The trick to this Korean short ribs recipe is to marinate thinly cut beef ribs in our savory-sweet soy marinade, then cook them on a hot grill or grill pan until they’re caramelized and a little bit charred.

Adam is obsessed with Korean-style ribs. Also called beef Galbi, these are thinly sliced beef short ribs that soak up all the flavor from the marinade and cook in just a few minutes on the grill. You get those perfect caramelized, charred edges that we can’t get enough of.

The Galbi marinade is a lot like our go-to bulgogi marinade, just with a little extra brown sugar, an onion, and more aromatics for an authentic flavor. This is one of our favorite ways to bring Korean BBQ flavors into our own kitchen, and you can totally do it at home, too!

Key Ingredients

• Flanken Ribs: For this recipe, you’ll want thinly sliced short ribs. Somewhere between 1/4-inch and 3/4-inch thick is perfect. The thin cut means they grill up super fast. When you’re shopping, look for packages labeled “flanken ribs,” “Korean-style ribs,” or “LA-style beef short ribs.” Just make sure they’re cut across the bone, so you get 3 to 4 little round bones in each piece.
• Soy Sauce: This is the base of our marinade. We usually go for low-sodium soy sauce, but low-sodium tamari works great, too.
• Rice Wine Vinegar: Look for unsweetened rice vinegar (usually with a green bottle cap or label).
• Sesame Oil: Toasted sesame oil adds a lovely, toasty, rich flavor to the ribs.
• Brown Sugar and Honey: We really love both for this. The combination makes our beef taste more interesting and complex. The honey also caramelizes beautifully. We use the same combination when making beef bulgogi, another Korean-inspired recipe.
• Black Pepper: We use a lot of black pepper in this recipe. I hand-grind mine, so it has to be worth it. Trust me, it is! One teaspoon is just right.
• Garlic and Ginger: I always go for fresh garlic. For ginger, you can use fresh ginger root or grab ginger puree from the store (refrigerated or frozen both work).
• Pear: This is the secret ingredient in a lot of Korean marinades. It adds sweetness and helps tenderize the beef. We look for Asian, Korean, or Nashi pears, but if you can’t find those, a ripe Bosc or Anjou pear works just fine.
• Lettuce, Rice, and Sides: To make it a full meal, we serve these ribs with steamed rice and lettuce leaves for wrapping. Don’t forget the banchan (little sides) like kimchi or spicy cucumber salad, and a bit of ssamjang, the savory Korean dipping sauce that ties it all together.

Find the full recipe with measurements below.

How to Make Korean Short Ribs at Home

Tip 1: Prepare the ribs. If you have thin-cut flanken ribs that are 3/8-inch or thinner, skip this tip. If, however, you can only find thicker-cut ribs (say 1/2-inch), stick around. The thinner the ribs, the more tender they turn out, so if you are sitting there with a thicker cut, it’s a good idea to grab a meat mallet (a dual-sided one with the spiked teeth on one side). Lay each rib flat, then lightly pound the beef using the pointy side. This helps break up connective tissue, making the meat more tender in the end.

Note: Ribs thicker than 1/2-inch won’t have the same results, even with the meat mallet.

Tip 2: Make our galbi marinade. We like using our food processor to make the marinade. If you don’t have one, you can make this marinade by hand, but a food processor makes really quick work of it. Toss everything in and hit pulse until mostly smooth. If you’re doing it by hand, you’ll mince the garlic, finely grate the ginger with a microplane, then grate the pear and onion with a box grater.

Tip 3: Marinate overnight. If you are short on time, you can cut the marinating time down a bit, but for the best results, we highly recommend leaving the ribs in the marinade overnight.

Once made, pour the marinade over your ribs, then massage them and move them around in the marinade so all of the beef is well covered. Cover the bowl, then refrigerate. If you have the chance, go back once or twice and move the ribs around a bit to make sure everything is still well coated.

Tip 4: Grill the ribs. At a Korean barbecue restaurant, there’s often a grill right in the middle of the table where you can quickly sear/grill the ribs. At home, we use our outdoor grill or a heavy-bottomed grill pan over medium-high heat.

If cooking on a grill pan, add a little oil, then cook the marinated ribs in batches, keeping one layer of ribs in the pan at a time (stacking too many at once will steam the beef rather than caramelize and brown it).

