Mexican Style Braised Short Ribs
Quick Overview: Mexican Braised Shredded Short Ribs
- ⏱️ Prep Time: 15 minutes
- 🍳 Cook Time: 3 hours 30 minutes
- 🕐 Total Time: 3 hours 45 minutes
- 🍽️ Servings: 8
- 🔥 Cook Method: Sear, then Dutch oven, oven braise.
- 🌶️ Flavor Profile: Rich, earthy, mildly spicy with a hint of citrus.
- ⭐ Difficulty Tip: The braise does most of the work, your biggest job is the sear and shred.
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What Makes These Mexican Short Ribs So Good
- Bone-in short ribs are one of the most flavorful cuts of beef. Braised short ribs dishes are incredibly full of flavor. The bones enrich the braising liquid as they cook and the fine marbling infuses so much flavor, building a dish that tastes like it came out of a fine restaurant kitchen.
- Different chilis, different flavor: Guajillo brings fruity, tangy depth and that beautiful deep red color. Ancho adds smokiness with hints of cocoa and earth. Together they create a complex, rich base that no spice blend can replicate.
- Orange juice brightens everything. A little citrus lifts the richness and balances the deep chili flavors beautifully.
- The sauce is a bonus recipe. After blending, you’ll have more sauce than you need for the short ribs, and that’s a very good thing. Use it as a dipping sauce, drizzle it on tacos, or freeze it for later.
- Incredibly versatile. The shredded meat is the gift that keeps giving. Pile it into quesadillas, tacos, nachos, taquitos, burritos, or huevos rancheros.
Ingredient Notes and Substitutions
- Short Ribs: Look for bone-in short ribs with a good 1.5-2 inches of meat on the bone. Well-marbled beef is what you want to see.
- Dried Guajillo and Ancho Chilies: Guajillo brings fruity, tangy depth and gorgeous deep red color, while ancho adds smokiness and earthiness with hints of cocoa. Look for them in the international aisle of most supermarkets, or online. Choose peppers that are still pliable with shiny skin, as brittle ones are too old and lost most flavor.
- PRO TIP: Remove the stems and seeds from both dried chiles before using. The seeds don’t add heat but they do add an unpleasant gritty texture to the blended sauce.
- Jalapeño: Fresh jalapeño adds a clean, green heat. I remove the seeds and membrane, making it relatively mild. Want more heat? Leave them in, or swap for serrano or habanero.
- Orange Juice: Fresh-squeezed from one navel orange. The citrus cuts through the richness and ties the flavors together.
- Soy Sauce: Trust the process on this one. It doesn’t make the dish taste Asian but it deepens the umami and gives the sauce a rounder, more complex flavor. A trick I borrowed from restaurant kitchens.
- Beef Broth/Stock: Use homemade beef stock or good quality low sodium store-bought.
- Spices and Seasonings: Dried oregano, ground cumin, ground coriander, and coarse kosher salt work together to round out the chili and citrus flavors. Make sure to taste the sauce before adding back the short ribs to see if salt or anything else needs adjusting.
How To Make Shredded Braised Short Ribs: Step-by-Step
Fist, always prep all your ingredients before cooking. Getting everything prepped before you start means the cooking flows smoothly.
Pat dry and season the short ribs generously with salt and pepper on all sides right before adding them to the pot.
Preheat the Dutch oven oven medium heat and sear the seasoned short ribs with some oil. Sear them in batches, don’t overcrowd the pan, give each piece room to brown properly. A deep, golden-brown sear builds the flavor foundation for the entire dish. Set them aside.
Using the same pot (those browned bits are flavor gold), sauté the onions and jalapeños until golden.
Add garlic and let it get fragrant for a few seconds (don’t overcook or it will get bitter), then add the dried chiles and sauté for about a minute.
Pour in beef stock and deglaze the pot, scraping up every bit from the bottom. Add the remaining ingredients, stir well, and bring to a simmer. Taste for salt before adding the ribs back in.
Nestle the short ribs back in and make sure they are just covered in sauce.
