Oxtail Stew

I'm a huge oxtail fan, and it's not been easy to find good oxtail stew in Singapore. The best I've had recently was at the Tavern at the Tanglin Club but that's not exactly an everyday restaurant for me. So I managed to dig out a recipe to cook my own, one day after work.

I had 2 types of carrot pieces - those super fine ones for flavour, and the larger ones to eat as part of the stew

A few sticks of finely-chopped celery make a huge difference in the flavour of the dish
Frying it all up with garlic and onions, and setting it aside.
I rolled the oxtail pieces in some plain flour, seasoned with salt and pepper
These were fried as well
The good stuff - not that we would have chosen to cook with such good wine, but it really had to be drunk (it was beautiful, by the way...and even better after about 20 mins of breathing)In everything went, with some beef stockThe end result a few hours later - meat falling off the bone. Fantastic with a warm ciabatta.

Beef Stew

We were clearing some leave last month and we had some bottles of wine that needed to be opened urgently. So the conclusion was that we would cook with half of it and drink the rest. No better dish than beef stew.

We did a supermarket run to pick up lots of veggies - carrots, celery, pumpkin, mushrooms and potatoes.
Flour seasoned with pepper and salt for dusting

The beef pieces. We used chuck because it was the cheapest stew cut.

I started by frying bacon strips in minced garlic and onions.

Then threw in the beef.

And added some tomato paste, beef stock, as well as the veggies. And poured in half a 2005 bottle of D'Arenberg Footbolt Shiraz.

I threw in a variety of herbs including rosemary, thyme and a bay leaf

After sitting for two hours on the stove

Separately, I minced some garlic with rosemary to sprinkle on top.

Ready to eat!

Great with ciabatta

The very next day, we went to the inlaws' place for dinner. Of course, as luck would have it, the MIL cooked beef stew too. Hers was a different style - she used guinness stout instead of wine. So it was drier and less soupy.

And she baked her own ciabatta with olives and rosemary.

I liked her version better.

The husband brought back some brie from Hunter Valley so we had that after dinner.

It was gloriously smelly

Loved it!