How I wish you could meet my Aunt Jenni. She’s my sister’s mother-in-law and twice a year we head over to Canberra for the long weekend where she generously welcomes our whole family for Christmas and Easter lunch. She cooks for over 20 or so people and I’ve never once seen her stress about it. She’s all about simple, delicious and as much as possible, “make ahead” recipes.
Jenni came to Sydney this weekend to celebrate her son’s birthday. “Jenni, you MUST MUST give me some recipes to blog about!” I told her. She did better than that – she gave me two of her well-used recipe journals that contain her tried and tested recipes!
Here’s one of Jenni’s recipes I had over the weekend (Yes! She cooks even while she is in Sydney). The recipe of Braised Oxtail with Asian Flavours is from New Zealand food celebrity and cookbook author Annabel Langbein.
I absolutely love this recipe because of how amazingly easy it is to prepare:
- There’s no need to sear the meat (which I find very messy) to get it to that nice brown colour – this is all done in the oven (why didn’t I think of that before?!). To brown the meat, the recipe calls for you to bake the oxtail pieces in an oven for 30 minutes at 220c. Less frying to me means less mess!
- This recipe uses tomato juice and water as the braising liquid – there’s no need for beef stock nor red wine as with most braised recipes.
- There’s no chopping of aromatic vegetables (eg carrots, onions, celery etc.) The whole dish took me 10 minutes to prepare. The rest of the time the meat is either browning or braising in the oven.
And of course, there’s nothing like a meltingly tender, falling off the bone tail, unctuously rich piece of perfectly braised oxtail.
Braised Oxtail With Asian Flavours
Recipe from Annabel Lanbein
This recipe is great served with some parnsip and carrot mash or a bowl of steaming white rice. If you prefer, you could also use another cut of braising meat for this, like veal shanks
- 2.5 kilos oxtail
- 500 ml tomato juice (canned variety)
- 500 ml water
- 4 star anise
- 3 dried chilies (I used 2 dried and 1 fresh)
- 1/2 fresh orange peel (removed with a vegetable peeler so there is no pith)
- 1 tablespoon brown sugar
- 85 ml soy sauce
- 2 tablespoons rice wine vinegar
- 1 head of garlic, peeled and halved
- 2 thumb sized pieces of fresh ginger, thinly sliced (18 slices)
- Line a large baking dish with baking paper and arrange the oxtail in one layer. Season with salt and pepper. Bake in a 220c (conventional oven so if you are using fan forced, adjust the time) for 30 minutes until nicely browned.
- Remove the oxtail and place the pieces in a casserole dish. Bring down the oven temperature to 180c.
- Mix all the other ingredients in a bowl and pour it on the oxtail, making sure to scatter around the ginger, garlic, star anise etc. Cover with baking paper (to stop any exposed meat from drying out) and a tight fitting lid and bake at 180c for 2.5 hours. This dish can also be cooked a day or two ahead, in which case, bake for 2 hours and then reheat for 40 minutes at 180c.
Can’t wait to fix this dish for my hubby.
[…] I suggest, is ideal as it gives a different texture to the whole meal. Recipe followed from trisallicious. I doubled the portion of ginger in my cooking. The gingery taste is an effect that I generally use […]
[…] says he will never get sick off. You might remember that I’ve mentioned how much I love Jenni’s recipes before because she’s all about simple and delicious – this pie is a perfect example. […]
[…] mentioned in a previous post that I learned to brown tough cuts of meat in the oven rather than frying over the stove top […]
This dish is packed full of flavours! And I like it can be done easily. On my must do list.
i already like this recipe!!!! Great looking braised oxtail, which i love!
Trissa, we both made an oxtail dish! I love how yours turned out. I agree about your tip #1–it’s so much easier to brown meats that way.
Besides the tender meat, you know what I’m really drooling over in this picture, the sauce! All I need is a plate of hot rice to mop it all up! Yum yum! Will have to try this next. Thanks to you and your Aunt Jenni. 🙂
Great photo, Trissa. I don’t eat meat but love the sound of the flavors.
I can just imagine how soft and flavoursome that oxtail would be… looks mouthwatering!
I love this recipe, it sounds stunning. Gotta love these Canberranites huh…, something in the water I think…. fabulous food folk down this way 😉
Don’t you just love getting a good look at one of your fave cooks recipe journals, its like peeking inside the heart of a fairy…., Mmmm, not that I’ve ever done that…, but it sure sounds magical 🙂
As a lover of braised dishes I’m intrigued by this recipe! In a good way of course! No searing? Canned tomato juice? I think it’s still cool enough to try Aunt Jenni’s recipe!
I have been meaning to cook oxtail for a while since I saw it at the butchers. now I have recipe to go with it!! Thank you Aunt Jenni! I am going to make her my aunt tooo..!! :DD
Looks so tasty! Time to get some oxtails!
Oh yay! I’m all about the make ahead and do as little as possible 🙂 Thanks Trissa, and Aunt Jenni!
Clever trick. Will remember to brown oxtail in the oven.
The colours are SO vivid. Beautiful Trissa!
oh scrumptious! this is incredibly tantalizing and I love the star anis flavors here. i hear my tummy growling now!!
I love oxtail. I make oxtail soup all of the time. When I braise it, I usually serve it off of the bone. That way, I can have them all to my self in the kitchen. It is the best beef, ever!
🙂
Valerie
That sounds delicious! Great pictures!
Mary xo
Delightful Bitefuls
This is definitely a dish that you can tell is packed with flavour with a single glance. I suspect in person though you could tell this with your nose too 🙂
Wow, I’d LOVE to meet your Aunt Jenni if she could make something like that for me I’d even want her to adopt me 🙂
That looks SO good, reminds me of Indian style goat curry a bit.
Had this last weekend and it was to die for! Not only was it yum, but super easy!
Super dooper! Had this over the weekend and I can’t rave about it enough! Not only yum but easy!
I love oxtail. But when I cook it, I would usually leave the whole day free as it takes hours to become tender. But it’s all worth it huh. I just had siningang on Sunday- I could never get sick of it.
With todays winter-like temperature, I could do with a generous serve of this. It looks amazing!
I love oxtails!!!
BTW, thanks for the cookbook… I’m already excited to see it.