The porterhouse roast is the quiet achiever of the Christmas table. It is a crowd pleaser, it carves cleanly, and it asks very little of you on the day. Get a good piece of beef and a meat thermometer and it is hard to get wrong. Serve it warm with red wine jus, mash and greens.
Serves: 6
What to order: a 2kg Certified Organic porterhouse roast, tied
Prep: 25 minutes | Cook: 45 minutes | Rest: 15 minutes | Plus 35 to 45 minutes to bring the beef to room temperature
Ingredients
For the roast
- 2kg Certified Organic porterhouse roast, tied
- Salt and pepper
- Oil, for browning
- 1 jar Hagen's Organic Red Wine Jus
Rosemary mash
- 6 potatoes
- 3 sprigs fresh rosemary, leaves picked and chopped
- 150g butter
- 250ml milk
- Salt and pepper
Mint peas
- 1 bag baby peas
- Fresh mint, chopped
- Butter
- Salt and pepper
Leafy greens
- Mixed seasonal leafy garden greens
- 1 shallot, finely diced
- Mustard
- Lemon
- Olive oil
- Parsley, chopped
- French radishes, to serve (optional)
Method
- Bring the porterhouse to room temperature on a wire rack, 35 to 45 minutes. Preheat the oven to 180°C.
- Season the roast well all over with salt and pepper. In a hot pan, place it fat side down and brown the surface, working your way around for even colour.
- Transfer to a wire rack and roast until the internal temperature reaches 56°C, about 45 minutes. Rest covered for 15 minutes.
- While the beef cooks, make the mash. Bring a pot of seasoned water to the boil and add the potatoes. Cook until a knife passes through easily.
- Working while the potatoes are hot, pass them through a sieve or ricer, then tip them into a pot. Over the heat, scrape the potato with a rubber spatula to iron out any lumps. Add the milk in stages until blended, then the butter. Fold through the rosemary, salt and pepper.
- Cook the peas in seasoned water, strain, and toss in a bowl with butter, chopped mint, salt and pepper.
- Make the dressing by combining mustard, lemon, olive oil, shallot and parsley. Pour over the leafy greens just before serving.
- Heat the red wine jus in a pot or the microwave.
- Slice the porterhouse to your preferred thickness and serve on a platter with the mash and radishes, with the greens, peas and jus alongside.
What temperature for a medium rare porterhouse roast?
Pull it at 56°C internal. It will carry on cooking while it rests and settle around 58 to 60°C, which is a proper medium rare. A thermometer is the only reliable way to do this. Size, shape and oven all change the timing.
Why rest a beef roast?
Carving straight out of the oven loses the juice onto the board instead of keeping it in the meat. Fifteen minutes, loosely covered. It will not go cold, and it will carve far better.
How much porterhouse per person?
About 300g to 350g a head, so a 2kg roast comfortably feeds six. If the table is bigger, size up rather than cooking two smaller pieces. Christmas lunch, hour by hour will help you fit it around everything else.
Where the beef comes from
Every farm we work with is Certified Organic and third-party audited. Not a marketing claim, a legal standard. Ask us at the counter and we will tell you exactly which farm your roast came from.
Another way with a beef roast
Oliver Hagen serves his with chimichurri and a cos heart salad. The recipe is at Porterhouse Roast and Chimichurri, or try the scotch fillet roast with salsa verde.
Ask us
Tell us how many you are feeding and we will cut and tie it to size. Available at all six stores, or order online.
