Pot roast

The pot roast shown above is brisket, but you can use other cuts. Blade roast, chuck, or brisket are best. Other leaner cuts (like round roasts) can come out drier or stringy, but honestly are also just fine considering it will be smothered in gravy. 

This is more a method than an exact recipe - I change up the exact ingredients each time I make it, other than onions, carrots, and garlic, which I use every time. And cooking time is very dependent on both the size and shape of the roast. This is the basic outline for a 3 lbs brisket roast - scale the other ingredients up or down accordingly.

1. Lightly sprinkle roast with salt and pepper or seasoning salt. Slice up 2 onions, and mince 4 cloves of garlic. Slice 3 carrots into chunks. 
2. Brown your roast on all sides in a deep skillet or roaster, in a little bit of oil if there is no fat cap. If there is, just start your browning fat side down and it should release enough fat to brown the other sides.  
3. When fully browned, set the roast aside on a plate or bowl. Turn the heat down to medium and put your sliced onions in. Cook for a few minutes until softened then add in the garlic. Cook briefly until fragrant, then add about 2-3 cups of liquid to deglaze the pan. 
4. Add seasonings, check for salt level. Keep it on the un-salty side for now. You'll check the seasonings again and adjust after it's cooked a while and more of the meat flavour comes out into the liquid. 
5. Put the roast back into liquid, cover with a lid or foil, and put into a 300 F oven. Turn roast every hour. A thinner roast like brisket will take about 3 hours. A large blade roast can take 5-6 hours or more. There's not a great way to predict this more precisely than that, so don't make this if you're in a rush or have a tight timeline, make it the day ahead if that's the case. Check every hour for the first couple of hours, then every half hour after that. 
6. When meat is done to your liking (fork tender for slicing or falling apart if you like to serve in chunks), take the meat out of the liquid to rest on a foil covered plate. 
7. Taste cooking liquid and adjust salt level and seasoning. 
8. Transfer the skillet/roaster to the stovetop and heat to boiling and thicken with cornstarch or flour mixed with cold water. Taste and adjust seasoning again after thickening - sometimes the starch can dilute the flavours. 
9. Slice roast or use forks to pull apart into chunks. Put back into the gravy to reheat, or serve separately.

Liquids - I usually use some combination of water and onion soup mix or beef bouillon powder plus some red wine. Use a teaspoon of soup mix or beef powder per cup of liquid, and adjust as needed. 

Seasonings - I usually put in about a tsp of thyme, and sometimes an equal amount of sage. I also usually put in a healthy squirt of ketchup (instead of tomato paste which is often in recipes), Worcestershire sauce, and a little coffee as part of the liquid. 

Other additions - bacon, cut into small pieces and fried until the fat renders (do this step first, then use the bacon grease to brown the roast and saute the onions), sauteed sliced or whole mushrooms, potatoes (put in an hour before roast is done, and take out with a slotted spoon if they are fully cooked before the meat is tender), celery (saute with onions).