FTC for the win

We had a real quandary yesterday. Having lost his wife this past summer, a dear friend was facing Christmas alone. Any family we'd normally spend Christmas with were locked down for the pandemic. We've both had Covid and are immune for at least another couple months so we decided to cook and deliver Christmas dinner.

The mission: Prepare an herb encrusted boneless rib roast at home Christmas morning, then transport it 90 minutes and hold it for another hour until dinner time. I used an old recipe we've enjoyed for the last few years. The roast was just shy of 4 pounds. It had been dry rubbed with a heavy coating of Penzeys English Prime Rib Rub and wrapped in cling film for two weeks. Christmas Eve we covered it with a wet herbal slurry. Christmas morning it went into a 450* convection oven for 25 minutes, then throttled back to 350* for the better part of another hour. With an internal temp about 110* I pulled it, wrapped it tight with foil, wrapped that with a towel, and stuck it in a small preheated cooler. Fingers crossed.

When we got there I checked the internal again. It had risen to about 135*-140*. At carving time (2 1/2 Hours after the start of FTC) it was 140*/145*. We're a medium rare/Medium crowd so that was perfect. It was still very pink in the center and really juicy throughout. Fork tender.

I'm a real believer in the benefits of the cook and hold approach that FTC offers. We'll be egging another roast on NYD for us (we left the other with him) and I'll take some photos of the cook. As successful as this was, I see another long rest in store for the next roast.