Cover the pot with a lid and put it into a preheated oven (at 325°F). Let it cook for 2.5-3 hours and make sure to check the amount of liquid every hour or so. If the liquid is cooking out too much, add some more broth.
About half will cook out by the end, which is normal and expected. (P.S. your house will smell absolutely incredible!)
Remove the short ribs carefully and set them in a bowl. Remove the bones (they’ve likely already fallen off) and any chunks of fat or membrane. Shred the meat with two forks.
For the sauce: discard the bay leaves, then carefully blend everything in a blender safe for hot liquids until completely smooth.
Toss the shredded meat with 1/2 to 2/3 cup of the blended sauce and reserve the rest for serving.
PRO TIP: before blending the sauce, you will see a thick orange layer of fat floating on the surface? The easiest way to deal with it is to let the pot cool, refrigerate the whole thing, and simply lift off the solidified fat the next day. This is a great reason to make this recipe ahead of time.
Serving Suggestion
The shredded meat and sauce are a versatile duo. Here’s how to use them:
- As a Main Dish: Serve over rice, like Spanish rice or rice pilaf, or alongside roasted vegetables.
- In Tacos: Pile into a cheesy warm corn or flour tortillas with diced white onion, jalapeno, cilantro, a squeeze of lime, and a drizzle of sauce. Check out my baked breakfast tacos for a fun brunch version.
- In Quesadillas: Layer the shredded short rib with cheese in a flour tortilla and cook until crispy.
- On Nachos: Pile over tortilla chips with cheese, jalapeños, sour cream, and a drizzle of the blended sauce.
- In Taquitos or Burritos: Roll into corn tortillas and bake or fry until crispy, or wrap with rice and beans in a large flour tortilla.
- On Huevos Rancheros: incorporate these shredded short rib under fried eggs in my Huevos Rancheros recipe.
Make Ahead and Storage
- Make ahead: This recipe is genuinely better the next day. The flavors deepen overnight. Make the full recipe up to 2 days ahead and reheat gently on the stovetop or microwave.
- Refrigerator: Store the shredded meat and sauce separately in airtight containers for up to 4 days.
- Freezer: Both the shredded meat and the extra sauce freeze beautifully for up to 3 months. Freeze separately in freezer-safe containers or zip-top bags. You can also freeze in portions for easy weeknight meals. Thaw in the refrigerator overnight.
Mexican Shredded Braised Short Ribs Recipe FAQs
Yes, though the flavor won’t be as deep as the oven braise. Sear the ribs and sauté the vegetables first as directed, then transfer everything to the slow cooker. Cook on low for 8 to 9 hours or high for 6 hours. Blend the sauce and shred the meat before serving.
Any Latin grocery store will have them. They’re also commonly found in the international foods aisle of most larger supermarkets, and widely available online.
If you can’t find guajillo, dried New Mexico chiles are the closest substitute in both flavor and heat. For ancho, look for mulato or pasilla chilies. In a pinch, a combination of smoked paprika and chipotle powder can approximate the flavor, though the result won’t be quite the same.
With seeds removed from both the jalapeño, this is a mild spice level. The guajillo and ancho chilies are both considered mild. To increase heat, leave the jalapeño seeds and membrane in or swap for serrano or habanero chili peppers.
Sure, they are a little less widely available but you can use boneless short ribs just fine. Just braise for about 2.5 hours.
More Recipes To Try
Love this recipe? If you’re a fan of short ribs, you’ll also want to try my instant pot short ribs for a quicker weeknight version and my red wine braised boneless short ribs. For ways to use the shredded meat, load it onto nachos the same way you’d make my pulled pork nachos, or pile it into tortillas inspired by my pulled pork tacos. And if you love cooking big batches of shredded meat to use all week, my instant pot pulled pork is another great one to have in your rotation.
