Sous Vide: Oxtails in Japanese Curry
Oxtails are segments of a cows tail popular in South America, West Africa, China, Spain, Korea and Indonesia. It is also famously served in Jamaican and Caribbean dishes and are usually one of my favorite things to order from these restaurants. Here I wanted to use a contemporary cooking method called sous vide -- where you cook something in a bag submerged in water at a very precise temperature for an extended period of time -- to create a super tasty and tender oxtail, made in a simple Japanese curry.
Ingredients
Oxtails
1 - 3 Large Oxtails Per Person
1 lb small oxtails
1/4 Cup Aniseed
CURRY
1 Pack of J&B Japanese Curry, Spicy (It’s not spicy)
Optional Spices: Star Anise, Cinnamon, Cardamom, Black Pepper, Cayenne Chili, Bay leaves
Directions
Preheat the sous vide water bath to to 175ºF
(Optional) parboil the small oxtails in aniseed water for 15 minutes, drain and rinse off the excess aniseeds, reserve some of the strained liquid for using in the curry if desired.
Sear both sides of the large oxtails
While your oxtail cools, prepare the curry in accordance to the instructions on the box. Optionally, use the strained oxtail to make the curry.
Allow all to cool, you can speed up the process by putting ice cubes in the curry.
Add the oxtails and curry to a bad with the optional spices and seal the bag
Sous vide your oxtails in curry for 24 hours, they should have a little structure but come off the bone easily.
Serve with rice
Note: After refrigeration you’ll notice a cap of fat hardened at the top of the curry, you can simply remove this and discard it before reheating the curry.