One of my all-time favorite dishes that is oh so comforting is red-wine braised short ribs. When I see it on a menu I get pretty excited and usually order it. The results are often mixed; some restaurant dishes are amazing and others not so much. With the right ingredients and the basic braising technique, you can make some amazing short ribs at home that are as good as you will get anywhere.
Potato Purée (ultra smooth mashed potatoes) a classic pairing because they soak up the delicious sauce and match up with the delicate constancy of the braised ribs. Adding parsnips to the mix for a bright and fresh taste makes it even more delicious with the braising sauce.
The short ribs only get better the next day, so it's great to make them a day or two in advance. Just slowly warm them up in the sauce and serve.
This recipe was inspired by Kettle & Fire's Beef Bone Broth. One of the barriers to wanting to make this dish is great beef broth. Most beef broths at the grocery store are super salty and flavorless, leaving your end sauce salty and lacking the depth of real beef flavor. Making beef broth at home is not really an option either because of the time it takes and large quantity of ingredients needed. The Kettle & Fire broth is so flavorful and natural that it makes cooking dishes like this enjoyable at home and restaurant quality.
The quality of the ingredients really make a huge difference. Great meat, produce (from Specialty Produce in San Diego) and broth make this one pretty darn easy and impressive.
You will see both bone-in and boneless short ribs at the store. My local butcher (Sepulveda Meats & Provisions) had bone-in on this visit, so that's what I went with. Both are great. The bone-in might provide a little more flavor and flavor in the sauce, and the boneless will give you more meat.
Pat dry and heavily season the short ribs with kosher salt and freshly ground pepper right before cooking, then lightly dust with flour. This will help with the browning which provides for tons of flavor.
Brown on all sides, then remove and drain most of the fat from the pot.
Sweat the onion, then deglaze with red wine and add the remaining vegetables. You want to cook this down until most of the wine is gone (by about ¾). Leaving too much wine at this point will make the sauce taste a bit too winey. 🙂
This is after the sauce has been strained, fat removed and reduced down a bit more to thicken it and magnify the flavor intensity. The best way to re-heat the short ribs is to do so slowly in the sauce.
Ingredients
Braised Short Ribs
- 2 lbs bone-in beef short ribs
- flour for dusting
- canola oil
- kosher salt and pepper
- 1 ½ cups dry red wine
- 1 onion sliced
- 4 garlic cloves smashed
- 4 thyme sprigs
- 2 bay leaves
- 2 carrots sliced into 1" pieces
- small bunch fresh parsley
- 1 container / 17.6oz Kettle & Fire Beef Bone Broth or other high-quality beef bone broth
Parsnip-Potato Purée
- 1 lb about 3 medium parsnips, peeled and cut into 1" pieces
- 1 lb 1 large russet potatoes, peeled and cut into 1" pieces.
- 2 garlic cloves peeled
- kosher salt & white pepper
- 2 tablespoons butter
- ½ cup cream or milk
Instructions
Braised Short Ribs
- Pre-heat your oven to 325 degrees. Pat dry and heavily season the short ribs well with salt and pepper, then dust each side with flour. Heat a large dutch oven or heavy pot over medium-high heat with canola oil to coat the bottom. When the oil begins to smoke, sear the short ribs on all sides until well browned. Remove from the pan and set aside to drain.
- Drain off all but 1 tablespoon of the fat from the pot and place back on medium heat. Add the onion and sweat until it is translucent but not browned, stirring frequently. Carefully pour in the wine to deglaze the pot, scraping off any brown bits from the bottom. Add the carrots, garlic, thyme, bay leaves and parsley. Increase the heat and reduce the wine down by about ¾ and it starts to get syrupy.
- Add the beef bone broth and bring to a simmer. Add the short ribs back to the pot, cover and place in the oven for 2 to 2 ½ hours, until the meat is extremely tender, turning the short ribs over half-way through.
- Remove the short ribs from the pot and set aside. Strain the sauce through a fine mesh strainer and discard the solids. Pour the sauce through a fat separator or refrigerate and the fat will rise to the top where it can be scraped off and discarded.
- Reduce the sauce in a smaller pan to your desired consistency and slowly re-warm the cooked short ribs in the sauce.
Parsnip-Potato Purée
- Steam or boil the parsnips, potatoes and garlic until tender, about 20 minutes (I prefer steaming because it is faster than boiling and reduces water absorbed).
- Warm the cream or milk.
- Pass the parsnips, potatoes and garlic through a potato ricer or food mill to purée.
- Slowly mix in the cream, butter and season with salt and white pepper until smooth. Adjust the amount of cream and seasoning as needed.
- Keep warm.
Notes
This post was written in partnership with Kettle & Fire. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
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