Korean oxtail soup is a popular dish made with beef marrow, onion, radish, garlic, and ginger. The oxtail is boiled for up to five hours and served with chopped radish, green onion, and sometimes noodles. In Jamaica, oxtail stew is made by blanching and deep-frying the oxtail before braising it with vegetables and beans.
Members of every beef-eating culture have eaten oxtail in one form or another throughout the history of civilization, not content to let precious food go to waste. Though widely considered part of the animal’s “offal” waste parts, one of the most enduring and internationally acclaimed oxtail recipes as of 2011 is Korean oxtail soup. Packed with flavor from the marrow of beef, a signature broth is studded with hyper-fatty beef and just a few other simple ingredients like onion, radish, garlic, and ginger.
Known in Korea as gori gomtang or simply gom gook, Korean oxtail soup requires only a few typically affordable ingredients to concoct. It also requires mindful behavior and up to five hours of preparation. Until then, the oxen — typically cow’s tails in 2011 — won’t be tender enough to fall off the bone. Some chefs will remove the meat from the bones before serving, while others will leave the meat still attached to the bones and let diners decide how best to approach it.
Before Korean oxtail soup starts to come together, the oxtail should be trimmed of excess fat, then soaked in water and soaked for about an hour, according to the Chowhound website. Then, according to the site’s recipe, the rinsed tails are placed in a pot of fresh water and boiled with salt, onion, ginger, and garlic for up to four hours. Several recipes online advise cooks to skim the top of the broth regularly to remove bubbling fat.
Korean oxtail soup often includes not only chopped radish but also a side dish of cured radish known as ggak ddoogi. This spices the radish with ingredients like chili powder, minced garlic, rice wine, ginger powder, and salt before adding it to the soup. A typical side dish for Korean oxtail soup is chopped green onion, which perhaps adds the dish’s only color. Some even add noodles to make the soup a filling meal.
On the other side of the globe, another oxtail soup has evolved into an entirely different affair. Popular in Jamaica is an oxtail stew that blanches and then deep-fries the oxtail pieces in a skillet with bacon before a covered braising period in a bath of tomatoes, white and green onions, garlic, and carrots. To make the meat especially seared, you can dust a layer of flour or cornmeal before it hits the pan. Towards the end of a four to five hour simmer, some cooks will add beans and herbs to turn a soup into a stew.
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