1 can dark beer (500 ml) - like Guinness stout or Erdinger (wheat beer) dunkel
1 cup beef broth or beef stock
3 sprigs fresh thyme
2 sprigs fresh rosemary
3 bay leaves
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
To serve:
freshly chopped flat-leaf parsley
mashed potatoes or creamy polenta
Takes ,
serves 6.
Instructions
Preheat oven to 300°F. Place oven rack in the lower-third position.
Pat short ribs dry using paper towels then season both sides with salt and pepper.
Heat half the quantity of oil in a Dutch oven on stovetop over moderate to medium-high heat (oil needs to be very hot).
Add pieces of beef in batches, leaving undisturbed to sear, about 5 minutes. Flip pieces and repeat, browning the other side. Remove cooked pieces to a bowl. Add more oil to pot as needed and cook remaining beef in same manner.
Once all of the beef is seared, reduce heat to moderate or lower setting.
Add onions, cooking slowly to caramelize, scraping up brown bits and stirring frequently, about 10 minutes.
Stir in tomato paste and Worcestershire sauce and cook for 1 minute. Add carrots, celery, parsnip and garlic, cooking until soft, about 2 - 3 minutes.
Increase temperature to moderate high then add the beer and beef stock scraping up all the brown bits from the bottom of the pan. Drop in the thyme, rosemary and bay leaves along with the short ribs and any juices resting in the bottom of the bowl.
Transfer pot to oven with the lid slightly askew and cook for 2½ hours, turning the ribs at 1½ hour mark.
To serve: Carefully transfer meat to a platter and tent loosely with foil. Strain cooking liquid through a sieve pushing liquid through solids. Pour liquid into a gravy separator, leaving it to settle for maybe 5 minutes. Pour liquid into a small saucepan and heat over moderate heat, reducing by half to about 2 cups. Add balsamic, taste then season with salt and pepper.
Serve ribs from platter drizzled with sauce or serve over potatoes or polenta, adding a ladle of sauce over dish. Garnish with parsley. Serve immediately.
Braised Beef Short Ribs
Ingredients
4 pounds boneless beef short ribs
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 teaspoon black pepper
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 yellow onions, diced
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
2 carrots, diced
2 celery ribs, diced
1 parsnip, diced
6 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 can dark beer (500 ml) - like Guinness stout or Erdinger (wheat beer) dunkel
1 cup beef broth or beef stock
3 sprigs fresh thyme
2 sprigs fresh rosemary
3 bay leaves
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
To serve:
freshly chopped flat-leaf parsley
mashed potatoes or creamy polenta
Directions
Preheat oven to 300°F. Place oven rack in the lower-third position.
Pat short ribs dry using paper towels then season both sides with salt and pepper.
Heat half the quantity of oil in a Dutch oven on stovetop over moderate to medium-high heat (oil needs to be very hot).
Add pieces of beef in batches, leaving undisturbed to sear, about 5 minutes. Flip pieces and repeat, browning the other side. Remove cooked pieces to a bowl. Add more oil to pot as needed and cook remaining beef in same manner.
Once all of the beef is seared, reduce heat to moderate or lower setting.
Add onions, cooking slowly to caramelize, scraping up brown bits and stirring frequently, about 10 minutes.
Stir in tomato paste and Worcestershire sauce and cook for 1 minute. Add carrots, celery, parsnip and garlic, cooking until soft, about 2 - 3 minutes.
Increase temperature to moderate high then add the beer and beef stock scraping up all the brown bits from the bottom of the pan. Drop in the thyme, rosemary and bay leaves along with the short ribs and any juices resting in the bottom of the bowl.
Transfer pot to oven with the lid slightly askew and cook for 2½ hours, turning the ribs at 1½ hour mark.
To serve: Carefully transfer meat to a platter and tent loosely with foil. Strain cooking liquid through a sieve pushing liquid through solids. Pour liquid into a gravy separator, leaving it to settle for maybe 5 minutes. Pour liquid into a small saucepan and heat over moderate heat, reducing by half to about 2 cups. Add balsamic, taste then season with salt and pepper.
Serve ribs from platter drizzled with sauce or serve over potatoes or polenta, adding a ladle of sauce over dish. Garnish with parsley. Serve immediately.
Braised Beef Short Ribs
5 / 5. 1
Boneless beef short ribs slowly simmered in a flavourful sauce of dark beer, beef stock and veggies…
Whether you’re gathering with friends at home or the cottage, BRAISED BEEF SHORT RIBS are the perfect weekend meal idea.
We received tons of compliments during the testing of this recipe, and in retrospect, what’s not to love? These ribs are not only hearty and satiating but also extremely flavourful. Making a main course like these BRAISED BEEF SHORT RIBS might seem like a herculean effort, but it’s really the Dutch oven that does the heavy lifting. Just set aside a few hours to allow for the ribs to cook slowly in the oven and the finished dish is so worth it.
