Wine Braised Short Ribs

Yes, it absolutely tastes as good as it looks. A pillow of creamy, fluffy mashed potatoes with a tender beef short rib nestled on top with fresh herbs and a beefy red wine sauce coating it. Feel free to shed a tear over its beauty. Then head to the grocery store to buy some short ribs so that you can make this.

Short rib ingredients:
4 large short ribs, about 4 lbs
5 carrots
3 celery stalks
1 large onion
4 cloves of garlic
1 lb cremini mushrooms
8 sprigs of thyme
3 sprigs of rosemary
1 bottle dry red wine
2 cans beef consomme
salt and pepper to taste

Mashed potato ingredients:
5-6 medium potatoes
4 tbsp butter
1/2 cup fat free sour cream
splash of 2% milk
salt and pepper to taste

Mmmm delicious golden brown seared short ribs. That's step number one. Sear these bad boys and get some flavor going in your pan. I used a five quart dutch oven to make this, but if you don't have one you can use a stockpot or a large skillet. A five quart skillet would probably actually be the best option because more surface are and less depth is beneficial here. I'm really glad I thought of this now instead of when I made these short ribs. Anyway, while your short ribs are browning, chop up one onion, three carrots, and three celery stalks. You can leave them in fairly big pieces because they're pretty much going to dissolve into the sauce. That will be fixed later. Add them to the pan when the ribs are brown.

Add a pinch of salt when you add the vegetables to help them start releasing their liquids, which will help the brown fond stuck to the bottom of the pan begin to release. Fond is the good stuff. You want it in your sauce. While your veg cooks, finely chop the garlic and quarter the larger mushrooms. If they're pretty small, just leave them whole.

The mushrooms and garlic really only need to cook until the garlic becomes fragrant. Then comes the fun part. Add an entire bottle of red wine. It always smells incredible when you add wine to a hot pan, so just take time and enjoy that for second. 

As for choosing a wine, if you watch a lot of cooking shows or read a lot about food like I do, you've probably heard that you should only cook with wine you'd want to drink or to only use good wine or some such advice. Personally I think that's a load of crap. If you can tell the difference between the cheapest wine you can find and an expensive wine after they've cooked with all of these other flavors for several hours and you can genuinely say that one is noticeably better (I doubt it), then good for you. Use the cheap stuff folks. It doesn't make a difference. 

Now take some butcher's twine and wrap it several times around the rosemary and thyme. You don't even need to tie a knot. If you don't have butcher's twine, go and buy butcher's twine because you should have some as it's super useful. Add your herb bundle and consomme and put the short ribs on top of this mixture.

I've got four short ribs in that pan. I really should have thought of that large skillet idea earlier. It actually was a very legitimate issue that caused problems later on. Don't do this. Use a large skillet. Anyway, after they're in the liquid your work is pretty much done. Simmer them on low for four or five hours until they're nice and tender and the sauce has reduced. It should become thick like a gravy, but if it doesn't take a tablespoon of flour and add water to form a slurry. Add the slurry to the sauce and it should thicken up almost immediately. You can use cornstarch instead of flour, but just be aware that cornstarch thickened sauce will have a different consistency than flour. At this point you should taste it and add more salt and pepper as needed.

When there was about an hour left I cut the two remaining carrots into about one inch chunks and threw them in. I add the extra carrots because the celery, onions, and carrots that flavored the sauce will literally dissolve into it. This way you have delicious mushrooms and carrots that still have texture.

When the beef is tender and the carrots have softened slice the potatoes into large chunks and put them in a pot with cold water to boil. Once they're soft, strain them then put them back in the pot with the butter and sour cream. I make mashed potatoes with an actual potato masher because it leaves some chunks of potato, which I prefer over a super creamy mash. I add a little milk if the potatoes seem too dry then I season with salt and pepper until they're tasty.

I could stare at that all day. But then I wouldn't be able to eat delicious things like braised short ribs for dinner. Garnish it with fresh thyme and rosemary, and you've got a dish that will impress any sane person. Also, just so you know how tender these get, the meat on this rib was barely connected to the bone. This was actually the only one where the meat hadn't completely fallen off. 

I had leftover short ribs and sauce, and since there's a good chance you will too I'll share a little tip. This is equally delicious with noodles. I had some leftover dumpling noodles in my fridge from when I made chicken noodle soup, so I heated this up in the microwave with the noodles. It's really good and it's a slight alteration so that you don't get bored with your leftovers.

If you've never had short ribs braised in wine you need to make these immediately. I cannot explain how fantastic they are. I could go on and on about how good they are. They are absolutely incredible. Seriously they are just amazing. You'll taste them and and you won't be able to get them out of your head. You'll probably make them again the next day. You're definitely going to want to make enough to have leftovers. Sorry about that, I got a little too excited. These are good though, so you should make them.