Oxtail Soup

[Anna N]

One of the few times I can say I'm awfully glad I was born into a an income-challenged family.  Ate a lot of ox tails in my time. Delicious.  Now when I am a bit less income-challenged I can't afford them! Now ain't that ironic?  

[scubadoo97]

Remember my grandmother making oxtail soup.  It was a favorite. All the family members still have a soft spot for them

 

Yeah back then it was  cheap, plentiful and more in the soul food category and not popular unless you were in the know

 

I love them and still make them but have been doing long SV cooking over stove top cooking and using the meat in different applications 

[ElsieD]

1 hour ago, Anna N said:

One of the few times I can say I'm awfully glad I was born into a an income-challenged family.  Ate a lot of ox tails in my time. Delicious.  Now when I am a bit less income-challenged I can't afford them! Now ain't that ironic?  

 

Maybe that is why we had them as often as we did.  Lord knows, our family was not flush with cash either.

[lindag]

I was shopping around online looking for white truffle butter and went to the D'artagnan website.

I found Oxtails!  but look at the price!!!  Never mind.

Edited August 26, 2017 by lindag (log)

[Okanagancook]

There is only one tail per animal!

but, still seems expensive for what you get

they have us over a barrel

supply and demand, just like chicken wing prices.

dang

still good though

just buy them

life is short

[lindag]

I don't understand why they don't sell in smaller quantities.  I could justify a few pounds but appx. 15 pounds is more than I want or have room to store.

[JohnT]

@lindag I think you (or I) have misread the quantity! The ad says 1.25 to 1.5 pound (note the "point") and not 15 pounds. This, from what I gather, is $200.00 for one (1) tail. At that price I doubt they sell many of them! Here in my city and at my butcher they are also bloody expensive at around Rand 200.00 + per tail, which equates to about $15 + for a tail and is definitely way more expensive than a prime beef fillet. The days of purchasing a tail, for me at least, are way in the past. However, the other day I purchased two lamb shanks at a cost of around $13 and had a magnificent meal with left-overs for sandwiches the next day. I equate lamb shanks to oxtail in flavour and tenderness when properly cooked - both have that high intense flavour and aroma!

[Thanks for the Crepes]

I also interpreted @lindag's link to be $199 for 1.25 to 1.5 pounds, but perhaps I'm wrong, if it means 12 packages of that weight. I took it to mean the tail was cut into 12 pieces, including the very bony couple cut from the end of the tail in the linked photo. There seemed no way to clarify further on the website. Either way, only something I think a restaurant would be interested in.

 

These tails used to be given away to poor folks. Lobster used to be fed to prisoners. Ground beef used to be a budget meat. Things sure have changed. At least in this country, the poor have a nearly impossible row to hoe these days. 

[Anna N]

 I was a little taken aback too. But it actually says 12 pieces EACH 1.25 to 1.5 pounds.    Logic tells me that if you cut an ox tail into 12 pieces none of them could possibly weigh 1.25 pounds. So I take it it is 12 packages of ox tail each weighing between 1.25  and 1.5 pounds. That puts the cost of the meat somewhere around $13 per pound.  Math is not my strong suit so I'm happy to be corrected. 

[JohnT]

Anna, you are most probably correct - or I hope you are. The confusing part is that an oxtail has around 12 "vertebrae" and a tail does weigh around 1.25 to 1.5 lb. The ad should then read 15lb oxtail in 12 portioned packs each weighing 1.25 to 1.5 lb. As the ad stands, it is quite confusing to me. Anyway, I hope that whoever purchases some of those packs trims off the excess fat before cooking it up - the photo does show you would be buying a lot of very expensive fat! But that is something different - I still love oxtail in both a soup or slow-cooked form, but find it way too expensive.

[chromedome]

Back in the early 80s, oxtail and flank steak were my go-to cheap cuts. IIRC oxtail was then .79/lb and flank was .99/lb. Then, almost from one week to the next it seemed, they were "discovered" and the price rose tenfold. Now, of course, it's nearly twice that. 

 

The last time I checked (here in Atlantic Canada) my local supermarket was flogging oxtail at $14.99/lb and flank steak at $16.99. Needless to say, neither is a regular purchase any longer. 

[lindag]

Frozen / 12 Pieces (1.25-1.5 lb avg each)   $199.99 

This is exactly what it says.  I calculated 12 pieces at 1.25 lb. (appx) each piece, would arrive at about 15 pounds.

That comes to a bit more than $13. per lb.

 

Still, I'd bite if the quantity was smaller just so I could try them out.

IIRC, Ina used six oxtails in for her soup....that's at East Hampton prices!

 

 

 

Edited August 27, 2017 by lindag (log)

[Martin Fisher]

22 hours ago, lindag said:

I found Oxtails!  but look at the price!!!

 

Wegmans carries them here, but they are expensive! 

Years ago, they were dirt cheap! 

