Sunday, January 22, 2012

Short Ribs

Most weekends, particularly when it's chilly and wet outside, we try to make something that we can have for dinner one night and enjoy the benefit of having leftovers for lunch and/or dinner a couple of times over the next week. This is usually inspired by something one of us has read about or seen recently, or an old favorite that hasn't had a showing for awhile. Sometimes we use a recipe, most of the time we just look at a bunch of different ones in our cookbooks and on websites to give us an idea of what we need to do if we are trying something new. Otherwise, the goal is to make something tasty that makes the house smell good. A couple of weeks ago we made some short ribs. Maybe next time we will think to take a picture of it before it gets devoured.

Here is the primary recipe that we looked at for guidance; I love Cook's Illustrated for all the things they try and report on and once I've read through their accounts I know exactly what NOT to do.

This recipe from Smitten Kitchen looks pretty delicious, and I like the final step of crisping the ribs up like they were carnitas, but so many pots and pans.

First a note about short ribs; these come cut two ways; English cut which is one longer whole rib bone cut parallel to the bone OR Flanken which is cut perpendicular across the ribs so you have several bones in the piece of meat. I like the Flanken cut better, it seems easier to work with, but that’s just me. I also like to use grass fed beef because it’s way leaner and you don’t have to skim the fat off the top of the braise if you are going to make a sauce out of the stuff you braise with which I rarely do because we usually throw things in the sauce to make the meat tasty, but the liquid is usually pretty pungent and not so great for making into a sauce, plus there is the whole matter of too many pots and pans being used for such a simple meal.

This is what we did last weekend:

A couple of pounds of short ribs (flanken cut)

Bacon fat (or a couple of pieces of bacon or pancetta cooked to get some bacon fat)

An onion or two if small, cut into loose wedges

A large carrot or two smaller ones, cut into pieces

A few stalks of celery, cut into pieces

A bunch of garlic cloves peeled, can be smashed if you want

¼ cup of flour

Small can of tomato paste

14 oz can of diced tomatoes

Delicious red wine – I usually use a Rhone or a Syrah, totally up to you but make sure it is something you would like to also drink.

Low salt Chicken Broth so you can salt to taste

Fresh Thyme

Fresh Rosemary

Bay leaf (ves)

Salt

Fresh Ground Pepper

Preheat your oven to 300 degrees.

Trim up the short ribs if they need them, season them with salt and fresh ground pepper – generously, it will feel like too much, but do it anyway. You can use kosher salt if you want it to taste less salty.

In a Dutch oven, Brown the short ribs on all sides in the bacon fat (Or you can use a little olive oil if you don't have any bacon on hand, but really, who doesn't have some bacon around?); remove from the pan onto a plate once they are seared on all sides.

Once the ribs are removed from the pot, toss in the onion, carrots, and celery cook until slightly wilted/browned, season with salt and pepper while they are cooking. Cook about 12-15 minutes on medium heat.

Add the garlic about 10 minutes into the onion/carrot/celery cooking time. Be sure to stir the veggies around occasionally so they don’t burn. You can add the bay leaf(ves) in now too if you want, or wait until you add the liquid, up to you.

Toss the flour in and stir with the veggies, let the flour cook a little bit until it starts to toast – this creates a kind of roux and helps to thicken the sauce if you think you are going to use it as such. I always add the flour even when I’m not making a sauce, not sure why, but it doesn’t hurt so why not.

Add the tomato paste into the pot once the veggies and stir to cook – the cooking of the tomato paste helps to caramelize the flavors. Be careful this can burn; so keep the heat down and stir.

Add the liquid, the diced tomatoes, the fresh herbs, and any other spices (more salt? Pepper, whatever) you want to – add the wine to broth in a 1:2 ratio – I used 2 cups of wine to 4 cups broth this last go round which leaves enough to have a big glass of what you are cooking with once you’ve got it in the oven! Make sure all the brown bits on the bottom of the pan are up by scraping/stirring once the liquid is in.

Put the meat back into the Dutch oven along with any liquid that has accumulated on the plate it was resting on. Push it down under the liquid; add more liquid to cover if you need to.

Bring the whole thing up to a boil. Watch it, you don’t want it to boil for a long time, you are just getting it up to that point before you put it in the oven.

Put the lid on – or if you have got this far and realized that your pot does not have a lid, cover it tightly and securely with foil, maybe put a cookie sheet on top to hold it tight, the point being that you don’t want the liquid to steam out while it’s cooking.

Put the covered pot in the oven – I usually like to have it cook longer and a little slower so at this point so I turn the oven down to 275 and let it cook for 4 hours. If you want it to cook a bit faster you can leave it at 300 and cook it in 2-3 hours.

Go read a magazine.

When the four hours is over, take the pot out, and let it sit while you prepare anything else you need to. Leave the pot covered so the contents stay warm.

If you are going to make a sauce with the braising liquid, now is the time to do so. Follow instructions on the recipes I’ve linked above. However, if I am making short ribs it is because I want to do something easy, not strain and dump and whatever else those recipes tell you to do. I usually just sauté up some mushrooms and serve them with the meat over either (a) mashed potatoes (b) noodles or (c) polenta (make with the same chicken broth) that I’ve made while the meat is resting.

To serve, either place the short ribs on a platter bone and all (most of them will be falling out by now) OR pull the meat off the bone and make plates with the starch (I really like polenta) and whatever else you are putting on it (sautéd mushrooms).

Other than that, if you didn't make sauce out of the braising liquid, you could use a Knorr mushroom gravy packet to make a gravy if so inclined. A salad can be a nice addition, or not.

Red wine is not optional.

Use leftover meat and mushrooms to make short rib+mushroom quesadillas the next day served with horseradish sour cream.