Red Wine Beef Short Ribs

The red wine sauce is priceless. You can’t buy this flavour from a canned beef broth. The key is burning off the alcohol with a blowtorch. If you don’t, the beef will suck in the alcohol and the dish will taste bitter. Once you burn off the alcohol you are left with the complex flavours of the wine. Use a decent red wine. I will used a bottle that costs about $20. The 3 day process is worth it. The infused flavour of the sauce into the ribs and the fall off the bone texture is amazing.

• 1 bottle red wine
• Fresh Thyme (bunch)
• Fresh bay leaf
• 1 onion
• 2 celery sticks
• 2 carrots
• 1 leek
• 2 heads of garlic
• 1/2 cup flour
• 1.5 tbps cold butter
• 4lbs short ribs (bone in)
• Canola Oil (or any neutral oil)

1. Slice the short ribs into big squares.
2. Wash and rough chop the onions, carrots, celery, leeks, cut the garlic head horizontally.
3. Add all the vegetables, a whole bottle of red wine into a pot.
4. Heat up the pot of wine and use a blow torch to burn off the alcohol. Keep lighting it until there isn’t a flame that appears from the alcohol. Burning off the alcohol removes any bitter taste and is key to a good sauce.
5. Add thyme and bay leaf to the red wine.
6. Allow the red wine sauce to cool completely and add the sauce and the ribs to a big zip lock bag and let it marinade 12 hours.
7. Pre heat oven to 275F.
8. Remove the short ribs from the marinade and dust with flour.
9. Heat up a pan with oil. You want to heat up the oil until you see it shimmer and a bit of smoke comes off the oil. Sear the short ribs on all sides. About 30 seconds per side.
10. Pour the left over marinade in a pot a simmer and skim off the impurities.
11. Put the marinade and ribs into a ceramic pot with a cover and let it slow cook for 3 hours.
12. After 3 hours, take a toothpick or fork and see if there is no resistance when you poke the short ribs.
13. Remove the ribs and set aside. Then use a strainer to remove the vegetables and herbs.
14. Put the rubs and the strained sauce into a container and let it cool.
15. Once cooled, put it in the fridge for 12 hours.
16. Put the ribs and sauce in a pot and on medium heat warm up the sauce and ribs.
17. Reserve some sauce and heat up in a pan. Whisk in the cold butter to emulsify the butter into the sauce. Taste and adjust the salt and pepper levels. If the sauce is a bit too acidic, add a bit of sugar. The sauce should taste balanced with no one taste sticking out (too sweet or too sour or too salty).

I serve this with parsnip purée and grilled asparagus.