Gesundheit!

Paisano and I were cruising through the meat department trying to decide what to fix for dinner when Paisano cried “GwaCHETto,” to which I responded with a polite, “Gesundheit.”

“No, no, no. Oxtails! GwaCHETto!”

“Ok, so what’s that?”

Turns out it’s a pasta sauce, or soup, or maybe stew made with oxtails, or fish, or maybe beef or pork ribs. I even found a recipe for frog legs. As I later learned, guazzetto as it’s actually spelled means “splashed” and specifically splashed with wine and tomatoes.

Paisano cried “GwaCHETto,” to which I responded with a polite, “Gesundheit.”

So we bought the oxtails and returned to his friends’ house and made guazzetto, pasta, and baby artichokes. Oddly — well, maybe not so oddly, he is the Paisano after all — he served the guazzetto over browned cubes of stale bread. Pretty damned tasty.

Guazzetto
Serves 6.

1 1/2 lb oxtails
1/2 oz dried porcini
2 tbsp olive oil
1 onion — finely chopped
1 carrot — finely chopped
3/4 c red wine
15 oz can diced tomatoes
2 tbsp tomato paste
2 tsp anchovy paste
2 bay leaves
1 whole clove
3 – 4 sprigs fresh rosemary
4 – 6 sprigs fresh thyme
2 c homemade beef or chicken stock or 2 c canned chicken stock
salt and pepper to taste

Heat oven to 275F.

Bring 1 cup of water to a boil, remove from heat, and add dried porcini. Allow to rehydrate for 15 minutes. Remove mushrooms and reserve. Strain the water the mushrooms soaked in though cheese cloth or a coffee filter and reserve.

Generously season oxtails with salt and pepper. Heat oil in a dutch oven over medium high heat and brown oxtails on all sides. Set oxtails aside.

Wrap clove, rosemary, thyme, and bay leaves in a small cheescloth sack ad tie with string.

Reduce heat to medium low and sweat onions and carrots for 10 minutes with a generous pinch of salt. Increase heat to medium high, add wine, and deglaze pot. Add all remaining ingredients including oxtails, mushrooms, and mushroom liquid. Add enough stock to just cover the oxtails.

Bring almost to a boil and transfer to a lower rack in the oven. Cook for three hours, topping up liquid with water or additional stock as necessary. Remove from oven. Remove oxtails and shred meat, reserving. Place pot on stove top and reduce to about 2 cups over medium-high heat. Add shredded meat and serve over polenta.

Paisano is a ficticious character.

Technorati: Food | recipe | kevin d weeks | seriously good | guazzetto | oxtails | italian | stew | braise | paisano

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