short ribs and grits

a festive meal to make before 2022

See bottom of this post for a printer version of the recipe!

Happy Boxing Day and welcome to the hundreds of new subscribers who received What To Cook for Christmas! If you fall into that category, hi! You’ve been gifted a one year subscription to this newsletter, which I really don’t like calling a newsletter because it’s more of a serialized, one-recipe-per-week cookbook. Every Sunday you’ll receive one recipe in your inbox that is a complete meal — no need to root around trying to pair the perfect entree and side dishes together, I do the heavy lifting for you. These recipes almost always take under an hour to cook — although I’m breaking that rule for the second time in WTC history today because… it’s still the holidays. Next Friday is New Years Eve and this is an absolutely perfect NYE dinner party meal.

To check out past WTC recipes for meal planning purposes, you can go to the site, login using the email address, and noodle through all past posts. Or, you can go check out this categorized index of all past WTC recipes.

I know it was weird and Omicron-y, but I hope everyone was able to find magic in the madness of the 2021 holiday season. My children haven’t eaten anything but cookies in about three days, but they are happy and I am happy and tomorrow we will attempt to reintroduce vegetables to our diets. Maybe.

We’re all exhausted so let’s cut to the chase: short ribs. Short ribs are an excellent set-it-and-forget-it meal that are actually a rather elegant meal versus, ya know, another freaking pot of chili (but if you’re looking for a chicken chili look no further). After a very minimal amount of prep, you throw everything in a pot, let it crank for a few hours, and voila. Succulent, fall apart-y meat awaits. We’re serving ‘em with grits here, but polenta, mashed potatoes, mashed cauliflower, or my personal fave, cauliflower mashed potatoes would all work.

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ingredient spotlight

Really quickly though, let’s talk about short ribs. Short ribs are from the “chuck” cut of a cow, but include part of the rib bone. They are the exact same cut of beef as a beef spare rib, so if you can’t find short ribs, you can always ask your butcher to time spare ribs into short ribs. They are a tough, cheap cut of meat, which is why we coax the flavor and tenderness out of them with a nice long braise (aka a long bath in a flavorful liquid). What we wind up with is a fall-off-the-bone, melt-in-your-mouth, ridiculously flavorful piece of meat.

If you can’t find short ribs, you can just buy a chuck roast and trim it into 4-inch chunks to make boneless short ribs!

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short ribs and grits

Serves 4-6

Cook time: ~20 minutes active time, 3 hours and 45 minutes total