Guest post from John

This is a post from my son John. He's a bachelor and he's not afraid to cook! He reported later that the meal was great and it fed him for several days.

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My mom gave me a slab of beef with no instructions on how to cook it. I've never cooked a roast or anything, but I'm willing to try new foods.

I went over my small cook book library on the phone with Mom, and confirmed the decision I had already made: find a recipe and try it. I chose a recipe from "Six Ingredients or Less Slow Cooker" by Carlean Johnson (CJ Books, Gig Harbor, WA -- www.sixingredientsorless.com).



Easy Beef Dinner

2 to 2 1/2 pound round steak (whatever that is)
4 medium potatoes, peeled and halved
4 carrots, cut crosswise into fourths (whatever that means)
1 can (10 3/4-ounces) condensed French Onion soup

Trim fat from meat and cut into serving size pieces.

Place potatoes and carrots in slow cooker. Arrange meat over the vegetables. Pour soup over meat. Cover and cook on LOW 7 to 8 hours or until meat and vegetables are tender. Makes 4 to 5 servings.

Well I don't have a kitchen scale and I don't know how big a pound of beef is, so I'll step on my bathroom scale and then step on it holding the ziploc with the beef. Hmm, looks like 2 or 3 pounds I guess. Sounds about right. How big is a serving of uncooked meat? The recipe says 4-5 servings so I'll cut it into 5 pieces.

Looks like I only have one carrot. I'll just use more potatoes then. I like potatoes. 4 medium potatoes, 3 small potatoes, and one carrot -- same number of vegetables, should work. What does "crosswise" mean? I'll just cut it up.

Hmm, I have a can of condensed cream of mushroom soup. It's even 10 3/4 oz. I don't know of anything magical about "french onion."

So hey, I have the right ingredients, sort of. In 8 hours I'll see if "sort of" tastes good.

(Side note: I think I'll add "better potato peeler" to my Christmas wish list.)
Ed. This is John's cat, Abby. Anncrafts has no pets but her children make up for that.