Perfect Your Braising Skills with Oxtails with White Beans and Fava Beans with Artichokes

today on America's Test Kitchen we're braising everything Dan makes Julia delicious braised oxtails Adam reveals his top pick for dutch ovens and becky shows bridget a foolproof recipe for fava beans with artichokes asparagus and peas it's all coming up right here on America's Test Kitchen [Music] an oxtail is exactly what it sounds like it's the tail of an ox or at least that's what it was traditionally and how they got their name today they can be cut from any of the beef animals including heifers cows and bulls and Dan's gonna show us how to cook them so I am very excited to be cooking with these they make an incredible braise and that's what we're gonna do this is a really a world-class one-dish meal that we're gonna do they're inexpensive they're super beefy and if you cook them long enough they get meltingly tender so they're awesome so we're gonna take some inspiration from a classic Turkish dish that has beans and tomatoes it's a really cool pepper in it it's got enough flavor to really stand up to the ox tails all right so we're gonna start with them and shopping wise there's a little bit to look for with ox tails so we're gonna work with 4 pounds you want to look for the biggest specimens possible and really that's about getting as much meat as you can so you can see these guys have lots of nice meat on them compared to this is the tail end of the tail great for making broth and bad for braises absolutely tons of flavor in it but just not a lot of meat we're gonna need to roast these get tons of flavor and also plot a lot of that fat so it doesn't end up in our braise so we're gonna be using a roasting pan we're gonna Pat these dry with paper towels and we're gonna season them up really nicely with kosher salt and pepper so we've got a lot of meat here but we also have a lot of fat and we find that when you have a lot of fat in a recipe you actually need more salt for it to taste the season I'll get them on both sides we're also gonna roast these we're gonna lose all out of this as we drain the fat so I'm gonna transfer this now to a 450 degree oven on the lower middle rack will go for about 45 minutes all right well that's a bubbling mmm they're already starting to look good but the real key is how much fat we've gotten out of the bottom there so we're gonna get rid of that a little bit of fat is obviously really nice great flavor too much can ruin a braise greasy greasy so we're doing two things here we're rendering a lot of fat but we're also developing a ton of fog I see that and that means flavor in our braise okay so I'm just gonna pour off this fat in this bowl over here and and he's right back in mmm smells meaty this one good okay so we're gonna go back in the oven for just 15 to 20 minutes we want to get a little more browning on these and extra fond in the pan mmm all right so look at these beautiful beautiful oxtail they're gorgeous they're nice and brown they're not tender yet so we're gonna get them out of the roasting pan here and you can see we don't have as much fat this time we got rid of most of that on that first roast but we do have even better browning and really good fond would you mind just covering these with foil forgot it aside yep so we got all this great fond and the only thing to do now is to scrape it up so we're have four cups of chicken broth here and it makes it easier to clean your family all right you can see this broth has turned really nice and brown all that fond is up so I'm just gonna get the rest of that four cups in there well done okay so we'll leave that aside for just one second and we're gonna start building our braise in a Dutch oven here it's gonna be really even heat we're gonna use in the oven it's perfect so we start with two tablespoons of extra-virgin olive oil so I'm just gonna heat this over a medium heat until it starts to shimmer all right so it's time for aromatics we have one onion that is chopped fine and one carrot so we're gonna cook this until the veg is soften about five minutes all right all right well this is smells good and it looks good we've softened up our onion and carrots so now we're gonna go in with some more aromatics we've got six cloves of minced garlic 2 tablespoons of tomato paste and 2 tablespoons of Aleppo pepper pepper really special pepper we're using a lot of it because it's not that spicy it's got a really really nice flavor and then a teaspoon of minced fresh oregano so this is really getting that kind of eastern Mediterranean vibe to it big big flavors gonna stand up great to the beef so I'm cook this for about 30 seconds here you can really smell that Aleppo right yeah now I'm going to add our beautiful broth we made over here with all those nice drippings it's amazing how dark that broth got I know grab it after that I'm also adding a 28 ounce can of