Braised Short Ribs over Mashed Red Potatoes – $2.42

This is one of the best tasting things I’ve ever cooked, and I’m not exaggerating. Now, don’t be intimated, and go cook it.

This recipe is just for one, so adjust as necessary if you’re doing more. Buy a short rib- you can get one at any decent meat market or even Harris Teeter like I did. One short rib was like $1.77! Now most of the meat I use costs less than $1 per serving- but just remember that buying this at a fine foods restaurant would be at LEAST $20 a plate.

You’ll see the silverskin on the bottom. Don’t try to take it off, it’ll come off eventually.

And YES I totally used my slow cooker for this! You don’t have to- you’ll just have to move the food from one dish to another later on and it can be a pain.

Put the short rib down on a very hot, greased pan. Don’t use olive oil, but rather vegetable oil. It needs to have a high smoke point.

Leave it alone and let it cook for a few minutes. Now roughly chop up 1/2 carrot, a stalk of celery, and 1 small onion (or 1/2 medium/large onion). Don’t worry about making it pretty.

Flip the meat and cook the other side until it’s seared/darkened. Don’t try to cook the inside. Take it off the heat and set aside.

Add the veggies plus a few thickly sliced cloves of garlic and cook on medium high heat.

Cook till it has some color.

Then add roughly a cup or so of wine, a sprig of fresh thyme (or a few shakes of dried thyme), and a few cups of stock of your choice or water if you don’t have any.

Add the beef back to the pot.

Now, as you can see from the photo above, the liquid didn’t fully cover it because I only had one rib. If I had 5 or 6 ribs it wouldn’t be a problem. So I actually moved it over to a smaller dish so that the liquid could completely cover the beef.

Cover it with foil or a lid and cook for 2 hours at about 350*. Uncover and this is about what it should look like.

Drain the veggies and trash them.

And take out the beef.

You can take the bone off. See that fatty part on the right side? That comes off.

There it is. Make sure you don’t serve that. Gross. You’re left with a nice piece of tender beef. Just set that aside.

Now you should have the drained juices back in the pot. Start boiling it on high heat.

In the meantime, cut up some red potatoes and get ’em cookin’.

Once they boil for 8-10 minutes they should be done. Just drain and set aside while the juice is cooking down.

Feel free to go ahead and put the beef back into the juices. It won’t hurt it.

By the way, see that stuff on the side? Don’t ever throw that junk out! Just stir it right back in. That’s like beautiful beefy juice concentrate!

After boiling for a while, you may need to bring down the heat so it doesn’t burn. It’s going to start getting very thick. Just keep stirring and cooking.

While that’s cooking down, let’s go back to the potatoes. Go ahead and mix the potatoes however you please- I just added a tiny bit of butter, sour cream, salt and pepper.

As the liquid gets thicker and thicker, take a spoon and keep drizzling the juice on top of the beef. Just keep doing it over and over. See how thick it is, and how it’s coating the spoon? That’s how thick you want it. Keep cooking and thickening until it’s the amount of “gravy” you want.

Plate the potatoes first, then the piece of beef on top, then glaze the beef & potatoes with the juice. I think I should have served it with that awesome looking bone for decor, but I forgot.

Seriously though, doesn’t that look amazing?

Ohhhh mama.

• Short Rib – $1.77
• 1 Red Potato – ~$.15
• 1 Cup of Cheap Red Wine – $.50
• 1 Serving: $2.42
• 2 bucks is much better than $20-30!