Herbed Rib Roast — The Kitchen That Keeps Winning

The week began the way the weeks begin now: coffee at 5:30 AM in the dark kitchen, Sven at my feet, the lake beginning to show itself through the window as the gray of pre-dawn turned into the gray of full dawn. The silence is no longer the silence I feared. The silence is the architecture of a life I am still learning to live in. I have lived in this house for thirty-seven years. The first thirty-two of them, Paul lived here too. The last five, he has not. The math gets clearer every year and the meaning gets harder. Mamma called Tuesday. Her voice was small but her mind was sharp. She wanted to talk about Pappa, of all people. About the time he fixed her bicycle in 1962. About how he always said "there" when he had finished a job, the same way every time, the small declarative finality. She had not thought of this in years, she said. The memory came to her in the kitchen, while she was peeling an apple. I listened. I did not interrupt. The memory was unprovoked and total. The memory is everything. Erik came over Sunday. He chopped wood for me without being asked — the pile by the back door was getting low, and Erik had noticed, and Erik had brought his ax, and Erik had spent forty-five minutes splitting and stacking and not making a single comment about how the wood needed to be done. He drank coffee. He left. The whole visit was forty-five minutes. It was perfect. Erik is a perfect brother in the specific way of Scandinavian brothers — silent, useful, present. Julbord prep is in full force. The list is on the fridge. The pickled herring is ordered (three varieties — mustard, dill, onion — from Russ Kendall's, delivered next week). The meatballs are scheduled (Wednesday before Christmas Eve, sixteen pounds of beef and pork, the kind of cooking marathon that requires water breaks). The kitchen is at war with December and December is losing. The kitchen has been winning this war since 1990. The kitchen will win again. I cooked Wild rice soup this week. The Thursday constant. The Damiano Center on Thursday. Gerald told me a long story about a bus accident he had survived in 1988 in Duluth. He had not told me before. He has been telling me more stories lately. I am the audience he has been gathering, slowly, over years. I listen. I do not interrupt. The stories are the gift he is giving. Pappa would have liked this week. The fish were biting. The weather was clear. The Vikings won. He would have approved of all three. Pappa was a man of small approvals — he did not say much, but he made a small grunt of acknowledgment when something was right, and the grunt was the highest praise he gave. I miss the grunt. I miss being given the grunt. It is enough. It has to be. And on a morning like this, with the lake doing what the lake does and the dog at my feet and the bread on the counter and the kitchen warm enough to live in, it is. I keep a small notebook on the kitchen counter — green spiral-bound, from the drugstore. I write in it most days. The notebook holds the things I do not want to forget — Erik's stories about Pappa, Karin's notes about Mormor, Sophie's first words about her babies, the recipes I have changed slightly and want to remember in their changed form. The notebook is a small museum. The museum will go to Anna eventually, and then to Sophie, and then to Sophie's daughter Ingrid, and then onward. It is enough.

The Julbord list is long this year — herring three ways, sixteen pounds of meatballs, bread, cookies, all of it — but the piece that anchors the whole table, the thing that makes the kitchen feel like it is truly winning, is the Herbed Rib Roast. It asks almost nothing of you while it works, which is exactly right for a December when your hands are already full. I have made this every Christmas for years now, and every time I pull it from the oven and say “there” to no one in particular, I think of Pappa.

Herbed Rib Roast

Prep Time: 20 min | Cook Time: 2 hr 30 min | Total Time: 2 hr 50 min | Servings: 8

Ingredients

• 1 bone-in beef rib roast (4 to 5 lbs), fat trimmed to 1/4 inch
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 tablespoons fresh rosemary, finely chopped
• 2 tablespoons fresh thyme leaves
• 1 tablespoon fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 tablespoon coarse kosher salt
• 1 1/2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

Instructions

1. Make the herb paste. In a small bowl, combine garlic, rosemary, thyme, parsley, olive oil, salt, pepper, Dijon mustard, and oregano. Stir until a thick paste forms.
2. Prep the roast. Pat the rib roast thoroughly dry with paper towels. Place it bone-side down on a rack set inside a large roasting pan. Score the fat cap lightly with a sharp knife in a crosshatch pattern.
3. Apply the rub. Spread the herb paste evenly over the entire surface of the roast, pressing it into the scored fat and around the sides. Let the roast sit uncovered at room temperature for 45 minutes before roasting.
4. Roast at high heat. Preheat oven to 450°F. Roast the beef for 20 minutes to develop a crust, then reduce the oven temperature to 325°F without opening the door.
5. Continue roasting. Continue cooking until an instant-read thermometer inserted into the thickest part (not touching bone) reads 120°F for rare, 130°F for medium-rare, or 140°F for medium — approximately 15 to 18 minutes per pound after the initial sear.
6. Rest before carving. Transfer the roast to a cutting board and tent loosely with foil. Let it rest for 20 minutes. The internal temperature will rise another 5 to 10 degrees during rest. Carve between the bones and serve immediately.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 520 | Protein: 48g | Fat: 34g | Carbs: 1g | Fiber: 0g | Sodium: 610mg