Braised Short Ribs in Beer

Man, this was a good recipe. High off the braised short ribs at Chestnut, we had our home version yesterday (and leftovers will be dinner tonight, pushing all the other planned dinners back one day). Since we loved the pureed rutabega at Chestnut, we decided to have pureed turnips instead of rutabega or mashed potatoes.

While our recipe didn't use the same flavors the Chestnut dish had, it still used the same technique. Braising is so easy, I'm not sure why we don't do it more at home during the winter.

We picked up about two and a half pounds of short ribs at the local butcher. I asked him to cut those into three-inch pieces, give or take. As I prepped the veggies - carrots, onion, garlic, turnips - Steve browned the ribs. After everything was together the way it was supposed to be, we decided it needed more beer. Beer is the only liquid added to this braise. There is some liquid from the crushed tomatoes and veggies, but not much. When in doubt, add more beer. The reason why we added more was because the liquid level should come up about half-way on the meat.

The only sort of snag we ran into was determining what pot was big enough to hold everything and oven safe. A piece I'm missing is a cast iron dutch oven, or something similar that has a lid and can go in the oven. We decided to use the All-Clad stock pot. Not ideal, but it certainly did the job just fine.

After three hours, we had fall-off-the-bone, melt-in-your-mouth meat with tons of flavor. We removed the turnips around the half-way point, and I set those aside to puree with melted butter, salt, pepper, and a touch of half-and-half later.

Dinner was delicious last night and I expect the flavors to be even more developed tonight. I really must remember to take a picture of the finished dish for these blog entries. Usually, by the time the food is ready, we are ready to dig in and I completely forget about grabbing the camera. I'll try to remember to get a pic of our leftovers tonight.

Dinner menu for the week

I received my first issue of Bon Appetit this month (March). It was a Christmas present from Steve's parents. I poured over it yesterday, and it had features on three of my favorite foods - cheese, potatoes, and caramel! There are so many delicious recipes crammed into this issue that it's hard to choose what to make first. I find that recipes are like books - there are so many good ones that I'll never get to all of them.

But I've made a few choices, and put together the menu for the week provided that I am able to get all the fresh ingredients I need:

Sunday - braised beef short ribs in beer
Monday - Winter squash and apple bisque (vegetarian)
Tuesday - Beef pasties with caramelized onions and Stilton cheese
Wednesday - Pizza with Fontina, potatoes, and tapenade (vegetarian)
Thursday - left overs
Friday - Potato-wrapped halibut with sauteed spinach
Saturday - eat out, whew!

I haven't decided what sides will accompany each dish (except for Friday) yet. The braised short ribs and the bisque are from William-Sonoma's Soup & Stew cookbook, and all others are in the March BA issue.

We are going to go out in a little bit to get our short ribs and other ingredients for tonight and tomorrow. I'll do the rest of the shopping on Tuesday when it's not as hectic and crowded. This menu will also require visits to the local butcher and fish market, both of which I love going to. (Except the butcher shop has that raw meat, bloody smell which I don't really like.) After I wrote the menu and really looked at it, I realized that almost every dish this week has potatoes in it or can be nicely accompanied by mashed potatoes or potato gratin. Did I mention that I love potatoes? Yukon golds especially.

Speaking of potatoes, for St. Patrick's Day, I already know I'm going to make caraway soda bread (Amanda's recipe) and potato & leek based Colcannon soup. The last time I had both the soda bread and soup was at Harcourt during our children's marketing hosted St. Pat's pot-luck-O'the-Irish lunch. Children's marketing could be depended on to host/organize holiday events for the company. Sigh.

Therefor, I didn't want to make a potato based soup this week, even though it would have completed the theme of the week. We also have an Irish pub right around the corner from us, Ceol, and I suspect we may pop in the week of St. Pat's for some bangers & mash or Shephard's pie and a pint of Guinness.