12-Hour Slow Cooked Caribbean-Style Oxtail

I love oxtail, a truly succulent and delicious meat when properly prepared, though this generally requires long cooking times.

Today I am going to take a look at preparing oxtail in the slow cooker and doing it Caribbean style.

While oxtail is a popular ingredient in many cuisines and is used in a wide variety of stews and soups, I love West Indian oxtail dishes and they are one of my favourite things to eat out.

When making oxtail at home I do it in both the Dutch Oven and in my clay baker, but the meat also lends itself very nicely to being cooked over many hours in a slow cooker.

The first step is to take around 2-4 lbs of oxtail (depending on how much you want to make and how big your slow cooker is) and dust the pieces with some flour. Put into the bottom of the slow cooker and then season them liberally with curry powder (use West Indian style curry powder if available) and black pepper. Season them as well with salt to taste.

Sprinkle 1-2 tablespoons of mustard powder over the oxtail and add 4-8 cloves of minced garlic as well as around 2-4 tablespoons of minced ginger. If you have it I also like to sprinkle 1-2 teaspoons of Vegeta seasoning over the oxtail. Stir up the oxtail pieces to mix all of this together and distribute it.

For the oxtail you can add 1-2 Scotch Bonnet peppers. You do this by slicing the peppers down the middle so that they are intact but have an opening in them to the seeds. They then cook with the oxtail. Alternately you can add a few teaspoons to taste of your favorite West Indian style hot sauce.

I added 2 teaspoons of El Yucateco's fiery Caribbean Hot Sauce.

The addition of the peppers or hot sauce adds not just some heat but a lot of flavour and the dish is not the same with out it!

Pour into the slow cooker enough beef broth so that it almost covers the oxtail pieces all the way. Add also 2-3 bay leaves, 1-2 tablespoons of soya sauce and 1-2 tablespoons of Worcestershire Sauce.

Cover the slow cooker (of course) and cook on low for 10-12 hours. If at all possible cook the full 12 hours!

Stir up a bit gently and remove the bay leaves before serving and serve with rice, rice and peas, naan or roti on the side, extra hut sauce and red wine or ice cold beer. Be sure to spoon lots of the rich juices that are produced when you cook this over your rice.

The oxtail will be incredibly moist and truly delicious. It will fall right off the bone. And, as an added bonus, your house or apartment will smell fantastic for hours!

Enjoy.

See also: Pepper Goat Soup

See also: Caribbean Style Goat with Potatoes in a Dutch Oven