Korean short rib tacos

I am not a big fan of fusion food, but I must say, when I heard about Korean tacos, I was intrigued. Korean and Mexican are two of my favorite kinds of food. Actually they ARE my two favorites. I when I heard about Kogi, I almost moved back to LA on the spot (not really). But it DID make me want to try and replicate them in my new shiny Dutch Oven.

I went to the Italian market and got 4 pounds of beef short ribs, cut in half at the butchers. I also picked up some fresh vegetables, and went home to experiment.

Short Rib Ingredients:
4 lbs. Short Ribs
6 cloves of garlic
1 large yellow onion
4 medium red potatoes
2T fresh grated ginger
1c gochujang (you can make a close approximation with Siracha, Ketchup, Brown sugar, and a dash of sesame oil)
1/2c miso paste
1c soy sauce
1c water
1c chicken or beef stock
1c brown sugar
1T sesame oil
Salt
Pepper


First, let the meat warm up for about thirty minutes to an hour, then heat a good amount of oil in the bottom of your Dutch Oven. Take the ribs dump in salt and pepper in the bag they came in
and shake to coat. Pull out the ribs and place in the hot oil. Don't move them for a couple minutes. This will let them brown up nicely. Then rotate them and continue browning on all sides.


At the same time, I started a sauce pan with oil and threw in the garlic letting it saute for about 2 minutes. After that, pour in the stock, water, gochujang, miso paste, brown sugar and sesame oil and let simmer, stirring. After the short ribs are done browning, dump this into the dutch oven, cover and put it in the oven at a temperature between 250-350 degrees depending on how much time you have. I had all day so I set the oven at 290 and let it cook, covered for about 3 hours. I then pulled it out, and let it sit, covered, on the stove and come to rest. It is VERY important at this stage that you leave the ribs in the cooking liquid as they come to rest. They will soak up the liquid as they SLOWLY cool in the dutch oven, and remain incredibly moist and tender.


About 2 hours before I am going to serve them, I heat the oven to 300 and put them back in. I also toss in the onions and potatoes to cook for the last 2 hours. I don't put them in at the beginning because don't want the potatoes to turn into mush. Allowing them to slowly come back to heat really lets the flavor build in these succulent morsels.



I cook for an hour with the lid on, and then another hour with the lid off. The lid off allows the exposed pieces of meat to carmelize, and in turn makes for a DELICIOUS piece of beef in your taco, or eaten plain. You will not believe how good this is. One of the best meals I have ever made.