Red Wine Braised Beef Short Ribs
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Featured Comment
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This was delicious, the original as well as the leftovers! Served with mashed potatoes and a variety of roasted veggies.. Thanks for the recipe.” ~Cindy
Why Everyone Loves My Red Wine Braised Short Ribs Recipe
- Braised short ribs is an extremely flavorful and comforting dish. This is truly an amazing short ribs recipe that features braised, fall-off-the-bone tender beef short ribs and my red wine sauce is absolutely incredible!
- A whole roasted garlic bulb adds incredible depth. Instead of minced garlic, a full bulb of garlic goes in cut-side down to slowly caramelize and mellow as it braises. It adds a sweetness to the sauce you just can’t replicate any other way.
- To make these classic short ribs, I will walk you through the classic braising technique of searing the meat in a Dutch oven and then finishing in the oven slow and steady.
- The braising technique is the secret. If you love braised beef, you’ll also love my Mexican braised short ribs for a bold, chipotle-spiced twist on the same technique, or my boneless short ribs if you prefer a slightly leaner cut with an equally incredible red wine sauce.
Table of Contents
What Are Short Ribs?
Most of the short ribs you find at the grocery store come from the chuck, the shoulder section of the cow. This cut has beautiful marbling and a lot of connective tissue, so it needs a long, slow braise.
After a few hours of gentle heat, all that collagen melts into gelatin, and you end up with meat so tender you can cut it with a fork and a sauce with real body.
How to Choose the Best Short Ribs
- Look for English cut: These are thick, rectangular pieces, 2 to 3 inches long, with one bone each and the meat sitting on top. This is the cut you want for braising because there is generous amount of meat.
- SKIP flanken cut: Butchers slice flanken ribs thin, about ½ inch, across several bones. They are perfect for Korean-style grilling, but they are too thin for a long braise, and you’ll end up with shreds instead of ribs.
- Look for thick meat and good marbling: Choose ribs with at least 1½ to 2 inches of meat above the bone, a bright red color, and thin streaks of fat running through the meat. Pass on packages with thick, heavy fat caps.
- Bone-in over boneless: For this recipe, bone-in is the way to go. You get more richness and body in the sauce from the bones. If boneless is all you can find, check out my boneless short ribs recipe.
Ingredient Notes and Substitutions
- Bone-in beef short ribs: Choose the meatiest, thickest ribs you can find at the store (about 1.5-2 inches meat thickness). Beef shrinks quite a bit during cooking, so thicker ribs mean more meat on the plate. Bone-in is highly recommended over boneless here because the bone adds more richness and body to the sauce.
- Dry red wine: Use a dry, full-bodied red wide you’d actually drink. Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, and Pinot Noir all work well. There’s no need to splurge here: a good everyday bottle in the $10 to $15 range is perfect, since a three-hour braise completely transforms the flavor. Avoid anything labeled “cooking wine,” as it has added salt and lacks the depth you need. Not cooking with wine? See my no-wine swap in the FAQ below.
- Beef stock: Use homemade beef stock or a good quality low sodium store-bought beef stock or beef broth.
- Tomato paste: it adds color, body, and a subtle umami depth to the sauce. Make sure to use “tomato paste” not “tomato sauce.”
- Garlic bulb: The whole bulb goes in with just the tips trimmed to expose the cloves. No need to peel or separate it. It roasts slowly in the braise and adds a mellow, sweet garlic flavor throughout the sauce.
- Fresh herbs (thyme, parsley stems): Fresh is important here because they will braise in the liquid for several hours. Dried herbs would work in a pinch but fresh thyme and parsley give the sauce a brighter, more complex flavor.
How to Make Braised Short Ribs: Step-by-Step
Remove the ribs from the fridge and take them out of the packaging. Allow them to rest at room temperature for about 30 minutes before cooking. This helps them cook more evenly and sear better.
Pat the ribs dry with a paper towel, then season generously with coarse salt and cracked pepper on all sides. Drying the surface is key to a good sear.
Preheat a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat and add the canola oil. Sear the ribs in batches of 3 or 4 so they are not overcrowded. Sear them on all 4 sides until deeply golden brown, then set aside on a plate.
In the same pot, sauté the onion, carrots, and celery until softened and golden, about 5 minutes. This will build more flavor for the sauce.
Add a little more oil if needed. Add the garlic bulb cut-side down and let it sear for just a few seconds.
Pour in the red wine while slowly stirring and scraping the bottom of the pot. All those brown bits of fond on the bottom are pure flavor. Don’t skip this step.