Before listing a few tips on how to prepare them perfectly, here’s a quick overview of what to expect when you go to make these ribs at home or the cottage:
You’ll need about 15 minutes to chop the onions, carrot, celery, parsnip and garlic for the recipe.
Browning the ribs over medium-high heat before adding them to the stewing liquid locks in flavours and ensures the ribs stay tender.
The braising mixture is really just a straightforward sauce.
The seared ribs slow cook in the liquid for 2½ hours.
Final step is to separate the braising liquid from the solids in the pan and reduce it down to a bold, big-flavoured gravy to serve with the ribs.
If this sounds like your kind of meal, let’s get started. Here’s how to make BRAISED BEEF SHORT RIBS:
EQUIPMENT
Let’s begin with a photo of the tools and equipment we used to prepare our short ribs recipe. Nothing special is required: a large Dutch oven or covered pot, either stainless steel or cast iron; fine strainer; wooden spoon; pot-friendly whisk and a gravy separator. If that gravy separator is something not yet in your culinary equipment arsenal, perhaps now is a good time to purchase one. It’s helpful not only in this recipe but others like our DRY-BRINED ROASTED TURKEY, where pan juices, and not fat, are needed to make a gravy.
BEEF SHORT RIBS
In preparing this recipe, we reached out to a favourite butcher to assist by trimming up the ribs for us in advance. Short ribs are a cut of beef taken from the brisket, chuck, plate or rib areas of beef cattle. They consist of a short portion of the rib bone and the surrounding meat, which varies in thickness. There are two types of cuts associated with short ribs: “flanken cut” (think Miami-style or these KOREAN RIBS) where the meat is cut across the bone, or “English cut” where cuts are made parallel to the bone.
The next photo shows a single beef short rib, cut to a 4-inch length. During the testing of the recipe, we discovered that leaving the bone on the meat yielded a fattier finished dish, but removing the rib bones eliminates much, but not all, of the fat. When ordering boneless short ribs from your butcher, ask them to include the bones separately when you pick up your order. You can boil up and simmer short rib bones with herbs and vegetables to create a stellar beef bone stock.
BONELESS BEEF RIBS
In this next photo, you can see the four pounds of boneless beef short ribs laid out on a sheet of butcher paper. What this photo doesn’t show, but the VIDEO attached to this recipe does, is the key step of patting the ribs dry with paper towel. Doing this before adding seasoning ensures the ribs sear and brown in the oil.
Seasoning the short ribs before the sear is also important. We suggest a simple mix of kosher salt and black pepper, with a ratio of 2:1. Happy to report, you can enhance the flavour of this recipe by also rubbing the ribs with our BUTCHER’S BLEND SPICE MIX. It adds a pleasing level of herbs and spice to the beef as it cooks.
SEARING THE RIBS
One of the key moments in this braised short ribs recipe is when we sear or brown the ribs in vegetable oil.
We suggest doing the ribs in batches to not overcrowd the pan; makes it easier to handle and turn the ribs.
BRAISING
By definition, braising is the slow cooking of meat or vegetables with liquid in a tightly sealed vessel. Building the flavours for this recipe has us adding a classic mirepoix of veggies along with a bold-flavoured beer, meat stock, herbs, tomato paste and Worcestershire sauce. Adding the short ribs into this flavourful mixture and cooking them slowly at a relatively low temperature (300°F / 149°C) gives the ribs tons of rich flavour.
VEGETABLES
No surprise that we included yellow onions, carrots and diced garlic in the mirepoix for this recipe. We also included celery and parsnip in the mix to add a bit of natural sweetness to the dish. One thing worth mentioning, we feel there’s no need to peel the carrots and parsnip before dicing them up for the recipe. Do give them a good rinse under cool water though.
Speaking of dicing, as mentioned off the top, there will be chopping. So sharpen your knives and dice up all the vegetables before you begin the recipe. It makes the cooking process less stressful when everything is prepped and ready to go.
BRAISING LIQUIDS
One of the toughest parts of the recipe is deciding what liquids to use. Although you can make braised short ribs with a red wine like merlot, cabernet sauvignon or Pinot Noir, we found using beer created a more pleasing taste. You can use a lager or pale ale for braising or stewing meats like beef, pork and lamb, but we recommend using a dark stout for this recipe, like Guinness or Erdinger Dunkel. Both have deep caramel flavouring that works wonders with the beef.
MIREPOIX
Here’s a simple photo of the mirepoix cooking away over moderate or medium heat in the Dutch oven. There are three things to remember during this portion of the recipe. First, leave the onions to cook slowly, stirring frequently, scraping up the browned bits from the bottom of the pan as they cook. This should take about 10 minutes, the goal being to caramelize them. Second consideration is to cook the tomato paste and Worcestershire sauce into those onions before adding the rest of the ingredients. Third and final thing, once all the veggies are in the pot, cook them until they’re tender. This usually takes 2 – 3 minutes, maybe longer. No need to rush these steps, just take your time.