[Martin Fisher]

Leona Meats (subsidiary All Natural Beef Co.) and Bryan's Meat Cutting & Country Butcher Shop are down in Pennsylvania, about 30 miles away.

I'll have to ask them about beef tail.

[Norm Matthews]

They are a lot less at our local Asian Market. 

[Katie Meadow]

When I lived in New Mexico in the 60's and 70's oxtails were perfect if you wanted to make a green chile with beef instead of pork. Oxtails make such a rich broth all you needed in addition was an onion, some roasted Hatch chiles, and a few potatoes and you had the best Bowl of Green. But the price is so discouraging now I rarely buy them. Oxtails also contribute to a fabulous pho broth, which I haven't made in a few years either. Sounds awfully good, though, and winter is coming. Well, not for a few months yet here in the Bay Area. Although hundred degree weather never stopped any New Mexican from diving into a bowl of chile, especially this time of year when the harvest was in full swing. Yum. Truth to tell I don't think I could handle the heat levels I used to routinely tolerate in green chile. 

[Paul Bacino]

12 minutes ago, Katie Meadow said:

When I lived in New Mexico in the 60's and 70's oxtails were perfect if you wanted to make a green chile with beef instead of pork. Oxtails make such a rich broth all you needed in addition was an onion, some roasted Hatch chiles, and a few potatoes and you had the best Bowl of Green. But the price is so discouraging now I rarely buy them. Oxtails also contribute to a fabulous pho broth, which I haven't made in a few years either. Sounds awfully good, though, and winter is coming. Well, not for a few months yet here in the Bay Area. Although hundred degree weather never stopped any New Mexican from diving into a bowl of chile, especially this time of year when the harvest was in full swing. Yum. Truth to tell I don't think I could handle the heat levels I used to routinely tolerate in green chile. 

Just picked me up some,   was in ABQ   last weekend  ..good idea!!!

[cdh]

What is causing the prices to go through the roof like this?  Is there some trendy fad recipe everybody is making that I've just never heard of?  Has Campbell's Soup cornered the market? I'm perplexed.

[Shalmanese]

5 hours ago, cdh said:

What is causing the prices to go through the roof like this?  Is there some trendy fad recipe everybody is making that I've just never heard of?  Has Campbell's Soup cornered the market? I'm perplexed.

 

For an entire ~2000lb cow, there's only ~4lb of oxtail so it doesn't take much for demand to rapidly swing prices. Enough price insensitive yuppies started buying it because they saw some recipe on food network that it's shot up in price, same as flank steak or chicken wings.

[dcarch]

Now that USA can ship beef to China, ---------- If you think beef is expensive now!

1.379 billion mouths can eat in one month all the oxtails USA produces in one year.

 

dcarch

 

Edited August 28, 2017 by dcarch (log)

[Smithy]

I confess, I have yet to see the fascination with oxtail.  I've enjoyed the soup when I've had it, but when I've tried cooking oxtail i've been disappointed.  Several delicious-looking oxtail recipes (including a daube from Paula Wolfert, one of my culinary goddesses) have turned out meat that was stringy, almost mealy.  I probably didn't know enough about what I was doing at the time to make adjustments on the fly, and would get better results now.  Still - is the flavor truly that much better, richer, meatier than other cuts of beef when the meat is cooked properly? Based on my experience to date I'd probably substitute - oh, chuck roast, I think.

[Martin Fisher]

13 hours ago, cdh said:

What is causing the prices to go through the roof like this?  Is there some trendy fad recipe everybody is making that I've just never heard of?  Has Campbell's Soup cornered the market? I'm perplexed.

 

I think the cheap cuts, or what used to be the cheap cuts, have received a lot of attention in recent years due to the books put out by Fergus Henderson (The Whole Beast: Nose to Tail Eating, etc.), Jennifer McLagan (Odd Bits: How to Cook the Rest of the Animal) and others.

And it all sort of snowballed on social media and the like.

Hence the high prices now.

[Anna N]

9 hours ago, Smithy said:

I confess, I have yet to see the fascination with oxtail.  I've enjoyed the soup when I've had it, but when I've tried cooking oxtail i've been disappointed.  Several delicious-looking oxtail recipes (including a daube from Paula Wolfert, one of my culinary goddesses) have turned out meat that was stringy, almost mealy.  I probably didn't know enough about what I was doing at the time to make adjustments on the fly, and would get better results now.  Still - is the flavor truly that much better, richer, meatier than other cuts of beef when the meat is cooked properly? Based on my experience to date I'd probably substitute - oh, chuck roast, I think.

 I don't think much can match the depth of flavour of oxtail.  Nor the texture.  But that's just my opinion. 

[chromedome]

Shank and neck pieces are the closest, to my mind, but not really the same. And neck is almost impossible to get in my neck of the woods, unless you know the meatcutter personally. 

[Smithy]

1 hour ago, Anna N said:

 I don't think much can match the depth of flavour of oxtail.  Nor the texture.  But that's just my opinion. 

 

It certainly could be Operator Error on my part. :-)