whole peeled tomatoes we're gonna cook this for about three hours in the oven and then we're gonna stir it and you'll see those Tomatoes just melt apart really nice so I'm going to bring this up to a simmer and then it's meantime to add our ox tails okay so dried Aleppo is a key flavoring in this dish and it's a key spice used around the Mediterranean and in the Middle East now it has a tart bell pepper left in the Sun flavor with a subtle but building heat now you can find this increasingly in supermarkets obviously online and in specialty stores but if you can't find it simply substitute equal parts paprika that's for the sun-dried bell pepper flavor and crushed red pepper flakes that's for the building heat our liquid is at a simmer so oxtails are gonna go in and that whole juice at the end beautiful this is coming right back up to a simmer here and we're gonna cover and go into the oven I drop that down to 300 degrees and we're gonna go for about three hours to really tenderize these ox tails okay you ready for the big reveal I smell it oh hello beautiful it smells so good so hearty this is three hours and I want to show you how tender these are I have a fork here but I could probably use a spoon that looks delicious right that's beautiful so what we're gonna do is transfer them out of here nice and gently because they are super tender okay great would you mind just cover that with foil and okay so now I'm going to strain this out so we can get rid of just that little bit of fat that's on top there and you're gonna watch these Tomatoes just basically fall apart you know I was looking at those Tomatoes and thinking they're still good and I'll just press it through and this stirring motion right here nice Tomatoes just fall apart they help really thicken the sauce up in a nice way I'm kind of just scraping the bottom letting that liquid fall through once they break down a little bit they're gonna go right back into the pot just separating them from the liquid that okay so we're gonna go into our fat separator over here I see you had to get the vegetables out of the way so you could really do fat the liquid exactly this is like pure gold in here it is it's been five minutes got a nice separation between the fat there so we're just gonna hit this button here let the good stuff fall through the bottom you don't want to leave in of that flavorful liquid behind but you don't want any of the fat so we're good I mentioned that beans are in the traditional Turkish version of this dish so this is a 15-ounce can of navy beans that we drained we've also got one tablespoon of sherry vinegar which is also an awesome ingredient so much flavor and finally two teaspoons of fresh oregano really pop that fresh flavor yeah so stir this in now we're gonna add back our beautiful super tender Oxley nice liquid wasting nothing oxtails are cooked we just want to heat those beans through so we're gonna put it over medium heat and cook for about five minutes just warm everything through then it's time to eat alright now obviously you could make this ahead to this point if you were serving it for company absolutely yeah and it would even get better over a couple of days you can just put it back on the heat when the guests arrive alright it's time to serve this up everything is heated through it is looking gorgeous mm-hmm and a platter this up here what I love about this dish is it's a braise which aren't always the most beautiful thing this is absolutely gorgeous and it's gonna look beautiful on a nice platter and a spoon one nice cup of our braising liquid and vegetables over the top here and then we'll serve the rest on the plate oh that smells good the Aleppo pepper it's just it's been mellowed but it still smell it mm-hmm I'm choosing the perfect piece for you here oh I appreciate it this is pure comfort food oh yeah now you used your knife there but I did it was really just to prevent the whole thing from falling off the bone at once just because this is really tender mmm it's so good that meat is so rich and so deep in flavor and it really just peels right off the bow falls away and with the brightness of the sherry vinegar and the heat of the Aleppo pepper this is a terrific cold-weather dish it's good right this is delicious thank you thank you so if you want to make a world-class oxtail dish start by roasting the oxtail in a 450 degree oven use the drippings left in the pan to build a flavorful braising liquid along with onion garlic and dried Aleppo pepper then braise the oxtails in the oven until tender before serving beef at the braising liquid is stirred in some navy beans and cherry vinegar so there you have it from America's Test Kitchen to your kitchen a great new recipe for braised oxtails with white beans tomatoes and Aleppo pepper I'm definitely making this one oh yeah this is a new one to the winter roster [Music] in France they call it in cuckoo