Banana's Brisket

Banana's Brisket

from Banana and Ellen's kitchens, with thanks to The New Basics Cookbook

Ingredients:

• 1 beef brisket (5-6 lbs)
• 1-2 tsp all purpose flour
• coarsely ground pepper, to taste
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 8 onions, thickly sliced and separated into rings
• 2 tbs tomato paste
• 1 1/2 tsp coarse salt
• 2 cloves garlic, quartered
• 4 carrots, peeled

Preheat:

• oven to 375.

Trim:

• brisket of most of its fat, and dust very lightly with flour.  Sprinkle with pepper.

Heat:

• oil in large heavy dutch oven.  Add the brisket, and brown on both sides over medium-high heat until some crisp spots appear on the surface.  Transfer brisket to a dish.  Keeping the heat on medium-high, add the onions to the dutch oven and stir, scraping p the brown bits left from the meat.  Cook until the onions have softened and developed a handsome brown color, 10-15 minutes.

Remove:

• dutch oven from heat, and place the brisket, along with any juices on top of the onions.  Spread the tomato paste over the brisket as if icing a cake.  Sprinkle with pepper and salt.  Add the garlic and carrots and cover.  Place on the middle rack in oven and bake for 1.5 hours.

Remove:

• from oven, and transfer meat to cutting board.  Cut into 1/8 to 1/4" thick slices.  Return the slices to the pot, overlapping them at an angle so that you can see a bit of the top edge of each slice.  Cover, and return to the oven.  Cook until meat is brown and fork tender, 1.75-2 hours longer.

Slice:

• carrot and transfer roast, onions, juice, and carrot slices to a heated platter.  Serve.