FFWD: Short Ribs in Red Wine (sans Port)

This week's selection from FFWD is short ribs in red wine and port. I was looking forward to this recipe. I have never cooked with short ribs before and it sounded so good (how could anything braised in red wine for hours taste bad? :)).

The ribs that I got happened to be humongous, 5 of them are already 2.2 pounds, so that's all I bought. I decided to keep with the recipe and use the same quantity of vegetables.

First the ribs are broiled in the oven for 10 minutes. Then the vegetables are sauteed until a bit wilted and soft. Next is the part where I'm supposed to pour in the wine and port, reducing it to half. I decided to forgo the port for a couple of reasons. One, it's expensive. Two, the last time I made something with port, it was too heavy and my stomach was unsettled afterwards.

Then pour in the beef broth, add star anise, rosemary, thyme, parsley, and celery leaves and bring it to a boil. Place the pot in the oven for 3 hours at 350 degrees.

The recipe calls for cooking it for 2 hours, but by the 2 hour mark, the meat were not as tender as I'd like them to be. So I cooked them for 3 hours until they looked like they want to fall off the bone.

Cooking them for 3 hours resulted in them vegetables to be super tender, so when I strained them out, they turned into puree. Add that to the fact that there are not that much liquid leftover, resulted in a dense sauce, so no sauce reduction needed. The sauce is chunky and not pretty but since I'm serving this just for myself and hubby, we care only that it taste good.

And oh boy it is good. The meat is so soft and tasty and they peeled off the bone clean. I served this with roasted fingerling potatoes and carrots.