Add the ribs back into the pot and lower the heat to medium. Let the ribs simmer in the red wine for about 10 minutes.
Whisk together the beef stock and tomato paste, make sure it’s heated so it doesn’t lower the temperature of the pot and then pour it into the pot.
Add in remaining ingredients, stir everything carefully and cover with a lid.
Transfer the Dutch oven into the preheated oven and cook for 2.5 to 3 hours covered. Then remove the lid and cook for another 30 to 40 minutes until the rib meat is completely tender and falls from the bone.
PRO TIP: make sure to check in on the liquid levels every hour or so and add a little more broth if it’s cooking out too fast. Note that almost half the liquid will cook out. The liquid should be covering about 2/3 of the short ribs by the end.
Test for doneness: you can slide and fork into one of the ribs and it should be soft and tender and flake easily. You can also slice a pairing knife into the thickest part to check it it slides in nice and easy.
Carefully remove the ribs from the pot and set them aside (it is completely fine if they fall off the bone). Strain the sauce through a large fine mesh strainer, pressing and stirring the vegetables to extract all the juices. This will also release thicker vegetable mash, which will thicken the sauce.
Once you got all the liquid from the vegetables, discard the leftover solids.
Add the ribs back into the pot with the strained sauce. You can skim any excess fat off the surface of the sauce, or refrigerate overnight and lift the hardened fat off the next day.
Best Sides to Serve with Braised Beef Short Ribs
- Homemade mashed potatoes are the classic, and for good reason. The creamy, buttery potatoes soak up that incredible red wine sauce like nothing else. It is the combination.
- For lighter sides, roasted green beans and mushrooms, sauteed haricot verts, and roasted cauliflower both balance the richness of the beef beautifully. Balsamic roasted carrots are another great option, and they echo the carrot flavor already in the braise.
- A simple crusty bread to mop up the extra sauce is never a bad call either.
- Creamy polenta with a handful of Parmesan stirred in is my other favorite base. Every spoonful catches that red wine sauce.
- Buttered egg noodles or wide pappardelle work beautifully too, especially if you have extra sauce to spare.
- Wine pairing with short ribs: For wine, my favorite pairing is a glass of the same wine you used in the braise, since it ties the whole meal together. If you’d like something different, serve red wine like a bold Cabernet Sauvignon or a smooth Merlot to match the richness of the beef.
Make-Ahead Instructions
This is one of those dishes that is genuinely better the next day. The flavors deepen overnight and the fat floats to the top of the sauce in the refrigerator, hardening into a layer that is very easy to lift off and discard before reheating. If you are making this for a dinner party or special occasion, making it a day ahead is the move.
Cook the ribs completely through the sauce-straining step, let everything cool, and refrigerate in an airtight container with the ribs submerged in the sauce. The next day, skim the fat, then gently reheat everything in the pot over medium heat until warmed through.
Storing and Reheating Braised Beef Short Ribs
- Store: Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator with the ribs submerged in the sauce. They will keep for 3 to 4 days and taste even better on days 2 and 3.
- Reheating: Reheat individual portions in the microwave, or warm everything together in the pot over medium heat until just heated through. Do not boil.
- Freezer: Cool completely, then transfer to a freezer-safe container with sauce covering the meat. Freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator before reheating.
Braised Short Ribs Recipe FAQs
Braising is a method of slowly cooking food using wet and dry heat. This technique starts off with searing the meat first at high temperature and then slow-cooking in the oven with liquid. This technique provides a great amount of flavor along with succulent and tender texture of the meat.
Yes, but the flavor will not be as bold or complex as oven-braised (not as good).
Start by searing the ribs and the vegetables in a pan on the stove, then add everything to the slow cooker. Cook on low for 8 to 9 hours or on high for about 6 hours. When finished, strain the sauce and thicken it with a slurry of cornstarch and cold water or a butter-flour roux whisked in.
After several hours of braising, the vegetables have given everything they have to the sauce and are completely spent. What is left in the strainer is soft, mushy, and mostly flavorless. The sauce gets all of their nutrients and flavor. If you prefer a chunky sauce, you can skip the straining step, but the texture will be different.
Absolutely. They reheat beautifully and the flavor improves overnight. See the make-ahead section above for details.
The easiest method: refrigerate the finished ribs in the sauce overnight. The fat will rise to the top and harden, and you can simply lift it off with a spoon the next morning before reheating and straining the sauce.
