French Fridays with Dorie - short ribs in red wine and port

Short ribs are one of my all-time favorite things to eat.  I love the slow-braised, tender, fall off the bone meat...marbled perfectly with fat to make the meat juicy and flavorful.  Whenever we go out to eat, if short ribs are on the menu, I have to order them...I can't help myself.  Now, a little confession.  I've only made short ribs once myself.  I'm not sure why...but I guess I thought they were to difficult to make.  That, and the fact that the boys are not huge short rib fans.  As Ethan likes to remind me...he doesn't like to eat fat!!!  (And neither does St. James.)  Oh my...it really is their loss.

I was really looking forward to making Dorie's short ribs.  Turns out, they are a bit of work...just because there are a few steps...from roasting them quickly under the broiler, to creating the amazing braising sauce, to braising them for a few hours in the oven...to chilling them overnight (optional step)...to skimming the fat...to roasting them quickly under the broiler again.

I decided that short ribs would be perfect for our Valentine's dinner, so I started them on Sunday.  Sunday night, when they were done braising...it was all I could do to keep myself from eating them right then and their.  They were so gorgeous, with such an amazing color and aroma...I was in heaven just looking at them.

Unfortunately, this was not the case Monday night when I went to finish them off for serving to the boys.  I scraped all the hardened fat off the top (and their was a 1/4 inch layer that was tinged orange from the tomato paste in the broth) and gently lifted the cold short ribs (still miraculously attached to their bones) out of the dutch oven and into a baking dish for their final roasting under the broiler.  Now, I did question how the short ribs were going to get heated all the way through with only a couple of minutes under the broiler, but I've learned to stop doubting Dorie...since I've seen so many of her recipes magically transform.

I spooned some sauce over the short ribs and place them under the broiler and turned them every few minutes so that each side got "glazed."  By the last turn, my poor short ribs were looking like charcoal briquettes.  I almost cried...ok I actually did cry for a few moments.  So much time and effort and it appeared that my Valentine's dinner was ruined.  Since I had nothing else to serve and the boys were hungry...I put the ribs on the table...apologized and said to pull off the burned part and eat whatever wasn't burned.

See how burned they looked!

Were we in for a surprise!  I took my first bite of what appeared to be burned edges...and the short ribs were not burned at all.  While they had a very dark color...after the first bite...I realized it was from the amazing broth with the red wine and port.  The short ribs were literally black...but tasted amazing.  Hallelujah!  These were so tasty, I was really glad I'd made 8, as I then had leftovers all week.  The boys actually enjoyed them too...cutting their way around any visible fat!

Served with Dorie's Green Beans w/Homemade Bacon and Mashed Potatoes

The boys and I joked that this was our black and red Valentine's dinner.  The short ribs were black, served on red plates.  And, for dessert, I made a chocolate pudding cakes with raspberry sauce.  I made the cakes with Hershey's special dark cocoa powder and when the cakes came out of the oven...they were black as tar.  When you took a spoonful, you then had the lovely red raspberry sauce and the coal black cake.  While nothing looked quite the way I thought it would...everything tasted amazing.  There are no pictures of the black cake, which is too bad because then you could all get a good laugh at our red and black Valentine's dinner too!

See how my other FFwD friends fared with their short ribs here.  Sorry I don't have more pictures...but at this point I feel lucky that I'm actually getting the FFwD recipes cooked...I don't seem to have enough time to also take nice pictures!  Hopefully, in March I'll be a little more organized and actually cook when there's some lovely light outside!