I have an embarrassment of Korean cookbooks, written in both English and Korean. My interest in Korean food/ 한식 began in 2013 after the first foray at Bibigo London (now closed). When our family took a trip to South Korea in April 2014 we ate heartily and we ate well. There was no turning back. It was like falling in love truly, madly, deeply.
In the years since then I have eaten at many Korean restaurants, from mom-and-pop cafes to Michelin-starred establishments. My favourite remains home-cooked dishes that families can share around the communal dining table.
I have cooked these braised short ribs multiple times, but have not managed to write the recipe down. Each version is subtly different on account of the provenance of the ribs, accompanying braising vegetables, amount of sugar added and whether the ribs were cooked in a Le Creuset casserole (oven) or in a pressure cooker (stove top). In my digital photo book there is a cemetery full of photos I took but never shared.
There is an art to buying the ribs. This is a fatty cut and sometimes the bone can be very big. Every time I pass a butcher’s shop I take a look at the ribs to check the meat-fat-bone ratio. When I see the ideal rib then the phrase money is no object comes to mind.
Over the weekend we were in Harrods and Mr Gochugaru pointed out the beautiful short ribs at their meat counter. It was a very happy experience as I got to choose the four ribs that I wanted, and the attendant butcher obligingly sawed (yes, sawed) each rib in half as requested. The meat was then divided into two bags in case I wanted to freeze half.
For tonight’s dinner I decided to sear the ribs, then place them in a pressure cooker to cook with the other ingredients for an hour. The whole process from chopping board to serving plate is extremely time consuming. Since I knew from past experience that this would be so, I listened to a new book on Audible which helped lessen the tediousness of washing up etc. If you are attempting this dish, you could rope in a friend to share the work, or make it in stages.
This is a very forgiving dish and I have made many iterations of it over the years, never following one single recipe. This attempt is a good start but not definitive. The joy of it is that as long as the ribs are of a high quality (big meat, small bone, fat trimmed) you can play around with the other ingredients a little and still have a superb meal at the end.
As I work alone in my kitchen, it was difficult to garner the requisite side dishes / 반찬 that accompany all Korean meals. I will make that my goal for the next Korean meal with friends. There were just the two of us for dinner tonight and we ate the beef with some steamed rice.
The ingredients for this dish are essentially very simple
For the Ribs:
(This amount will feed 6 adults)
2 – 2.5 kg beef short ribs
2 large carrots (around 180 g), peeled and sliced thickly
1 large onion (around 120 g) peeled and cut into large pieces
60 g fresh ginger, peeled and smashed
1 whole head of garlic (around 50 g), halved horizontally
2 sticks cinnamon
4 star anise
10 black peppercorns
850 g chicken or vegetable stock
100 g light soya sauce (I use Kikkoman brand)
50 g maple syrup
50 g dark brown soft sugar
350 g butternut (or other) squash, cut into 2 cm cubes
180 g peeled and cooked chestnuts
150 shiitake mushrooms (weight without stalks)
100 g pine nuts, to garnish
How to Make:
Part I: from chopping board to pressure cooker
Heat a non-stick frying pan and place a layer of beef, top-side down first, to sear. The fat from the top will be released as it heats up. Using a pair of tongs, turn the beef to sear all sides. Remove and keep aside.
Using the same pan and residual beef fat, fry the carrots, onion, ginger, garlic, cinnamon, star anise and peppercorns.
Place the carrot mix into a suitably-sized pressure cooker. Arrange the seared beef ribs on top. Add the stock, soya sauce, maple syrup and sugar.
Place the lid on the pressure cooker, tighten to lock, and cook the meat for one hour.
[Alternatively, place all of the above in a large Le Creuset casserole, adding an extra 200 g water, and cook in the oven at 160 C fan / 180 C for three hours]
After an hour, switch off the heat and let the pressure come down until you can open the lid safely.
Part 2: from pressure cooker to bowl/ jug
Using a pair of tongs, remove the beef ribs and place in a large tray or bowl.
Strain the sauce through a metal sieve into a bowl or large measuring jug. Discard the braising vegetables.
There will be a thick layer of fat on the sauce and ideally you would cool the sauce down, then place the bowl/ jug in the fridge. The fat will solidify quite fast and can be easily removed before finishing the dish. Otherwise, it is possible to skim the fat off using a ladle, however not all the fat will be removed this way.
Whilst the sauce is cooling in the fridge, use a pair of disposable gloves and remove the bone from the meat – this slips off with no effort. Gently prise off the meat from its connective tissue (the white spongy part) and leave aside. The meat can be left in large chunks or pulled apart into smaller pieces.
Part 3: from saucepan to serving plate
After removing the layer of fat from the strained sauce, place the sauce, squash, mushrooms and chestnuts into a large saucepan. Simmer uncovered until the squash is tender and the sauce is reduced slightly. Add the beef and give everything a stir.
To garnish, toast some pine nuts and sprinkle this over the finished dish. Depending on where you get the pine nuts, this is almost twice the price of the beef. The beef cost £22 a kilo at Harrods and the pine nuts are £40 a kilo at Waitrose. Thankfully you only need 100 g of pine nuts for the entire dish.
Stages in cooking: searing the beef ribs, frying the braising vegetables, the ribs before and after pressure cooking
Whilst preparing, cooking and washing up, I listened to Impossible City: Paris in the Twenty-First Century by Simon Kuper. The book is published by Profile Books, ISBN 978-1800816480. This was to get me into the right frame of mind for our trip to Paris at the end of this week. Like the beef short ribs, I feel that Paris is really hard work. With a bit of preparation and a lot of patience, I hope it will turn out to be a rewarding and enriching experience.