Plan on about 1 to 1¼ pounds of bone-in short ribs per person. The bones and fat account for a good part of that weight, and beef shrinks quite a bit as it cooks. My recipe uses 4½ to 5 pounds for 4 servings.
Yes. Follow the recipe through adding the stock and herbs, then cover the pot but leave a small stack for steam to escape. Keep it at a gentle simmer over low heat for 2½ to 3 hours, turning the ribs once halfway through. Uncover for the last 30 minutes. Keep the heat low, since a hard boil tightens the meat, and check the liquid every 45 minutes or so.
Yes. Cook them on high pressure for 45 minutes, then let the pressure release naturally for 10 to 15 minutes. You can find the full method in my Instant Pot short ribs recipe.
Yes. Replace the wine with an equal amount of beef stock plus 3 tablespoons of red wine vinegar or balsamic vinegar and a tablespoon on Worcestershire sauce. You need that bit of acidity to balance the richness of the beef. Non-alcoholic red wine works well too. The sauce will taste a little different, more beefy and less deep, but still delicious.
Most of it does, but not all. According to the USDA Table of Nutrient Retention Factors, about 5% of the alcohol remains after 2½ hours of simmering or baking. If you’re cooking for someone who avoids alcohol completely, use the no-wine version above.
In almost every case, they need more time. Short ribs go through a tough stage before they turn tender, and it takes hours of low, gentle heat to break down all that connective tissue. Cover the pot and keep cooking in 20 to 30 minute increments until a knife slides in with no resistance. Also, keep the oven at 325°F: cranking up the heat to speed things along tightens the meat instead.
Yes. Boneless ribs cook a little faster, so start checking for doneness about 30 minutes early. You’ll lose a bit of body in the sauce without the bones. I also have a dedicated boneless short ribs recipe with red wine sauce if you’d like a version built around that cut.
Absolutely. Sear the ribs in batches so you don’t crowd the pot, and use a 7-quart or larger Dutch oven, or split everything between two pots. Keep the liquid about two-thirds of the way up the ribs. For two separate pots, cook time will be the same, for one large pot, it will take longer, up to an hour longer.
Pat the ribs completely dry, use an oil with a high smoke point like avocado, and sear over medium-heat rather than high. Turn on your vent fan on high before you start.
Shred the meat and warm it in the leftover sauce with a splash of stock, then toss it with pappardelle and plenty of freshly grated Parmesan. It also makes incredible tacos, sandwiches on toasted crusty rolls, or a crispy potato hash topped with a fried egg.
More Beef Recipes You Don’t Want To Miss
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Braised Short Ribs Recipe
Ingredients
- 4.5-5 lbs bone-in beef short ribs cut in about 2-inch pieces*
- 2 tbsp coarse salt
- 2 tsp cracked black pepper
- 2 tbsp neutral cooking oil avocado, canola, vegetable, etc
- 1 yellow onion
- 3 medium carrots
- 2 celery ribs
- 1 bulb of garlic
- 750 ml dry red wine
- 3 cup beef stock low sodium preferred
- 3 tbsp tomato paste
- 6 thyme sprigs
- 6-8 parsley stems with leaves
- 2 tsp dried oregano
- 2 bay leaves
- cracked black pepper
- salt to taste
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 325°F and remove the middle rack in needed, to be able to fit the Dutch oven.
Rest the short ribs:
- Take short ribs out of the refrigerator and out of the package. Let them rest and warm up on the cutting board, on the counter, for about 30 minutes before cooking.
- Slice onion, dice carrots, and celery and set them aside. Peel the outer loose skin of garlic and cut off just the tips to expose the garlic flesh.
- Pat the ribs dry with a paper towel and season generously with salt and pepper on all sides.
Season and sear:
- Preheat a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add oil.
- Sear the ribs in batches of 3 or 4 so they are not overcrowded. Sear them on all 4 sides until golden brown, for about a minute on each side.
- Take them out and set aside. (If there is a lot of excess fat from searing the ribs, drain it off.)
Cook vegetables and make the sauce:
- Sautee the onion, carrots, and celery in the same pot until softened and golden. (Add a little more canola oil if needed.)
- Add garlic bulb cut side down and let it sear for a few seconds.
- Pour in the bottle of wine while slowly while deglazing, stirring and scraping the bottom of the pot.
- Add ribs back into the pot and lower the heat to medium. Let the ribs simmer in red wine for about 10 minutes.
- Whisk together beef stock, tomato paste, and herbs and pour it into the pot.
- Stir everything carefully and cover with a lid.
Cook In The Oven:
- Transfer the Dutch oven into the preheated oven and cook for 2 1/2-3 hours.