Our Favorite Way to Serve Korean Ribs

We love serving these family-style next to rice, big lettuce leaves, kimchi, and ssamjang (a savory dipping sauce — look near gochujang in Korean markets or more internationally friendly grocery stores). Very often, when we’re out at a Korean BBQ place, we’ve seen people using kitchen shears to cut the grilled beef from the bones, then take the meat and build their bite. If you have some on hand, try it! It does make removing the beef from the bones easy. Otherwise, just get in there!

More of Our Favorite Beef Recipes

Source link

This impressive braised short ribs recipe has mouthwateringly tender beef slowly cooked in a caramelized onion and red wine broth.

Think of this dish as French onion soup meets red wine braised short ribs. It’s cozy, it’s rich, and it’s perfect for a cold evening. We’ll caramelize lots of onions for this dish, adding a sweet, rich onion flavor to the braising liquid. Then, to achieve that pull-apart texture, you’ll braise the beef for three hours, but all of that’s hands-off.

You’ll be left with unbelievably tender and flavorful beef and a thick, rich gravy swimming with caramelized onions. Your best bet is to serve this over something that soaks up all of it, like creamy polenta, grits, mashed potatoes, buttered noodles, or thick, crusty bread.

Key Ingredients

• Short Ribs: There are two popular kinds of beef short ribs sold in stores, chuck and plate. If you have the choice, use plate short ribs cut into smaller pieces (3 to 4 inches long), sometimes labeled English-style. They have the best balance of meat and fat and become especially tender when cooked low and slow. Chuck short ribs are smaller and a bit more irregular in shape, but will still work. We also use short ribs for these bbq beef ribs.
• Onions: Use yellow onions or sweet onions in this dish. Both will caramelize wonderfully.
• Tomato Paste and Garlic: The tomato paste adds richness. I love the double-concentrated tubes, since the tube and screw on lid make it easy to store what you haven’t used. Fresh garlic is best here.
• Flour: Use all-purpose flour to help thicken the gravy.
• Wine: A dry red wine is perfect. Use something you’d drink. We like Chianti, Bordeaux blends, or Merlot.
• Stock: The short ribs add a lot of beefiness to the gravy, so plain store-bought beef stock works nicely. However, to make this completely from scratch, here is our beef stock recipe.
• Herbs: We love fresh thyme in this and always add a bay leaf. Rosemary is nice, too, but can be overpowering. If you have it on hand, feel free to add ¼ to ½ teaspoon chopped fresh rosemary to the beef before braising in the oven.

Find the full recipe with measurements below.

How to Make Braised Short Ribs

Tip 1: Brown your short ribs. Before braising the beef, you really want to take the time to brown the short ribs on all sides first. This adds flavor to the pot, which we will use to build the braising liquid, and it adds flavor and texture to the beef.

Heat a Dutch oven or braiser, add olive oil, then brown on all sides. Since we have a lot of short ribs, you’ll likely need to do this in two batches.

Tip 2: Caramelize the onions. If you’ve ever made French onion soup, then you know the beauty of caramelized onions. They take a little time, but I promise it’s worth it for this showy dish.

To do it, you’ll add a little butter to the rendered beef fat in the pot (yep!). Then add your onions, give them a good stir, and cover the pot. Leave them for 10 minutes. When you uncover them, they will have softened and released some moisture into the pan. From there, uncover and continue cooking, stirring often, until they are deeply browned and smell sweet (30-ish minutes more).

Tip 3: Simmer the wine. As you are building the braising liquid, add wine to the pot. It adds so much flavor, and red wine braised short ribs are an absolute classic! Before adding anything else to the pot, simmer the wine for a few minutes to burn off some of the alcohol.

Tip 4: Cover with a lid and slowly braise in the oven. To get that pull-apart, tender beef, you need to slowly cook the short ribs for around 3 hours. Think of it as similar to making beef stew, where you want the fat and collagen to melt and the connective tissues to soften and become really tender.

Add the browned beef to the braising liquid, and make sure it’s mostly covered so it does not dry out. Then cook slowly, covered, in the oven for about 3 hours. After 3 hours, the beef will be shockingly tender and so delicious.

Serving Suggestions

You’ll be left with a lot of braising liquid. It’s thick, laced with sweet onions, and absolutely delicious (with or without the beef!). I highly recommend skimming the fat at the top of the pot. There’s going to be quite a bit. Once you do, you can serve the beef on or off the bone. A few bones may already have slid off the meat (it’s that tender). We remove the bones, place chunks of tender beef on top of polenta, grits, or mashed potatoes, then spoon a generous amount of the braising liquid over the top. You’ll probably run out of beef before the gravy, but I still think you should save it for spooning over something else for dinner another night.

