I cook this recipe all the time at home.  It lasts a long time and does well in the freezer if I have to freeze it.  Eye round beef is also a very lean cut of meat which is also a bonus.  One of the drawbacks is that it is a tough cut of meat and if you don’t prepare it rare, it’s not going to be very tender.  Also, it needs to be cut razor thin, which works well if you are making a sandwich or something like that.  I usually cut it as thinly as I can and usually serve it at room temperature along with a salad, some blanched broccoli or beans, some crusty bread, and/or some cheese…and I usually just put all of it on a cutting board and serve it as is.  The flavor of this roast is great, at once salty and sweet with hints of herbs and spice.  I got the recipe from this cookbook, which I’ve featured on the blog before (buy it…you won’t be sorry about the investment).  I’ve followed this recipe exactly and I’ve also made it using the same basic technique but using different spices and herbs.  I really liked the way it tasted with herbs de Provence.  However, here, I followed the recipe by and large from the book as written so that you could get a sense for what it looks like from that perspective.

Two things before the recipe that I should mention.  One, the good news is that this roast only takes about 20 minutes to cook the whole thing at 425 degrees.  Two, the bad news is that the rub of all the seasonings and herbs needs to be done two days (48 hours) in advance of cooking it.  So this involves a bit of planning to pull off.  However, the saving grace about it is that once you create the rub and season the beef, you wrap it up, pop it in the fridge and it just sits soaking up all the flavor for a couple of days.  It takes about 15 minutes to gather everything, make the rub, and season the beef.  So all in all, not a whole lot of time to prepare.  It does, though, require some forethought which may be inconvenient on occasion.  So, with those two things in mind, here is my current favorite rare roast beef recipe.  It’s almost exactly the recipe published in the book, just written in my own words with a few noted changes.  Recipe follows after the jump…

Ingredients:

2 Cloves of garlic

Fine Sea Salt

1 Untrimmed 5 lb. eye of round roast beef

1 Juniper Berry (I actually use a 5 or 6 but the recipe calls for only 1)

1 Tablespoon peppercorns

2 Dried bay leaves

1 Tablespoon dried rosemary

1 Tablespoon dried sage

1 Tablespoon brown sugar

¼ Cup olive oil

Instructions:

• Crush the garlic and then combine with some salt and grind into a paste (mortar and pestle is best for this). Rub the garlic mixture all over the roast.
• Take 4-5 Tablespoons of fine sea salt and rub it all over the beef.
• Take the peppercorns, juniper berries, bay leaves, rosemary, and sage and grind with a grinder until almost powdery.
• Combine the spice rub with the brown sugar and mix. Rub the roast all over with this mix.
• Wrap the roast completely with plastic wrap. I place it on a cookie sheet in case it leaks but you don’t have to.  Either way, place it in the refrigerator for approximately 48 hours.
• One the day you are going to roast the beef, remove the roast from the oven about two hours prior to roasting. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
• Once the roast has come to room temperature and the oven has preheated, place the roast in a roasting pan outfitted with a rack.
• Rub the roast all over with the olive oil.
• Place in oven and roast for 10 minutes. Rotate the pan and roast another 8 minutes (I usually go for another 2-3 minutes more, especially if my roast is a bit over the 5 lb. mark).
• Remove from oven and allow to rest about 30 minutes (I usually go for an hour but I usually serve this at room temperature).

Once ready, use a very, very sharp knife and slice the roast as thinly as possible.  Go slow as this can get away from you and you can cut yourself pretty easily doing this (I speak from experience).

Enjoy this roast warm, room temperature, or cold.  It’s great on the day it’s made but it’s also great leftover and on sandwiches.  Since you slice it so thin, the roast also lasts longer than you might think.