and in South Africa it's known as a pooja but here in the u.s. we call it a Dutch oven and I wouldn't want to cook in a kitchen without one so luckily I've got Adam here he's gonna show us which one when our testing these are true kitchen workhorses British they are all right we have 11 dutch ovens here that we're all about six to eight quarts and the price range was a low of 54-31 to a high of 360 $7.99 that's quite a spread yes most of these pots were enameled cast iron we love the heat retention qualities of cast iron for a Dutch oven two of them were outliers that one down at the very end is just plain cast iron no enamel coating and this one right here is ceramic the ceramic one is significantly lighter and you know if that was a viable alternative we were definitely interested in search so let me tell you about the tests okay the cooking tests included searing meat balls and then simmering them in tomato sauce braising beef burgundy frying french fries and baking almost no need bread and the pots were evaluated on the quality of the food and how easy these pots were to use and to clean so let's talk about some design factors that affected ease-of-use the first one is the cooking surface and that relates to the shape of the pot and that relates to these sides of the pot you want the largest cooking surface that you can get because that means fewer batches when you say browning meatballs are made for second or something like that this one has sides that kind of curve in towards the bottom that takes away some of your cooking surface so this one had a fairly small cooking surface at 8 inches whereas the sides of this one don't curve in they're pretty straight that left more cooking surface nine and three-quarter inches okay we also paid attention to the interior finish this one is dark and that actually made it a little harder for testers to judge what's going on with the fawned when they were searing meat or meatballs it also made it hard to see the tip of a remote thermometer when they had it in there when they're frying french fries much easier to work with a lighter colored interior weight was another important factor like I mentioned cast-iron Dutch oven are almost always heads sure and the range in this lineup was just over 18 pounds that's this guy to 9 and 3/4 pounds and why don't you do a little weight lifting for me Bridget this is empty and this is really heavy I mean imagine this full of hot fat or a big cassoulet something exactly how much does this weigh again 9 and 3/4 pound right oh yeah no totally I could bring my kids around in that yeah so it's a point in favor of the ceramics yeah another important design feature was the handles because you know if you're lifting a stew or your cassoulet out of the oven it's hot it's heavy you want something to grip onto and testers really preferred big open looped beefy handles like this one give me a try nice and secure yep and compared to little tiny tab handles like that one lift that one out yeah I mean you have to use your fingertips oh that's heavy too you have to use your fingertips and I can't even imagine if it was hot and I had big pot holders oven mitts or pot holders do not make that any easier these should be pots for the long haul I actually have friends who are using their grandmother's hand-me-down touch of exactly and so we wanted to get a sense of their durability and that meant abuse testing the testers performed three abuse tests scrubbing the pots clean ten times with an abrasive sponge whacking the rim 50 times with a metal spoon and slamming the lid onto the base 25 times Wow now all but two of these survived unscathed pretty strong this was unfortunately the downfall of our lightweight ceramic here it is check it out yeah Fisher there it's only gonna get bigger with more u''s and that was just putting it down from a two inch height Wow so that pretty much kills it it's too fragile to be a serious workhorse kitchen pot one of the other pots got a little chip in the enamel but it really didn't affect its functionality so in the end we had our winner which was no surprise this is the la Cruz a seven and a quarter quart round Dutch oven we've loved it in the past we still love it it's three hundred and sixty seven dollars and ninety nine cents the price will make you gasp but it's thirteen point seven pounds so it's a nice manageable weight it's got a light interior it's really durable it's just it's a great pot if you don't want to spend that much money and a lot of people don't there is a Best Buy this is the Cuisinart chef's classic enameled cast iron covered casserole this is the one that got a little tiny chip in it from the EPA's testing but again it didn't affect the functionality it's a little bit heavier than our winner but it's got the big wide cooking surface it's got the easy to see light interior and this one was only eighty three dollars and seventy