Braised oxtail
With winter stubbornly receding, I had an urge to see off the last days of the season with a full-on hearty dish. Until I saw it in the butchers I had always thought (and assumed) that oxtail wasn't kosher. My assumption was based on the fact that a) I've never eaten it and b) I've never seen it on a kosher restaurant menu. It may be the ultimate hackneyed and massacred gastropub food, nonetheless it was something I was longing to try.
I bought a couple of tails and some chuck steak to bulk-up the stew and headed home to find a recipe that would guide me through my culinary ignorance. Cooking things you have never eaten but longed for is a strange experience. You have a mental picture of what it will taste like, but if it doesn't you have no way of knowing if you have ballsed up, or your dreams were always misplaced.
I used the indominatble The Cook's Book as a base recipe - figuring that I couldn't go too far wrong following Marcus Wareing's lead. For those who haven't got this book, you really should buy it. It could easily be the only cook book - as opposed to recipe book - you ever need. Each chapter is written by a leading chef: Marcus Wareing on meat, Charlie Trotter on vegetables, Shaun Hill on poultry, Ferran Adrià on foams and Pierre Hermé on desserts and sweets, to name just a few of the chefs and chapter headings.
This recipe is a variation on the one on p300 of the book. My changes reflect what I had in the kitchen at the time.
Mash seems to be the natural accompaniment. However, because of kosher restrictions of serving milk with meat I had to find an alternative. I boiled up some potatoes until they were nice and soft, heated some oil in a frying pan and crushed them into that until they were brown and crispy.
This serves 4 although not in the largest portions.
- 2 oxtails, cut into 4 joints, excluding the tail-ends, but keep hold of them to add body to the stew
- 250g stewing steak - optional depending on size of oxtails
- 125g carrots
- 125g leeks
- 3-4 tbsp olive oil
- 500g tinned tomatoes - The Cook's Book recommends fresh
- 8 sprigs of fresh thyme
- 2 fresh bay leaves - if using dried, only 1 is needed, but do try to get fresh, bay trees last forever under almost any growing conditions
- 4 garlic cloves, crushed
- approx 1 litre chicken stock - Marcus recommends veal which sounds much more flavourful than chicken stock, but who's got three days to skim?
- 1 btl of decent, full-bodied red wine, I used a Malbec
For the vegetable garnish
- Finely chopped mirepoix (1 carrots, 2 celery sticks, 1/2 leek and 1 onion)
- The book suggests 4 tomatoes, skinned, seeded and finely diced & 1 heaped tbsp chopped parsley - I didn't have either to hand at the time of cooking
- Pinch of fleur de sel
Preheat the oven to 180C (350F, gas mark 4)
Marinate all the meat, herbs and garlic for up to 48 hours before cooking. Even a couple of hours will have a beneficial effect.
Heat the oil in a large frying pan and brown the oxtail well. Turn them when they are browned. Once browned all over, remove with a slotted spoon and drain of any liquid. If using stewing steak, sear until brown as well. Remove and drain.
Add the carrots, onions, celery and leeks to the frying pan, ensuring to coat them with the residue of the meat. When vegetables are browned add in the tomatoes, thyme, bay and garlic (retrieved from the wine) and continue to cook for a few minutes more.
Put the oxtail in an oven-proof casserole dish, I use a large Le Creuset dish. Top with the vegetables. Pour in the wine and boil over a high heat until it is nearly evaporated, then add enough stock - or water if desperate - to cover the meat. Bring to a simmer, cover and braise in a hot oven for about 2 hours.
Lift out the oxtail and the meat. Pass the sauce through a sieve into a pan and skim any fat and scum, like a banshee. You can't skim a sauce too much. Boil the sauce for 10 minutes, continuing to skim.
Blanch the garnish vegetables (except tomatoes, if using) for 5 minutes, ensuring they don't overcook and become too soft. Drain and add to the sauce (with tomatoes and parsley, if using) and simmer for a couple of minutes.
Sprinkle a touch of fleur de sel over each portion for a bit of sweety saltiness.
