Oxtail Ragù
Grey day windy day, Mizzel here and mizzel stayed, Ragù Bubbling
We are no strangers to the Cornish Mizzel and the inevitability of it. If we are lucky the mizzel will arrive as soon as it will leave. In the winter season, we accept the more enduring nature of the mizzel and make preparation to reset our day’s expectations and accept an in-day. My wife is an expert on the in-days, she looks forward to the slow family days in her Grandparent’s self-built cottage near the sea.
There is no point in trying to avoid the in-days. It is too wet outside and too small inside to avoid the jigsaw moments of missing pieces which accurately mirrors the mizzel day or playing the doomed Monopoly with the marked replacement Piece Characters; such as Hazel the Cat is a wine cork, Scottie the Dog is a Limpet shell and Penguin is a small heart shaped beach rock. Once the hotels are popping up even on the cheaper streets, the weakened wills are just waiting for the first cheating incident to abruptly end the game.
Being a board game phobic myself, I subtly remove my involvement from the games by openly declaring my noble endeavour; I’ll do the in-day cooking. And in the process, teach the girls the skills. In fact, on each Cornish family holiday occasion, I plan and pack the ingredients for a couple of in-days.
On the 2025 Easter in-day, our chosen favourite is Oxtail Ragù. On this occasion, I packed a whole ‘base to tip’ of an oxtail from my local butcher, acquired during an emergency breakfast Black Pudding shopping in mid March. As a visually evocative ingredient, the whole tail was in the garage freezer out of sight, ready for the next Cornwall in-day.
An approximately 3kg of Oxtail, 3 tin of pulped tomatoes, 6 whole gloves of peeled Garlic, 25g of butter, 50ml of Olive Oil, a large onion, 75ml of white wine or red, 20-30ml of Lemon juice, salt and pepper. That’s it, I tend to keep the ingredients to a minimum for Italian dishes. For a good Ragù, to me, it’s the cooking temperature and time.
Start with 4-5 litre pot on stove top, add the butter and heat to the point of just before brown, swiftly add the olive oil to bring the butter temperature down. Add the chopped onions and cooked to translucence and soft, the add the pieces of tail evenly within pot and sprinkle the gloves of garlic on top of the beef. De-glace with the 75% of the wine and pour in the 3 tins of pulped tomatoes , the puree and the 25% of the wine from swishing out the residual contents of the tins. I tend to add a few pinch of salt and pepper, add 50% of the lemon juice and bring the content to quick bubbles.
On quick bubbles, I put the lid on and turn the heat down to 25% and bring the bubbling to a slow rhythmic popping of 3-6 bubbles, and just wait.
In term of beef cuts, oxtail is considered a cheap cut, however, oxtails when cooked correctly have better nutrition value than other cuts of beef; as it’s a rich source of protein, iron, collagen, magnesium and calcium. In my opinion, slow cooked oxtails is the best beef in term of its unctuous flavour and comforting texture, when served at the around 40 - 50°C.
The sweet savoury scent of the Ragù drifts and infiltrates into the in-day activities, girls will make snacks and bake cookies to temper the allure and anticipation of the Ragù. The 2nd hour, the 4th hour and then the final tortuous hours is the true test of human resolve.
For me, being the cook, I will have to evaluate the degree of cooking remaining, the final taste and consistency by prolong tasting, with the casual remarks on the progress. This Oxtail Ragù was declared ready to remove from heat at the 7th hour, then the final resting period as the final act of perfection. We have no choice, but to go for a walk in the mizzel and wind for the final resting hour.
To the traditionalists, the pasta should be Tagliatelle, I packed Linguine !