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Mexican Style Braised Short Ribs Recipe
Ingredients
- 4-4.5 lbs bone in short ribs with about 1.5 inches of meat on it
- 2 tbsp avocado oil or another neutral oil
- 1 white onion
- 2 jalapeno peppers
- 6 garlic cloves smashed
- 3 dried guajillo chili peppers
- 3 dried ancho chili peppers
- 4 cups beef broth or stock
- 2 tbsp tomato paste
- 3 tbsp low sodium soy sauce
- 1 Naval orange – juice only
- 1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
- 2 dried bay leaves
- 1 tbsp dried oregano
- 1 tbsp ground cumin
- 1 tbsp ground coriander
- 1 tbsp coarse kosher salt more or less to taste
Instructions
Prepare Ingredients:
- Dice onion. Take seeds and membrane out of jalapenos and slice them. Smash garlic cloves. Take the stems off and take out seeds from dried chili peppers. Squeeze out orange juice. Measure remaining ingredients.
Sear short ribs:
- Preheat the Dutch oven over medium heat and add oil.
- Season short ribs with salt and pepper on all sides. In batches, sear the seasoned short ribs on all the sides until deep golden brown and set them aside.
Prepare sauce and cook short ribs in the oven:
- Preheat the oven to 325℉ and remove the middle rack in needed, to be able to fit the Dutch oven in the center.
- Add diced onions and jalapenos to the same pot and sauté until golden brown.
- Move veggies over in a pot and add smashed garlic. Let it sauté for a few seconds, until fragrant.
- Add in dried chili peppers and sauté for a minute or so.
- Pour in beef stock and deglaze the pot by scraping the bottom with the wooden spatula as you pour.
- Add in remaining ingredients and stir well. Let the mixture come to a simmer, taste to make sure you have enough salt, and add the seared beef short ribs back in. Nestle them well so they are just covered in liquid.
- Cover the Dutch oven with the lid, transfer the Dutch oven into the preheated oven and cook for 3 hours.Tip: make sure to check the liquid every hour or so and if too much is cooking out, add some more broth. Note that about half will cook out.
Blend the Sauce and Shred Short Ribs:
- Take the pot out of the oven.
- Carefully take the ribs out of the pot and set them aside in a mixing bowl. Take out the bones if they haven't fallen off and discard. Use two forks to shred the short rib meat. Tip: go through the meat and take out the membrane that holds the bone and chunks of fat, if any.
- Excess fat tip: you will see a deep orange layer of grease/fat on top of the liquids in the pot. You can carefully strain it off or spoon it off. OR, the easiest way to get rid of it, is to refrigerate the sauce and then simply take off the solidified fat from the pot. This will take planning ahead though.
- For the sauce: take the bay leaves out and discard! Then, transfer everything from the pot into a blender that is safe to use with hot liquids and blend until smooth.
- Add about 1/2 to 2/3 cup of the blended sauce to the shredded short rib meat and mix it well. Reserve the rest of the sauce for topping or dipping of the dishes you make with short rib meat.
Notes
- Soy Sauce: trust me on this one! This ingredients will enhance the umami flavor but blend perfectly together with other ingredients.
- Want more spice? If you want spicier results, leave the seeds and the membrane in the fresh jalapeno and for even spicier results, you can substitute hotter fresh chili peppers like habanero or serrano. (Note, still take out the seeds from dried chilis as they are not spicy and will not add more heat.)
- Check on the Dutch oven while cooking: remember to check the liquid amounts in the pot while it’s in the oven about every hour. If liquid is cooking out too much, add a some more broth.
- How to use the shredded short ribs: the shredded short ribs are perfect to serve as a main protein but also great in quesadillas, tacos, nachos, taquitos, huevos rancheros, and so many more dishes!
- Save the sauce: you will have a good amount of sauce leftover, save it to use as a topping and for dipping. You can also freeze half of it and keep some in the glass jar in the fridge.
Nutrition
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Categories:
Beef Recipes, Cinco de Mayo Recipes, Dinner Recipes, Gluten Free Recipes, Mexican and Tex-Mex Recipes, Mexican Dinner Recipes,All images and text ©Lyubov Brooke for ©Will Cook For Smiles. Please do not use my images without prior permission. If using my posts in collections and features, please link back to this post for the recipe.
Disclaimer: Nutrition information shown is not guaranteed to be 100% accurate as most ingredients and brands have variations.
