A French inspired stew with red wine, thyme and garlic.  The meat is braised in red wine. Braising comes from the French word ‘braiser’ and involves both frying the meat at a high temperature to sear then cooking the meat slowly in liquid  in a covered pot.  

Serves 4

Difficulty Easy

Time approx 3 1/2 hours depending on meat sizes

Ingredients:

3 1/2 lbs oxtail

2 celery sticks

4 small red onions sliced

3 tbsp plain flour

1 whole garlic bulb

1 1/2 tbsp tomato puree

1/2 doz thyme sprigs

4 carrots chopped chunky

3 tsp Brown Sugar

2 tsp sea salt

2 tsp black pepper

60ml olive oil

1/4 cup butter

2 cups good quality red wine (french if possible)

approx 1/2 pint of good quality beef stock

(Serve with buttery mashed potatoes)

Method:

Empty the flour into a bowl with the sea salt and pepper mix well.

Then coat the oxtail in the flour.

Place oil and butter in a frying pan,  then add in the onions. Let these cook until golden.

Then with a slotted spoon remove and place into the oven dish (or crock pot for hob)

Next into the same frying pan add in the oxtail keep the heat high, again you are searing this to get a good colour.

Turn the meat so each side is browned. Once they all have a good colour remove and place with the onions in the pot.

Tuck in chunks of celery, carrots, thyme and the garlic which I just chopped the whole bulb into half.

Now splash some red wine into the hot frying pan to de-glaze and then pour over the onion and meat.

Then pour the rest of the wine to the pot.

Stir in the tomato paste, sugar and add the stock. Just pour in enough stock to ‘just’ cover the meat. You could use my organic tomato paste here, we unfortunately have ran out 😦 but it would have been great in this recipe.

https://lululemonandlace.com/recipes/pickles-chutneys-jams-and-pastes/organic-tomato-paste/

Cover well.

OVEN: Heat oven to max. Cook on highest heat for 25 minutes, then turn the oven down to 180 degrees and cook for around 2/3 hours or until the meat falls off the bone. Once it is tender remove lid and let the sauce reduce and meat colour for another 20 minutes.

HOB: With the heat on the highest get the pan to a boil then turn down and cook on low for about 3 hours. Keeping the lid on, until the meat is tender. Again once tender un-cover, I removed the meat at this point and then turned the heat up and let the sauce reduce a little before adding the meat back to the pan.

Half way through each pf the above options taste the sauce and see if it needs anymore seasoning.

Serve with buttery mashed potato.

It really was delicious, give it a go…

❤

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