cents a big difference yeah there you go if you want a Dutch oven for the long run look no further than the lake ruse a round Dutch oven it's three sixty seven and ninety nine cents there you go for a few weeks in spring Romans celebrate the incoming fresh vegetables by making a dish called vignola now it's a Bharathi concoction of fava beans spring peas and of course artichokes it can be thick like a stew or broth Ian served over pasta but Becky has a fresh a very quick version that's really gonna highlight the freshness of this dish that's right we're gonna do a really nice springtime braise and we're gonna cook all the vegetables perfectly lovely so let's start with some vegetable prep we have four three ounce little baby artichokes he's adorable they're adorable so we're gonna take off just the end here we want to leave about a 3/4 inch stem okay and I'm gonna lop off the top quarter here you just want to peel off these dark outer leaves and starting at the bottom because these are tough they are tough I mean it's a thistle yeah I don't know how people ever discovered these were edible he just worked slowly we're gonna take off three or four layers here okay anything that start green has to go okay so now you can see we're getting to the nice tender part you can tell me see how it turns a little bit yellow there sure does we'll get rid of that one that has a little bit of darkness on it and I'm just gonna use my paring knife I want to pare away this dark tough area okay on the stem using a paring knife as a parent that's right not as a peeler you could use a peeler yep if you found a little tricky to use a paring knife so that's nice and clean we've taken off all the tough outer layer and we're gonna cut this in quarters and that's ready to go so I have two quarts of water over here and you'll see that there the lemon in there and I squeeze that lemon and earlier to make okay water acidulated that's because artichokes will oxidize almost instantly they do the lemon juice will prevent them from turning brown grate them nice and pretty and add a little bit of lemon flavor yeah exactly so there's a total of four baby artichokes in there they're about three ounces each okay so let's move on to our next veggie fava beans you don't see them very much no you don't they're little bit hard to find if this is what they look like fresh in a pod here it'll and we're just gonna strip them out of the pod you just dig right in there and they pop right out and kind of slide your hand down the seam there so we want a pound of these these are gonna give some heft to our dish the fava beans have protein in them and they're a little bit meaty and texture a little bit dense now if you can't find fresh fava beans that's fine too frozen okay and so one pound of fava thin the shell is gonna equal about one cup shelled okay so speaking of shells I just went through all that work and these actually have one more little outer skin here they do a lot of times you'll see recipes where you have to slip off this outer skin it's like a membrane on the outside yeah it's not easy to do I don't want to have to do that entire Bowl you do not so we were happy to find that just by blanching the fava zs-- in a baking soda solution just for a minute or two softens those that outer skin enough so it's totally tender that's great so I have 2 cups of water boiling here and I'll add in a teaspoon of baking soda okay and that's enough to tenderize the skins without giving the beans of soapy taste okay we'll put these in here for one or two minutes and we're going to see the edges of the beans start to darken they might turn a little bit purple that's because we raise the pH of the water I say that's totally normal okay okay so it's been about two minutes you can see some of them like this little guy here starting to turn a little bit dark in color a little bit purple yeah yep so I'm gonna ask you if you would to drain these and give me a really good rinse that's gonna stop the cooking okay and wash off the all that baking soda all right runs under cold all right so let's continue on getting our braise going all right I have a tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil heating up over a medium heat and here is one leek just the white and the light green part I got rid of the dark green we slice these thin and wash them really really well because as you know leeks can be super super dirty sure can so you can see our oil is starting to shimmer nicely they're seeing a little bit of shimmer so let's put the leeks in that's a good sound always a nice sound teaspoon of salt I'm also adding a tablespoon of water we don't want these to brown we're gonna let these cook until they soften that's gonna take about three minutes all right now often when we cook onions or in this case leeks we'll add some salt right at that time when we add them to the scones because the salt helps