Oxtail Stew Part 1

My friend Cynthia sent me a link to a cooking website the other day so I could read up on my cry for help with the Pizza Dough situation. BTW...thanks for all the tips. I will have to try the pizza dough again. Maybe this time I'll just make it from scratch instead of buying it at Trader Joe's. Anyway, I decided to check some of the other recipes on there and I found one for Oxtail Stew. I love that the recipe has step by step pictures on it. I do better with pictures. I don't always like recipes in cook books with no pictures.

What is oxtail?
Oxtail (occasionally spelled ox tail or ox-tail) is the culinary for the tail of a beef animal. Formerly, it referred only to the tail of an ox, a castrated bull. The oxtail of a steer typically weighs 2 to 4 lbs. (1-1.8 kg) and is skinned and cut into short lengths for sale.
Oxtail is usually slow-cooked, often stewed or braised. It is a good stock base for a soup.

I decided to try it out. So I headed out to Crate and Barrel yesterday and purchased a dutch ove. Not just for this recipe but also for a few others I'd like to try. I've always wanted one and now I have one :o) I have a Mario Batali pizza pan which I really like so I decided to purchase the Mario Batali Dutch oven.

Then it was off to the store to buy all the ingredients. I headed to the Mexican Supermarket down the street from our home to get everything. You don't always find oxtail in Safeway although I have seen it at Draeger's. I knew though for sure I'd find it at the Mexican Mart.

I got all the ingredients ready and now our stew is on the stove cooking :o)



I just took a little taste of the meet and YUMMERS!!! Can't wait to actaully eat it! If it turns out good then I'll have to make it for my parents the next time they come visit. Or maybe I can even try Osso Bucco, there is a recipe in the little book that came with the dutch oven.

I also bought this little guy, a timer, that way I can stop using the one on the microwave :o)

We will probably follow the recipe as it's written and we won't eat the stew until tomorrow. It's not going to be ready until 3:00 and Rocky and I are heading to San Francisco about 3:30 for our Valentine's Day date :o)

oxtail stew to be continued........