Super-Easy Crockpot Roast

This recipe isn't new by any stretch of the imagination, but I'm posting it here because I've been enjoying it lately and because I have a couple of helpful tips. I may have broken my no-convenience-foods rule and my meat-is-only-for-special-occasions guideline (read here to find out why), but I'm still trying to make it as healthy, as un-processed, and as cheap as I can.

Since I was craving red meat, I decided to get a cut of beef and stew the you-know-what out of it in the crockpot. I wanted to get a good value for my money, so I did some reading about the leanest cuts of beef. Apparently the round cuts (top round, eye of round, bottom round) and the rump roast are the leanest cuts of beef, with about 20% to 25% fat. Top round is most tender and bottom round is least tender (not sure how rump roast compares), but when you're stewing it in the crockpot, that doesn't matter so much. For $7, I found a 2-pound roast that looked about the right size to feed me for a week. Last week, it was an eye of round roast; this week, it was a rump roast. (Sounds elegant, doesn't it?)

The next step is to pour onion soup mix over it, except for the fact that onion soup mix has MSG. So do the cheap beef bouillon cubes. I don't think I react badly to MSG, but I'd still rather stay away from it if I can. So I decided to assemble my own.

Onion soup mix is mainly made up of three things:

1) Beef bouillon, in some form. There's a store near here that sells beef-free beef bouillon powder that smells just like beef bouillon--and they sell 4 oz of it for under $1.50. I poured 1 teaspoon (equivalent of one bouillon cube) on the roast, poured 1/4 cup water over it, and then poured another generous teaspoon over the top of the roast.

2) Dried chopped onion flakes. The brand name 5th Season sells a good-sized jar of dried chopped onion flakes for 50 cents. You can find it at dollar stores or at some grocery stores (including Wal-Mart) on the bottom shelf below the expensive spices. I poured two tablespoons of those (at least) on top of the roast. (Since all these ingredients are dirt cheap, you can use as much as you want--you don't have to be limited by the size of the onion soup packet.)

3) Onion powder. This is cheapest when you buy it in bulk at a natural foods store, where you spoon some into a plastic bag and it costs a certain amount per pound. I got a 4 oz bag at the same place where I got the beef bouillon (for a similarly cheap price), and I poured 1 tablespoon of this on the roast.

4) If you want to add any celery salt or pepper, you can add some of that too. The beef bouillon will probably have a lot of salt, but if you want to add more table salt, sprinkle that on top.

To summarize: put unfrozen roast in crockpot, pour over aforementioned seasonings, and cook for a good long while. I like to do it 2 hours at HIGH and 4 hours at LOW. (This is because I can't seem to manage to get it in the crockpot early enough for it to cook for 8 hours on LOW.) It's done when it falls apart at the touch of a fork. Don't expect to slice it. It'll be too tender.

Now, a true Southerner would make gravy out of the drippings, but I haven't gotten that far yet. I asked my landlady how to dispose of the water-grease-mess that was left in the crockpot, and she replied: "You know what I like to do... I go out behind the house, off to the side a little way, and pour it out there for the critters. After all, they have to eat, too." I got quite a good laugh out of that, especially given that I was raised in suburbia (with homeowner's associations that forbid all kinds of random things), but she had a good point, and I took her advice. I hope the critters got a good meal out of it.