Short ribs really benefit from a low and slow cook, perfect for cooking in the residual heat of a wood-oven slowly overnight. The brine in this recipe is flavoured similarly to a pastrami rub, and the addition of soy sauce gives it a wonderful depth.
This recipe has a few processes, from initially curing and smoking the ribs, sealing them in a hot wood oven, and then slow cooking them over night in the residual heat.
Method
To make the brine, lightly toast the spices in a dry pan be careful not to burn them, cover with the water, add the sugar, soy and salt and bring to just before a boil. Remove from the heat and place into a bowl and pour in the ice to rapidly cool the brine. Completely submerge the short ribs in this brine for 8 hours
Pull the short ribs out of the brine and give them a very quick rinse in cold water. Pat dry and place in the fridge uncovered to completely air dry and form a sticky exterior. This sticky surface is called a ‘pellicle’ and will help capture the smoke and in turn take on a really great deep smokey flavour.
Ignite your wood oven and instead of building a large fire inside, find the smallest, finest logs and twigs you have and stack these up in a small bundle to create lots of smoke instead of intense heat.
Place your short ribs in the oven and close the lid door. Closing the lid door and any vent will cut off the oxygen from the fire and extinguish it creating a large pillow of smoke to smoke the ribs.
Once the ribs are smoked, remove them from the oven and build up your fire to around 450 degrees. Lightly oil your ribs and place back into the wood oven to seal and caramelise the meat.
Once sealed, remove the ribs from the oven and let the fire burn down a little. Wrap your ribs individually in foil and place on a wire rack on a tray and place back in the oven. Leave the short ribs to cook overnight or for at least 10 hours in the residual heat.
Chimichurri
For the chimichurri roughly chop your oregano and parsley together, add the chopped red chilli, finely grated garlic and the salt and chop everything together on the board, scrape this all together into a bowl or pestle and mortar, add the vinegar and loosen with the olive oil to create a loose herby dressing.
BRINING: Brining works well for this type of cooking because the salt begins to break down the protein structure of the meat, allowing the moisture to be absorbed in between the protein strands. When cooked the protein holds onto this moisture leaving you with a juicier, perfectly seasoned piece of meat.
This dish was roasted in the Alfa Forni 5 Minuti. For more information and prices, click here.
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Smokey Beef Short Ribs with Chimichurri
Short ribs really benefit from a low and slow cook, perfect for cooking in the residual heat of a wood-oven slowly overnight. The brine in this recipe is flavoured similarly to a pastrami rub, and the addition of soy sauce gives it a wonderful depth.
This recipe has a few processes, from initially curing and smoking the ribs, sealing them in a hot wood oven, and then slow cooking them over night in the residual heat.
Method
Chimichurri
BRINING: Brining works well for this type of cooking because the salt begins to break down the protein structure of the meat, allowing the moisture to be absorbed in between the protein strands. When cooked the protein holds onto this moisture leaving you with a juicier, perfectly seasoned piece of meat.
This dish was roasted in the Alfa Forni 5 Minuti. For more information and prices, click here.
Ingredients:
Alfa Forni pizza ovens | Flamery Asado grills | Beefer grill | Konro grills UK | Pujadas charcoal ovens | Blastcool outdoor fridges
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