Beef Roast with Taleggio Roasted Potatoes

Tonight's dinner was a special occasion: The Johnson's (Chris & Jenny) joined us for dinner.  I apologize for the blurry picture - we were all in a rush to get to the goodness.

The beef roast:

• I made a little rub of fresh thyme & garlic
• Cook in the 450 degree oven for 45 minutes to get a nice brown color, then turned downed the oven to 350 for another hour to bring the beef to a temperature of 145.  I had a 3 lb roast, and ended up overcooking it just a bit.  I forgot about the fact that it still keeps cooking on the inside as it rested after coming out of the oven. 
• I also have to fess that I chose a cheaper cut of meat than the called for rib roast.  I don't even know what cut of meat I ended up purchasing, but it was a roast of some sort. I have a bad habit of going to the store with the best intentions of buying the called for ingredient and substituting for a cheaper option.  Looking back, I should have bought the better cut of meat, as it was the main dish.

Taleggio Roasted Potatoes:
I hardly ever make recipes that I see in magazines because I usually become intimidated by the ingredients, but after flipping through my new Martha Stewart magazine, this recipe looked simple enough with one new ingredient: Taleggio Cheese.  I found this specialty cheese at Fred's.

• The recipe called for 2 pounds of fingerling potatoes, which I could not find, so I used half & half of small white & baby red potatoes, quartered.
• Started by roasting 8oz of baby portobello mushrooms with some fresh sage & garlic for about 10 minutes.
• I then cooked the potatoes on the rack above the roast for about 40 minutes.
• I have never cooked with Taleggio cheese before, but it upon initial inspection, it smelled like old socks. Not very appealing.  But it didn't taste as horrible as it smelled, it added a great gooey texture

One point to Martha for this one - it was well worth trying.

Aparagus:
With a big hunk of meat as the main dish, my first choice of vegetable pairing is asparagus.  We are big fans of asparagus. With asparagus, the thinner the better. Big thick asparagus are just too tough in my book. I try and buy the petite asparagus when they are available. I sauteed the asparagus with a touch of olive oil and lemon zest. Delicious!

Apple Cheesecake:
I received a cheesecake pan for Christmas, and this was my first adventure with making a cheesecake from scratch. There may be more simple cheesecake recipes out there, but I chose this one: Caramel Apple Cheesecake, but did not make the caramel portion of the recipe. I feared too much sugar. This cheesecake was pretty technically challenging and did not end up as well as I had hoped. The cheesecake pan achieved its objectives by releasing perfectly, but it was undercooked in the center and pretty gooey. I was a little disappointed with the way it turned out, but it tasted alright.  I figured that my first one wouldn't be the best.

These are a lot of dishes for one dinner - I know. But my key when we are entertaining, is to try and find recipes that I can prep ahead of time and take a lot of non-involved cook time.  I like to spend time with our friends, rather than slave away in the kitchen.  I think my total "in kitchen" time was 10-15 minutes.  Overall a great meal, but had that simple "meat & potatoes" feel.