to break down the cell walls of the onions or leeks and it softens them even faster those are nice and soft they look great beautiful smell great and I'm gonna add three cloves of minced garlic okay let's cook this for about 30 seconds start to smell it almost right away right away now we're cooking so now let's add our artichokes they take the longest to cook so we're gonna get these in the pot first just want to drain off that water you don't want totally fine the Roma's that just be rooted in just kitchen it's just crazy so nice I just turned down hate to medium low we're gonna let this cook for six to eight minutes until the artichokes are just about ten okay so put the lid on let's move on to the asparagus they have a pound of asparagus a lot of people take the asparagus and they snap off and right did it four years recently we found that all you really need to cut off is that bottom inch and you can see that it starts to get nice and tender right there exactly so we can line this up and use it as a guide these all came from the same Bunch so we can assume that's good for all of them now we're gonna cut these in two inch lengths just a little bit on the bias in the spring when you get your hands on the vegetables and they're at their best it's a game changer oh it is such a delight speaking of delights I have a pound of fresh peas you can use frozen but if you find the fresh ones there's nothing like them these are kind of like the father's you just have to get in there but open that pod so again a pound in their shells that's gonna yield about a cup so our peas are all set let's take a look at our artichokes they've been going for about six minutes they're not fully tender but they're getting there okay close so let's put in our peas can was a pound of peas and our asparagus now these don't take that long to cook that's why we're adding them in stages okay these are going in at the end give that a little stir this is beautiful all right so we'll put the lid back on well let this go for about five minutes longer till everything's nice and tender okay alright let's take a look here spend about five minutes it gets better and better every time you open up the skillet the last thing to add is our fava beans we have the ones that we blanched for a couple minutes and these just need to kind of warm through they take about two minutes to get tender okay so we'll stir those in and we'll put the lid back on just until the follows and the artichokes are fully tailored okay alright so it's been two minutes ooh beautiful everything's nice and tender so I'm gonna kill the heat and I'm gonna take this off of he I don't want to cook any more I don't want anything to get overdone it'll turn gray okay let's liven it up with some fresh herbs all right I have two tablespoons of basil that's nice and thinly sliced tablespoon of fresh mint that's minced up two teaspoons of lemon zest and that'll really add some nice brightness it's an orchestra of spring and summer even I was in here literally licking my chops hmm okay let's get this on a platter that is insanely beautiful how's that for a nice springtime lunch or light dinner that is gorgeous all you need right all right let me give you a nice serving here Oh cut the artichokes the flowers everything I want in a bowl more extra-virgin olive oil that just gonna add a little bit of richness if this tastes as good as it smells and it looks through me in business even halfway as good as it looks Oh knows everything is perfectly cooked so tender right I'm saying nothing everything is beautiful I'm speechless I am the artichokes are still really really creamy and tender from the fresh basil and mint really live-ins it up this really is a celebration of spring vegetables Thank You Becky you're very welcome well this beautiful spring vegetable braise starts with a little prep trim quarter then submerged baby artichokes in lemon water shell and summer fresh fava beans with baking soda and then rinse sautéed leeks and garlic add the artichokes and broth and simmer cut asparagus and add to the broth along with fresh shelled peas stir in fava beans then finish with basil mint limit so from our Test Kitchen to your kitchen a beautiful spring vignola or fava beans with artichokes asparagus and peas beautiful thanks for watching America's Test Kitchen what you think we'll leave a comment and let us know which recipes you're excited to make or you can just say hello you can find links to today's recipes and reviews in the video description and don't forget to subscribe to our Channel see you later I'll see you later

Channel: America's Test Kitchen

Views: 55,430

Rating: 4.9174943 out of 5

Keywords: braised oxtails, oxtails, fava beans, oxtail recipe, artichokes, cooking, cooks illustrated, americas test kitchen

Id: 1rsouvRUtmg

Length: 22min 57sec (1377 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 15 2020