Description

A whole bottle of red wine, a beef shank, and dried beans go into a Dutch oven and come out three hours later as the kind of deeply savory, falling-apart braise you’ll want to make when the weather is cold. The beans cook right alongside the meat — soaking up all that wine-dark broth until they’re creamy and rich.

Ingredients

Scale

For the braise:

1 beef shank, osso buco-style cut, bone-in (about 2–2½ pounds)
Kosher salt and freshly cracked black pepper
2 tablespoons high-heat neutral oil (such as algae, avocado or grapeseed)
1 yellow onion, diced
2 stalks celery, diced
2 carrots, diced
1 whole head of garlic, cut crosswise
2 tablespoons tomato paste
4 cups low-sodium beef broth
1 bottle (750ml) dry red wine
1 tablespoon dried fennel seeds
2 dry bay leaves
½ pound dried cranberry beans or kidney beans

To serve:

Cavatelli, cooked according to package directions
Fresh flat-leaf parsley, roughly chopped
Flaky sea salt
Parmigiano-Reggiano, freshly grated

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Instructions

Preheat your oven to 325°F.
Season the beef shank generously on all sides with kosher salt and black pepper.
Sear the meat. Heat a 2 tablespoons of neutral oil in a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Once the oil is shimmering, sear the beef shank on all sides until deeply browned. Remove and set aside.
Build the base. In the same pot, add the onion, celery, and carrots. Cook until softened and starting to take on color, about 2-3 minutes. Add the halved garlic head let it cook for a minute. Stir in the tomato paste and cook until it darkens to a brick red and starts to caramelize on the bottom of the pot — this is where a lot of your flavor lives.
Deglaze and combine. Pour in the beef broth and the entire bottle of pinot noir, scraping up any fond from the bottom. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer. Add the fennel seeds, bay leaves, dried cranberry beans, 1/2 a teaspoon of Kosher salt, and several grinds of black pepper. Give everything a good stir. Nestle the beef shank back into the pot.
Cover the Dutch oven and transfer to the oven. Cook for 3 hours undisturbed, until the meat is falling-apart tender and the beans easily cream with the back of the spoon.
Remove the pot from the oven. Using metal tongs and a fork pull the meat from the bone and shred the meat, discarding the bone. Remove and discard the bay leaves and the garlic head. Stir everything well.
Serve over cavatelli. Finish with a handful of fresh parsley, a shower of freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano, and a pinch of flaky sea salt.

Notes

Make ahead: This is even better the next day. Store the braised meat and beans in the broth and reheat gently. Cook the cavatelli fresh when you’re ready to serve.