Tappecue does Sous Vide Short Ribs

Ingredients needed for Short Ribs:

2 pounds boneless beef short ribs, cut into 4 equal pieces.
Salt and pepper.
2 tablespoons butter.
Minced Garlic
1 cup of porter or stout beer.
1.5 cups of homemade beef stock, or store bought.
2 tablespoons hoisin sauce or BBQ sauce.
1 tablespoon of brown sugar.

Ingredients for beef stock:

Distilled water
Beef bones
Olive oil
Apple Cider vinegar
Salt and pepper.

The great thing about using a Tappecue is that you are not limited to just one cooking method. Our team decided to do something new this week Sous Vide. This is something that a few of our customers have said they are trying. It requires you to have precise control of the water’s temperature, this can be done with a Sous Vide system, or even a beer cooler. For this time we used a Sous Vide water circulator, but next time we are going to try some of the other Sous Vide methods without using the circulator.

By using the Tappecue, we not only got an additional way to monitor the waters temperature but also, the internal meat temperature. We cooked up a Sous Vide short ribs. This took about 48 hours for the Sous-Vide portion. The water circulator was set to the temperature of 137 ℉. We used a long probe to monitor the precise temperature of the water and the extra-care probe to see when the short ribs reached that temperature. Since we had an additional probe port we used an additional long probe to make our homemade beef stock. Sous-Vide brings the meat up to the temperature of the water and holds it there for the duration of the cook. This causes the meat to become very tender and breaks down much of the connective tissue without losing much of the moisture in the meat.

First, we de-boned (saving bones for the beef stock) the steaks and placed them in a vacuum sealed bag with some salt and pepper. Place the vacuum sealed short ribs in the water bath with the circulator.

To prepare the beef stock, you'll need to roast the bones in the oven after applying a thin coat of olive oil for 30 minutes at 350°F. Once the bones look nice and browned, you can place them in a stock pan with distilled water barely covering the bones with 2 tablespoons of Apple Cider vinegar. Let them sit together for 30 minutes. Then pour in the rest of the 2 gallons of distilled water in the stock pot and bring to boil. Reduce to simmer and let set for 48 hour.

After 48 hours, strain the bones from the stock and let cool in fridge.

After the 48 hours of sous vide cooking, we removed the short ribs from the water bath and let them rest for 10 minutes. At this point we began to sear them. 1 tablespoon of butter was put into a medium to large sauce pan at medium heat. Once, the butter has browned we placed the short ribs in the pan and seared it, a minute on each side. The short ribs were removed from the pan and transferred onto a backing sheet. We placed the short ribs in the oven at a low temperature to keep them warm while we made the glaze.

To make the glaze we used a large saucepan. Using 1 tablespoon of the fat from the seared steaks we added the garlic and stirred over medium heat until brown on both sides. Pour in the beer, add salt and pepper to your taste, and stir with a wooden spoon until at desired thickness. Stir in the cooking stock, hoisin sauce (BBQ sauce), and brown sugar. Let it come back to a boil. Reduce the liquid until it has a thick syrupy texture. Lower the heat and then add another tablespoon of butter and mix in. Add more salt or stock to adjust to your taste. Return the short ribs back to the pan and spoon the glaze over them. This will take about a minute. Move the short ribs over to a platter, then enjoy some of the most tender meat you will ever eat.

This graph shows the four probes; Sous Vide Water (Blue), Short Ribs (Red), Stock (Yellow), and Air Temperature (Green). The Tappecue let us know when the water levels in the stock would fall low. By having the notifications we knew when it would require more water being added and without us having to be constantly watching it. The versatility of the Tappecue allows for a variety of cooking methods and consistant results.