- Take off the lid and cook another 30-40 minutes. (Until the rib meat is completely tender.)
Prepare sauce:
- Carefully take the ribs out of the pot and set them aside. (It's okay if they fall off the bone, they are supposed to.)
- Strain the sauce through a large fine mesh strainer. After liquids strained off, stir the vegetables in the strainer to extract the juices and discard what is left in the strainer. This will also help with thickening the sauce.
- Add the ribs back into the pot with the sauce. You can spoon the excess fat from the surface of the sauce or you can do it the next day while it's cold.
Tips:
- You can serve the ribs right away or the next day. It's actually better the next day and you will have a chance to get rid of the excess fat easily.
- To get rid of the excess fat, refrigerate the cooled ribs in sauce. While it cools, the fat layer on the top will harden. You can easily take it off with a spoon the next day and discard.
Video
Notes
- Choose the meatiest, thickest short ribs: Look for English-cut, bone-in ribs. These will give you the most meat because beef will shrink quite a bit when it cooks.
- No wine? There will be a flavor difference but it will still be good. Replace the wine with an equal amount of beef stock plus 3 tablespoons of red wine vinegar or balsamic vinegar and a tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce.
- Doneness: A paring knife should slide in and out of the thickest rib with no resistance. If not, keep cooking in 20 to 30 minute increments.
- Storing: Make sure to store it in an airtight container, in the refrigerator. Stored properly, they should last 3 to 4 days.
- Reheating: Reheat individual portions in a microwave, reheat all of it in the pot over medium heat just until heated through, or cover and warm the whole pot in a 300°F oven.
Nutrition
Originally published on Will Cook For Smiles in December 2020.
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Disclaimer: Nutrition information shown is not guaranteed to be 100% accurate as most ingredients and brands have variations.
This recipe was so simple to follow and OMGosh, so delicious!! I embellish on a lot of recipes but I didn’t on this one – followed it through to the end!! Thank you for sharing and I will be making this one again!! And I will be checking out what else you are making from time to time.
Thank you so much for the kind words! I’m so glad it turned out delicious for you. 🙂
So delicious ☺️
Thanks, Lori! 🙂
How would you serve it the next day? How will the reheating process be? Can I reheat the whole pan in the oven?
If you have leftovers, you can reheat individual portions in a microwave or reheat all of it in the pot over medium heat.
This recipe was amazing! I started out at 2 hours at 300 degrees covered and then 2.5 hrs at 375 uncovered. Fabulous!
I am so glad you liked it! Thanks for taking the time to let me know!
Why discard the veggies at the end?
Hey Anthony! After you strain the sauce, what’s will be left is not much of the veggies. It will be mushy and broken from straining and you’ve gotten all the nutrients out of them. If you don’t want a smooth sauce though, and don’t mind a chunky sauce, you don’t have to strain it but keep it chunky.
This was delicious, the original as well as the leftovers! Served with mashed potatoes and a variety of roasted veggies.. Thanks for the recipe.
I am so glad you liked it, Cindy!
Any recommendations for the wine used? I do NOT drink red wine, and I only enjoy very fruit-forward sweet white wines. That obviously wouldn’t be appropriate for this recipe.
I always get overwhelmed in the wine aisle; any specific brands/ types would be much appreciated!
Hi Crystal, I find that both the barefoot brand and the Chateau Ste Michelle brand have a good flavor and are not very expensive you will want a dry wine such as Cabernet Sauvignons, Merlots, or Pinot Noirs. Hope that helps!
How would you modify this for a crock pot? Season and sear meat and cook veggies to make sauce separately and then combine in crock pot for the 2.5 to 3 hours + 30/40 minutes? Planning to make this for Fathers’ day weekend.
It is easy to make in the crockpot but the flavor won’t be exactly the same, it won’t have as bold of a flavor as braised. Start by searing the ribs in a pan then add to the crockpot, then sear the veggies and add them to the crockpot, next add the liquids. If cooking on low I would say it will take about 8-9 hours and on high 6 hours. When it is done you can make a gravy with flour or cornstarch. To thicken with flour put equal parts butter and flour in a saucepan and cook for a minute then add in the liquid and whisk until smooth and thick. To use corn starch, first, use COLD water or broth and mix it together and then pour into the hot saucepan with the liquid and whisking until thickened.
Another smash hit from your site. Thank you! This meat literally fell off the bone. Served with your mashed potatoes and green beans. So Good!
I am so glad you liked it, Jojo!