Cooking with Jonny69: Braised Ox Cheek

[Jonny69]

I spotted an ox cheek in Waitrose, reduced on the butcher counter. I've never seen it before or even considered it a cut you can eat but it looked delicious and at 83p for a huge hunkachunk piece of red meat I figured I couldn't go far wrong

It's stewing meat, a slab of very dark coloured thick flesh with a nice marble of fat through it:



This one weighed about 0.5kg and I've taken a picture with a joke plastic dummy hand next to it to give you an idea of the size:



To cook I hunked it up into good size pieces:



Roughly chopped up some onions and carrots:



Coated the meat with flour, well seasoned with salt and pepper:



Brown the meat over a high heat and set aside. I used lard instead of oil because it adds lots of flavour compared to oil:





Then in some more lard add some colour to the vegetables:



The meat then goes back in the pan, I covered it with Old Speckled Hen ale, added 1/2 a stock cube, a tablespoon of tomato puree and left it to simmer for 3 hours. Before serving check the seasoning and dish it up with creamy mash:



It is absolutely PACKED with flavour and has a fantastic texture. I like oxtail but this tops it in terms of satisfying meaty stew flavour. It's my new favourite cut for stewing anyway