My actual favorite part of pot roast or another braised meat, is to make pasta from the leftovers. Chop yourself a half an onion and some garlic.

Saute them briefly in olive oil.

Deglaze with wine and add canned tomatoes and cook until sauce-like. Add the beef and whatever pan gravy you have to the tomato sauce. Check the seasonings.

Boil some pasta.

I’m sure there are many fine pastas in the world. I’ve been using DeCecco dry pasta for years now and it’s my favorite.

Pull the pasta and add it to the sauce. If you need to loosen it up, add some pasta water. Serve with a nice red wine.

We got this one on a recent trip to Paso Robles. It was a very dark Syrah, almost like a Petit Syrah in character. Quite reasonable, and not over oaked, with dark berry flavors.

When we discovered that the Packers would be playing in the NFC championship, as good expatriate Wisconsinites, we, of course, had to stay home and watch.

Pot roast seemed like a fun idea. Football games take three or four hours to play themselves out, and so does a pot roast.

Pot roast reminds me of Sunday night dinners with my grandparents in Southwestern Wisconsin. It was one of those dishes you could count on. That and the boiled red potatoes.

Unfortunately, the Packers lost to the New York Giants.

The Pot roast, however, turned out pretty well.

Of course I doubt my grandmother would have used garlic or wine in hers and parsnips are probably a bit exotic, as vegetables go.

And there certainly wouldn’t have been a bottle of Greenwood Ridge Zinfandel to accompany the meal.

Since we were off to some friends’ house for Cocktails & Canapes last evening, I made a pretty simple Saturday night dinner.

Salad with little tomatoes and a Sherry Vinegar Vinaigrette.

Fish Pie is one of those odd English comfort foods that really doesn’t sound all that appealing, but is in fact quite delicious. Make mashed potatoes. Boil two eggs. Poach some white fish in milk with a cut up onion, a bay leaf and a sprig of thyme. The trickiest thing here is controlling the heat on the fish poaching liquid, so you don’t over cook the fish or burn the milk. Pull the fish out of the liquid and strain it. Make a roux. Pour the warm milk into the roux, to make a bechamel and season with dry Colman’s mustard. Crumble the cooked fish into a baking pan including a little extra smoked salmon or haddock. Nestle the eggs in the fish. Pour the bechamel over the fish and eggs. Cover the whole thing with the cooked mashed potatoes. Then pop it into to the oven until the top is brown and it is warmed through.

It really is one of the whitest meals you can possibly have.

Serve with a nice white wine or hard apple cider.

I do not recommend following this dinner with copious amounts of delicious food and champagne cocktails. Especially not several Death in the Afternoon cocktails. Champagne spiked with Absinthe, not a great idea, if you want to remember the rest of your evening.