pot roast and place in a casserole dish. Layer on mashed sweet potatoes, which have a little more nutritional heft than white potatoes, and bake!

Dinner #3: Pot Roast-Grilled Cheese Sandwiches. Make a regular grilled cheese sandwich heartier by adding the last bits of that pot roast, plus a thin layer of mustard, and top it off with a few hamburger pickles. Serve on whole-wheat bread or hoagie rolls, toasted in the pan.

Charity Curley Mathews is the founder of Foodlets.com, and feeds four rascals dinner nearly every night.

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