Clear Oxtail Soup

Qing Dun NiuWei Tang (清炖牛尾汤)

Fall-off-the-bone tender oxtail is simmered low and slow to produce a luxurious broth with the purest beef flavor you’ll ever experience; accompanied by a spicy dipping sauce, it warms the soul.

This simple Chongqing style soup is also found in fine-dining restaurants throughout Chengdu. Clear Oxtail Soup is easily one of the most expensive soups, and when made correctly, is truly high-end. The cost of ingredients, the skill required, and the time needed are all contributing factors. While the costs may be unavoidable, the skill required for this dish is easy to overcome – provided one has the necessary patience and general awareness to cook the Oxtail until tender.

While Oxtail is obviously the key ingredient, it’s not alone. The delicious flavor of this soup is enhanced by adding a whole Chicken Leg, which, oddly enough, draws out the flavor of the beef. In fact, every ingredient in this Soup is used enhance the flavor of the Oxtail, and nothing is added which takes focus away from that flavor. In western soups and stews, many ingredients such as carrots, onions, and celery are used to flavor the soup, and while these can be delicious, much of the original beef flavor masked by the aromatics. Clear Oxtail Soup instead retains a pure beef flavor and remains much lighter than a western stew. That pure beef flavor will be obvious when cooking, because the aroma will be mouthwatering – a scent similar to cooking hamburger.

Clear Oxtail Soup, like most Sichuan soups, is meant to be served along with a bowl of Dipping Sauce for the meat. The perfect one to pair with this soup is the Fragrant Spicy Chili Bean Dipping Sauce (香辣豆瓣酱沾碟). This sauce is salty, spicy, complex, and robust, which compliments the purity of the Soup. However, any of your favorite Dipping Sauces can be used in combination with this Soup – either ones from this book or something of your own creation.

Prep Time: 60 min

Cook Time: 7 hours

Total Time: 8 hours

Serving: 4 people

Ingredients

1 kg. of Oxtail Segments

1 large or 2 small Chicken Legs

1/4 cup Shaoxing Rice Wine

Aromatics
1 stalk of Scallion (Tied in a Knot)
1 4-inch block of Ginger (Crushed)
2 tsp. of Green Sichuan Peppercorns

1 Tbsp. Salt (To Taste)

Directions

1.) Wash off the Oxtail and the Chicken Leg. Place the Oxtail and Chicken Leg in separate large bowls and fill the bowls with water. Place both bowls in the fridge and soak the meat for around 30 to 40 minutes to draw out blood. Afterwards, drain the water and wash the Oxtail once more.

2.) Fill a large pot with about 3 to 4 liters of water, heat on high, and bring the water to a boil. Add the Oxtail to the pot and return the water to a boil. As the water boils, use a spoon to skim the foamy scum off the surface.

(THIS STEP IS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT! Removing scum will improve the taste, quality, and appearance of the soup. Pre-soaking the meat will reduce a large amount of this scum. And remember, the amount of boiling water will need to be slightly more than the intended amount. I will usually start with around 4 liters of water and allow this to reduce to 3 liters during cooking).

3.) Add the Chicken Leg and return the soup to a boil. As it boils, skim away any scum that rises to the surface.

4.) When the surface of the soup is relatively clear, pour in the Shaoxing Rice Wine and add the Aromatics (Scallion, Ginger, and Sichuan Peppercorns).

5.) Reduce the heat to medium-low, half cover the pot with a lid, and simmer the soup for around 3 to 7 hours, stirring from time to time. Add water as necessary to keep the desired ratio of meat to soup.

(After 3 hours, the Broth will have plenty of flavor from the Oxtail, and the Oxtail will be extremely tender. If you allow the Oxtail to cook longer than this, the Broth will taste even better with more of that incredible, pure beef flavor. BUT some of the Oxtail may become too soft. Finding the perfect tenderness for the Oxtail can be a little challenging and requires practice. Many pieces will tenderize at different rates. The majority will be tender after about 2.5 – 3 hours, but some tougher pieces will require more time. To account for this, you can remove about 3/4 of the best-looking, tenderest Oxtail pieces and set them aside while continuing to cook the remaining tough Oxtail pieces for up to 7 hours. Afterwards, the tender pieces can be rinsed and returned to the soup. Clear Oxtail Soup can also be made in a pressure cooker to greatly reduce the cooking time. I prefer to do this the old-fashioned way on a stovetop so that I have more control over the tenderness of the Oxtail and the richness of the Broth).

6.) Remove the Chicken and Oxtail from the Broth and set them aside in a large bowl. Pour the Broth through a sieve or colander lined with cheesecloth into a different pot to strain out the Aromatics and any remaining scum.

7.) Rinse off the Oxtail segments thoroughly and then return them to the Broth. However, the Chicken Leg can be set aside for use in other dishes and is no longer needed for the soup.

8.) Return the Clear Oxtail Soup briefly to a boil, reduce the heat to low, and season the Soup with Salt to taste. Simmer the Clear Oxtail Soup for another 10 to 20 minutes while preparing the Dipping Sauces.

Serving Instructions:

Bring the soup to the table with a ladle and set in the center (preferably alongside other dishes). Give each guest their own soup bowl, small bowl of dipping sauce, a small bowl of rice, a soup spoon, and a pair of chopsticks.

Guests can help themselves to the Soup, ladling it into their own bowl. They can use chopsticks to pull meat from their bowl and dip it into the sauce. The oxtail will be extremely tender, so it will be easy to pull the meat off the bones. (The bones can, of course, be discarded). The sauce covered meat can be eaten directly or set on top of rice. The Soup itself is usually drunk after the meat is finished or intermittently toward the end of the meal to cool off the spiciness of the other dishes and the Dipping Sauce. The Soup broth can also be poured into the rice bowl to make a soupy beef-flavored rice.

 

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