Chilled beef shank poached in an Asian ‘laosui’ master stock 酱牛腱

‘Lao sui’ is a stock with variety of spices – cloves, cinnamon bark, fennel, citric peel, Sichuan pepper, star anise, dry ginger and licorice root. It is often reused over and over again to poach meat and eggs.

The beef shanks I use are ‘large shanks’ which is about 1kg each, available from Asian butchers.

Ingredients

• 1 large beef shank, approximately 1kg

Lao sui stock

• 2 tbsp. soy sauce
• 2 tbsp. dark soy sauce
• 1 tbsp. sugar (I use Chinese rock sugar)
• 4 star anise
• 6  bay leaves
• 1-2 cinnamon sticks (approx. 10g)
• 1 tsp pepper corns, lighted crushed
• 1 tsp cloves
• 1 tsp fennel seeds
• a few cardamom pods, crushed
• fresh ginger (approx. 20g or to taste), sliced
• salt to taste

Salad

• 2 continental cucumber, sliced
• 20g coriander, sliced
• 20g green shallot, sliced
• Toss together

Dipping sauce

• 1 tbsp. soy sauce
• 1 tbsp. sesame oil
• 1 tbsp. balsamic vinegar or Chinese traditional vinegar
• 2 clove of garlic, minced
• 1 chili, seeds removed, sliced
• 2 tbsp. of the cooked marinate
• Mix all ingredients together

Garnish

• 10g coriander, green part only, chopped
• 10g green shallot, chopped
• 1 chili, seeds removed, sliced

Method

• Place beef shank in a pot, cover with room temperature water, bring to boil; remove from heat; rinse the meat under cold water to ‘clean’.
• Place the beef shank in a heavy saucepan (cast iron would be ideal) and return to the the heat;  add the ‘lao sui’ ingredients; top with water enough to cover the meat; bring to boil; cover with a lid; simmer for 1-1.5 hour at the lowest setting; turn the heat off, leave the meat in the marinate for the remaining heat to continue to cook; Insert a skewer into the meat to ensure that the juice is clear. The meat should be just cooked and light pink.
• When the meat and marinate is cool, remove the meat from the dish; put in a container and leave in fridge overnight. To serve, thinly slice the beef against the grain.
• To assemble, lay the salad on a plate; place the sliced beef on top; pour over half of the sauce; garnish with chopped coriander, green shallot and sliced chili.
• Serve the remaining dipping sauce