If you are looking for an easy recipe that is sure to impress, you need to try this Garlic Prime Rib. We were having a large group over on Christmas Day so we had a great excuse to try this one out.
We went to a local butcher shop and came home with a whopping 16lb piece of beef. This is way more than we needed but our kids are carnivores and we knew we would have no problem sending them home with any leftovers. One thing I didn’t plan on was that most recipes for prime rib call for 5 to 10 pounds of beef. We made a few adjustments as necessary, tried an old aviation trick TLAR (That Looks About Right) and everything worked out just fine.
We pulled the meat out of the refrigerator a couple of hours before we wanted to start cooking it so it would be right about at room temperature. While the meat was warming to room temperature we mixed up the following ingredients. (amounts adjusted for a 10 pound piece of meat)
10 clove garlic, minced
2 tsp ground pepper
2tsp salt
2tsp dried thyme
2tbsp olive oil
We placed the prime rib (fatty side up) on a rack over a cookie sheet because we did not have a pan big enough to hold it. About an hour before we were to start cooking we mixed the ingredients above in a bowl and spread them over the fatty side of the prime rib.
This is such a good cut of meat that you probably don’t want put the garlic spread on it for more than an hour before cooking.
Here is where it gets a little tricky. It is very easy to overcook prime rib so it is very important to have a good meat thermometer.
Preheat the oven to 500 degrees. Cook the prime rib for about 20 minutes at this temp and then turn down the heat. We used 300 degrees for our lower temp. We started checking the internal temp of the prime rib after seventy five minutes on the lower heat. For this large cut that we had it took ninety minutes to hit an internal temp of 130 degrees.
Once we hit 130 degrees we pulled the prime rib out to let it rest. Some people don’t like to cover the meat during this time but we did cover it with foil. As you know the prime rib will continue to cook for a while after it is pulled out of the oven so it is better to under cook than cook it too long. The secret really is monitoring the internal temperature and not letting it get away from you. The ends of this cut of meat are thinner so the people that like medium or more well done are taken care of by serving them the ends.
A little potato side dish and asparagus with hollandaise sauce and we had quite a feast.
If you are planning a special event give this recipe a try. It was definitely a hit with our family.
