Kare-Kare
There are times in your life when you really just need some comfort food. Filipino comfort food. Something that will stick to your ribs, keep you comfortable, and also provide proper nutrition.
You’ve eaten enough lumpia and you now need something a bit more nutritious. Or maybe you’ve returned form a long trip and you need something easy and settling.
You need stew. Kare-Kare is a Filipino style stew utilizing ox tail and peanut butter. It’s OK, it’s just a few tbsp of peanut butter. Besides, you didn’t question the peanut butter in your Thai food did you?
My simple Kare Kare recipe utilizes a slow cooker (even better if you have a multi cooker) to make most of the prep hands off. You can use that extra time to make desert!
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- egg plant, salted
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- onions, garlic, ox tail
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- bok choy, sliced long-ways
I prefer to thoroughly brown the ox tail ahead of time, and to remove excess water from the egg-plant before cooking. This provides an extra depth of flavor with the caramelization of the meat, and the egg-plant reabsorbs the tasty broth without watering down the dish.
I like to use my multicooker for this recipe since it allows me to do multiple types of cooking in one place. I can easily brown and slow cook without having to do extra dishes or juggle multiple vessels. I actually did try using an instant pot for this filipino oxtail recipe once and it sort of obliterated some of the vegetables and ruined the textures.
**affiliate link alert! There may be affiliate links in some of my posts where I may get a small commission if you buy it (if I’m lucky). But I promise you these are things I use and believe in**
- 1 lb Ox Tail, cut
- 1 tsp salt
- 2 tsp cooking oil
- 2 cloves minced garlic
- 1 medium onion, diced
- 2 cups beef broth
- 3 tbsp peanut butter
- ½ lb fresh green beans
- 2 tbsp rice flour, or other thickener
- 2 egg plants (the long skinny kind), but into ½ quarter rounds
- 6 baby bok choy, cut in half long ways
- Using 1 tsp of salt, and fresh ground pepper liberally sprinkle the ox tail on all sides
- Place the cut eggplant in a large bowl and sprinkle with the remaining 1tsp salt
- In a multicooker, or whichever your vessel of choice is, heat oil, and thoroughly brown all sides of the ox tail.
- Once browned, remove ox tail and set aside.
- In the same vessel, sautee the onions and garlic until soft and aromatic
- Add beef broth and peanut butter and scrape up any browned bits in the pot
- Squeeze any water you can from the egg plant pieces before you add them to the broth
- Add ox tail back to vessel and slow cook for 6 hours until meat is thoroughly tender and comes off the bone easily
- Add thickener until the liquid has a thick consistency
- Spread green beans and bok choy across the top of the stew
- Bring the heat up to medium and cook another 30 minutes.
- Serve in a bowl with each ingredient separated, green beans, bok choy, ox tail and stew
- Enjoy!