TIME TO COOK
Once the beer and stock are added to the pot, it’s time to add the fresh herbs. We added fresh thyme, rosemary and bay leaves, then the final step, tucking in the seared ribs. We suggest manoeuvring them deep down in and amongst the veggies and herbs. This helps them soften as they braise slowly.
Pro tip: once the ribs have rested, make sure to add the juices that accumulated on the bottom of the plate or bowl. They have lots of seasoned flavouring too.
LID ASKEW
Above we mentioned how braising normally happens in a tightly sealed vessel. Well, we’re thinking this recipe presents a re-think. By leaving the lid slightly askew, some of the moisture evaporates away, causing the veggies, beer and stock to cook down and reduce ever so slightly. We believe this gives the dish even better flavouring.
FINISHED
Once your BRAISED BEEF SHORT RIBS are cooked, remove the pot from the oven, and if you’d like, test one rib for doneness. The rib should be soft and fork-tender, almost falling apart as you withdraw it from the pot. One thing to note that we didn’t mention in the VIDEO, you can prepare the ribs a day or two before serving. Just leave them in the pot to cool before placing them into the refrigerator to keep overnight. You can then carefully remove the fat which will have solidified. Then proceed with removing the ribs from the pot, straining the liquid and cooking it down to a gravy or sauce consistency.
PLATTER
If serving right after cooking, remove the ribs gently and carefully to a presentation plate or platter. Add a loose tent of foil to the platter to keep the ribs warm while you strain and cook down the sauce on a moderate simmer.
Very important: do not miss our direction to add a tablespoon of balsamic vinegar to the reduced sauce before seasoning and serving it. The balsamic vinegar used at the very end of this recipe takes the flavour of these boneless ribs from simple to amazing.
Ladle that delicious sauce over the ribs, add a sprinkle of freshly chopped parsley and serve. We suggest serving short ribs with our GARLIC MASHED or PARMESAN MASHED POTATOES and perhaps a SIMPLE SALAD or this MIXED GREEN SALAD. Since this dish is rather saucy, slices of SOURDOUGH BREAD are also a welcome idea when serving.
PLATED
Let’s say you’re channelling your inner chef and want to serve this meal plated to each guest, pair these ribs with our CREAMY POLENTA WITH PARMESAN.
This delicious dinner idea is so tasty, we suggest you PIN it to a favourite main course, dinner or weeknight meal idea board on PINTEREST or BOOKMARK this tab for easy access. SHARE it with friends so they can make it too. We’d also appreciate seeing pics of all the delicious dishes you’re making these days. Use #weekendatthecottage when you post those pics on Facebook and Instagram. Thanks!
You and your guests will love this BRAISED BEEF SHORT RIBS recipe. Enjoy!
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Ingredients
4 pounds boneless beef short ribs
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 teaspoon black pepper
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 yellow onions, diced
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
2 carrots, diced
2 celery ribs, diced
1 parsnip, diced
6 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 can dark beer (500 ml) - like Guinness stout or Erdinger (wheat beer) dunkel
1 cup beef broth or beef stock
3 sprigs fresh thyme
2 sprigs fresh rosemary
3 bay leaves
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
To serve:
freshly chopped flat-leaf parsley
mashed potatoes or creamy polenta
Directions
Preheat oven to 300°F. Place oven rack in the lower-third position.
Pat short ribs dry using paper towels then season both sides with salt and pepper.
Heat half the quantity of oil in a Dutch oven on stovetop over moderate to medium-high heat (oil needs to be very hot).
Add pieces of beef in batches, leaving undisturbed to sear, about 5 minutes. Flip pieces and repeat, browning the other side. Remove cooked pieces to a bowl. Add more oil to pot as needed and cook remaining beef in same manner.
Once all of the beef is seared, reduce heat to moderate or lower setting.
Add onions, cooking slowly to caramelize, scraping up brown bits and stirring frequently, about 10 minutes.
Stir in tomato paste and Worcestershire sauce and cook for 1 minute. Add carrots, celery, parsnip and garlic, cooking until soft, about 2 - 3 minutes.
Increase temperature to moderate high then add the beer and beef stock scraping up all the brown bits from the bottom of the pan. Drop in the thyme, rosemary and bay leaves along with the short ribs and any juices resting in the bottom of the bowl.
Transfer pot to oven with the lid slightly askew and cook for 2½ hours, turning the ribs at 1½ hour mark.
To serve: Carefully transfer meat to a platter and tent loosely with foil. Strain cooking liquid through a sieve pushing liquid through solids. Pour liquid into a gravy separator, leaving it to settle for maybe 5 minutes. Pour liquid into a small saucepan and heat over moderate heat, reducing by half to about 2 cups. Add balsamic, taste then season with salt and pepper.
Serve ribs from platter drizzled with sauce or serve over potatoes or polenta, adding a ladle of sauce over dish. Garnish with parsley. Serve immediately.
