I know two ways to make beef short ribs, and both utilize the same cooking technique: braising. You can do a wine-based sauce, or a vinegar-based sauce. Tonight I tried the vinegary approach, tempered with sweet vegetables and brown sugar.

It starts out with browning the short ribs.

Season them first with salt and pepper, then with oil, brown them on all sides in a heavy pan. I recommend using a cast-iron vessel or dutch oven.

After browning the meat, you can add your vegetables (carrots, pearl onions, bell pepper) and sweat them out. For flavor, I added one-half can of tomato paste. Then you add your liquid, which in this case was Xeres vinegar and brown stock.

I braised the ribs this time in the oven. I usually do it stove-top.

Meanwhile, I prepared potatoes to roast, not to mention broccolini.

Then when it was time to eat, I was like “why so much food?” I over-cooked. This was enough for a small party.

The broccolini was excellent. While I liked the sour type of flavor with the beef, I ultimately prefer a wine-based sauce. I thickened the sauce through reduction before serving.

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 7th, 2009 at 9:46 pm and is filed under In the Kitchen, Meat and Steaks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.