This dish is intentionally rich. If you’d like something a little lighter to start or on the side, we love this fennel salad, peppy lemon vinaigrette over greens, classic roasted carrots, or these roasted carrots and parsnips.

More Mouthwatering, Tender Beef Recipes

Source link

Learn how to cook incredibly delicious BBQ beef ribs in the oven. Most of the cooking time is hands-off, letting the ribs slowly bake until fall-apart tender.

The key is baking them low and slow. It’s the same approach we use for our popular pork ribs, and it works beautifully with beef. Once I started making beef ribs this way, I never looked back.

For this beef ribs recipe, we rub short ribs with a simple dry rub, sear them to build flavor, and then bake until unbelievably tender. A final layer of BBQ sauce goes on at the end, and as it finishes in the oven, it becomes sticky and glossy over the meat. They are incredible!

Key Ingredients

• Beef Ribs: This recipe is written for beef short ribs, which are meaty and become very tender when cooked low and slow. If using beef back ribs, you can still follow this method, but they may cook a little faster. Note, do not use flanken ribs (Korean-style ribs), as these are too thin for this cooking method. More details below.
• Dry Rub: Beef needs a generous amount of seasoning. We mix salt, pepper, smoked paprika, garlic powder (or granulated garlic), and onion powder.
• BBQ Sauce: Use your favorite store-bought sauce, or make our tangy BBQ sauce recipe.
• Apple Cider Vinegar: We add a bit of extra tang to the BBQ sauce with apple cider vinegar. White wine vinegar or champagne vinegar are good substitutes.
• Beef Stock or Water: This thins our BBQ sauce a bit. You only need ¼ cup, so if you have beef stock in the fridge, great. Otherwise, water does the job.
• Worcestershire Sauce: A teaspoon adds a bit more savoriness to the sauce.

Find the full recipe with measurements below.

How to Cook Beef Ribs in the Oven

Tip 1: Do not trim all the fat. When working with short ribs, we rarely trim much fat before cooking. The butcher has already done most of the work. If you see any very large pieces of fat or gristle, you can remove them, but avoid over-trimming. Some fat is key to tender, juicy ribs. As Chef Richard likes to say, “don’t go chasing the fat.”

Tip 2: Use our dry rub and sear before baking. Beef needs a good amount of seasoning, so use our simple dry rub early on to build flavor. It’s a mixture of salt, pepper, smoked paprika, garlic powder, and onion powder.

Rub the short ribs all over with the dry rub. They should be thoroughly coated. Then, sear them in a pan with some oil until golden on all sides. This step builds flavor and gives the fat on the outside a head start.

Tip 3: Bake them low and slow. High heat will toughen beef ribs before they have a chance to soften. A lower oven temperature gives us more time to slowly cook the connective tissues (collagen) and fat, which keeps the beef tender and juicy. In the photos below, the first one shows the seared ribs ready for the oven, and as you scroll down, you can see how tender they look after cooking them slowly in the oven.

For tender ribs, cook them at 275°F (135°C) for 2 to 3 hours, then add BBQ sauce and continue cooking for another hour. The size of your short ribs will affect baking time. We provide tips in our recipe below.

Tip 4: Cover the pan for most of the cooking time. Tightly cover your baking pan with foil so the ribs cook in their own steam. This prevents moisture from escaping and helps the ribs turn tender. Baking them uncovered for too long will dry them out.

Keep your ribs tightly covered with foil until the last 20 to 25 minutes. Then, uncover and bake until the glaze is shiny and sticky.

Tip 5: Check the ribs toward the end of cooking. Every oven runs a little differently. When the ribs are done, a fork should slide in easily with very little resistance. If they still feel firm, keep baking. Also, check the pan. There should be plenty of rendered fat and juices. If the pan seems dry, the foil was not sealed tightly enough.

Tip 6: Add BBQ sauce at the end. Spoon over your BBQ sauce during the last part of cooking. If added too early, you’ll lose some flavor, and the sugars in the sauce might even cause your ribs to dry out.

Brush on the BBQ sauce after the ribs have become tender, then return the pan to the oven. Finishing uncovered allows the sauce to thicken into a glossy glaze without burning or drying the ribs.

