Marinate!

The secret to tender steaks and roasts is to marinate before cooking. This is true of all beef, but particularly for grassfed beef, where the animals haven't been eating corn and other additives to add excess and unhealthy fats into the muscles.

Here's a great and simple marinade idea we got from Ed Whitfield from Lake Pointe Church. We tried it ourselves on an arm roast, and the meat was tender and falling off the bone!

Just buy a couple of cans of Jumex Pineapple-Papaya juice in the ethnic foods section of the grocery store. It comes in regular cola cans, but isn't carbonated. I'm sure other varieties of pineapple juice would do fine as well. After thawing, put the roast or steaks into a gallon ziplock bag with the juice, and let it sit overnight. The next morning, pour off the marinade, and just fix your roast in a crockpot however you typically enjoy it. I just put plenty of water, carrots, potatoes, onions, a couple of bouillon cubes, salt and pepper. A packet of onion soup mix if you want it. Just throw it all in the pot and let it cook long and slow during the day.

It was some kind of delicious. Plus I had the leftover roast on a sandwich for lunch today. It doesn't get any better than that.