Christmas Dinner

Merry Christmas, everyone!
For many years I've made a beef rib roast for Christmas dinner.
This year, family has requested beef tenderloin roast, which I'll serve with a Bernaise sauce.
Any help or suggestions on roasting and not over cooking? The butcher said each roast is about 2-1/2 lbs. I'll be making two of them.
Thank you!
BB🎄

BerryBaby
  • 1580 views
  • 12 Comments

12 Comments

BerryBaby December 26, 2018
Well, plans changed and family decided on tradition and we had a spectacular rib roast. Creamed spinach (with a hint of nutmeg), mashed potatoes, spiced apple rings and, of course, au jus. It was truly a perfection meal and I heard silence! It was that good!
Thank you to everyone for your suggestions on making tenderloin...very helpful for future meals.
Happy New year to all!🎉🎄⛄️
BB
 
MMH December 20, 2018
Good luck B.B. this is now my favorite Christmas dinner. I picked up a great restaurant trick for leftovers If you have any. You can rewarm this slices in a shallow pan of beef stock to avoid losing the perfect medium rare Im sure you will get.
 
Summer O. December 17, 2018
325 degrees and 20 minutes per lb. for meat thermometer should register 125. Meat should be a room temp before it goes in.
 
Pegeen December 17, 2018
These "melting potatoes" from Smitten Kitchen also sound delicious.

I love your description of cooking with your daughter. Enjoy your dinner!
 
Pegeen December 17, 2018
Oh and here's the link:
https://smittenkitchen.com/2018/03/melting-potatoes/
 
Pegeen December 17, 2018
David Leite's with madeira sauce is a good recipe. https://leitesculinaria.com/61751/recipes-beef-tenderloin-madeira-sauce.html.

I'm sure you already have a good working thermometer but that's the ticket with tenderloin. It's far too easy to overcook it. And your butcher could do all the trimming in step 1 if you're not of a mind for it. In my home, good sauce gets a lot of praise from the masses, I try to make double of whatever's I'm working with. Sometimes I think my life is all about the sauce.

I also remember making this recipe from this site to good acclaim: Porcini and Rosemary crusted tenderloin with port wine sauce.
https://food52.com/recipes/14725-porcini-and-rosemary-crusted-beef-tenderloin-with-port-wine-sauce

Are you making June's potato gratin to go with? You must. Or something like it.
https://food52.com/recipes/14548-gratin-dauphinois-a-lyon-really-rich-potato-gratin

I hope you have a beautiful dinner with your family.
 
Pegeen December 17, 2018
To add, the tricky part of a tenderloin is that the sauce is last minute. So you must have great appetizers - placed as far away from the kitchen as possible - to keep everyone out of the kitchen while you do the last master strokes. In the mayhem of Christmas, I have gone so far as to actually assign one of the guests to keep people out of the kitchen while I'm finishing. It's a beautiful dance and always worth it.
 
BerryBaby December 17, 2018
Thank you for the suggestions!
I use Julia Child's bernaise sauce recipe and have also made her Hollandaise, both are excellent.
My daughter is my cooking companion and it's like a dance when we cook together. No need to ask each other anything, we both just know what needs to be tended to. I ask my family what they would enjoy as sides and the only thing requested so far is Yorkshire pudding. Have made it many times before with the rib roast. So easy! I'll check out the potato recipe...Merry Christmas!
 
ktr December 16, 2018
I have never cooked beef tenderloin, but I cook venison tenderloin every year. I would recommend watching them closely as tenderloin is easy to overcook. With venison tenderloin I alway cook it until my thermometer reads 140 degrees Fahrenheit. Once it rests for several minutes, it is usually a perfect medium rare. Mine are usually fairly thin and cook really quickly (under 20 min usually) but I’m assuming beef tenderloin is a thicker piece of meat.
 
Nancy December 16, 2018
Dear BB -
It's nice to shake up tradition...I commend you on going outside the usual main course.
If you've made both this cut of meat and this sauce before, your main issues will be knowing how well done your family likes its meat, having a meat thermometer (and maybe an oven thermometer) on hand, checking if your oven runs true to the dial on temp or not.
Then you know how long or to what temp to roast for, say, medium rare in your oven, checking intermittently.
If, OTOH, you've made only the meat not the sauce (or vice versa), I recommend a test run pretty soon...only 9 days to Christmas.
This cut comes in steaks and as filet mignon, so you could make a mini version soon for, say, a couple and work out any problems on smaller and less costly cuts of meat.
Good luck & happy Christmas!
Nancy
 
BerryBaby December 17, 2018
Thanks, Nancy! I have 3 meat thermometers and use them all the time. I agree it's the only way to determine meat temperature.
 
Nancy December 17, 2018
BB - Were you ever a Girl Scout? Be prepared - if fails, you have back-up. BTW, like Pegeen, I was going to recommend the porcini and rosemary crusted tenderloin recipe here, but saw you'd already chosen (classic) Bearnaise. Have a lovely dinner!
 
Recommended by Food52