A Note on Types of Beef Ribs

There are four common types of beef ribs you’ll likely come across:

• Chuck short ribs: These are cut from the upper portion of the rib cage (closer to the shoulder). They are smaller, a bit more irregular in shape, and are the most common option in standard grocery stores.
• Plate short ribs: These come from the lower portion of the rib cage. They are larger, meatier, and have richer marbling. You are more likely to find them at a butcher shop or specialty grocery store.
• Beef back ribs: These have much less meat because they are usually removed after the rib roast or ribeye is cut away. Rib roasts or ribeyes are some of the most expensive cuts of beef, so most butchers leave very little meat on the bone. These work in the recipe below, but will cook faster. Start checking for tenderness earlier.
• Flanken ribs: These are cut very thin, sometimes called Korean-style or Galbi. These do better with quick, high-heat cooking, and are not ideal for this recipe. We use them in our Korean short ribs recipe.

Our recommendation: If you have the choice, use plate short ribs cut into smaller pieces (3 to 4 inches long), sometimes labeled English-style. They have the best balance of meat and fat and become especially tender when baked low and slow. I also use plate ribs for these red wine braised short ribs.

Serving Suggestions

These BBQ ribs are rich and satisfying. Depending on their size, plan for 1 to 2 ribs per person. Short ribs can be quite meaty, which is one of the reasons we love them.

For serving, something fresh on the side works beautifully. Coleslaw is a favorite. Try our creamy coleslaw or vinegar coleslaw. A simple green salad with a bright lemon vinaigrette or honey mustard dressing is also a great match, and this napa cabbage salad is excellent. As shown in our photos, we also love a side of pickles for something tangy.

For more sides, Cajun butter corn, corn salad, or homemade cornbread are all wonderful. If you want something heartier, serve the ribs with potatoes au gratin, mashed potatoes, a baked potato, or baked mac and cheese. Enjoy!

More Rib Recipes

Source link

This irresistible sticky ribs recipe is one of the best things we’ve made. The ribs are unbelievably tender and coated in a delicious homemade hoisin glaze.

These ribs are amazing! Every time we make them, we immediately want to make them again. The ribs are slowly baked in the oven with ginger, garlic, and cilantro to become incredibly tender and infused with flavor.

Then, we slather over our easy to make homemade hoisin sauce to use as the sticky glaze. These ribs are outrageously good!

Key Ingredients

• Pork ribs: I’ve used baby back ribs in my photos and video, but you can use baby back, spare ribs, or St. Louis-style ribs in the recipe below.
• Hoisin sauce: I highly recommend using our easy hoisin sauce, which I have included in the recipe below. It’s easy to make and lasts in the fridge for a month. I usually make a double batch and use it to make these chicken lettuce wraps.
• Garlic, ginger, and cilantro: For this recipe, we slowly bake our ribs in the oven and love to sneak in some aromatics that slowly infuse the ribs with flavor.
• Toppings: These are optional, but I love them. I add chopped peanuts, sliced green onion, and sliced red chilies to the ribs for serving.

Find the full recipe with measurements below.

How to Make the Best Sticky Ribs

Tip 1: Low and slow. I love baking ribs low and slow. We already have this baked ribs recipe on Inspired Taste with over 700 happy reviews. This sticky ribs recipe has a similar baking method, guaranteeing tender, almost falling-off-the-bone ribs!

Tip 2: Bake in flavor. I place the ribs on top of fresh sliced ginger, garlic, and cilantro, then carefully wrap parchment paper around them to create a snug packet. Then, I wrap it once more with foil to really make sure that it is well sealed. As the ribs bake to perfection, they transform, becoming unbelievably tender and infused with ginger, garlic, and cilantro. They bake for 2 to 3 hours.

Tip 3: Making that delicious glaze. Once the ribs are baked and rested, I unwrap them and generously coat them in our homemade hoisin sauce. Then, they return to a hot oven where the sauce bubbles, reduces, and transforms into a delicious sticky glaze.

Serving Suggestions

I love serving these with rice, coconut rice, or noodles for dinner. They are also amazing next to fried rice. I also love adding something fresh and crunchy. Try our cilantro lime slaw, garlic green beans, or this cucumber and avocado salad.

You can also serve them with spring rolls, egg rolls, homemade crab Rangoon, or this spicy ginger edamame.

More Rib Recipes

Source link