Ingredients:
- 5 1/2 pounds beef or veal shin, on the bone (see header notes)
- 20 garlic cloves, peeled
- 4 heaping TBSPS freshly ground black pepper
- Sea salt
- 5 sprigs of fresh rosemary
- 2 bottles of Chianti or other fruity red wine
- 2 bay leaves
Slice your meat into chunky slabs and get it all of the bone. Preaheat the oven to 300 F. Get a large roasting pan, just big enough to hold all the ingredients. Place a layer of your sliced meat at the bottom of the pan, cover with a few whole cloves garlic, then sprinkle well with one tablespoon of pepper and a little salt.
Add a sprig or two or rosemary, then repeat with another layer of beef and keep layering the ingredients like this until they're used up and the pot is almost full.
Pour the wine over the top, add the bone and bay leaves, and top up with water if necessary to cover the meat.
Bring to a boil, cover thightly with a double-thickness layer of aluming foil, and place in the preheated oven for 6 hours or until tender. If you want to cook the stew overnight (as many Italians do), lower the temperatur to 275 F and it can cook for 8 hours or more, until the meat is tender and falling apart. Make sure the aluminum foil is well sealed, as this will keep all the moisture inside the pot.
When the stew is done, take off the foil, skim off any fat from the surface of the stew, and remove the bone, the bay leaves, and the rosemary twigs. The meat should be really soft and the juice light but rich and powerful in flavor. Taste and season if you think it needs it.
Then, break the meat up with a spoon and serve a ladleful of the stew on a hot toasted brushetta with a drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil.
Or, you can serve with simply boiled carrots and new potatoes and kale.
Would also be lovely with some polenta and a drizzle of good-quality extra-virgin olive oil
Serves 10
