I have braised ox cheek in the freezer and while there are a number of ways of using it up – it is cheap piece of meat and feeds plenty – one of the best is to use it in individual suet puddings. Yesterday, this was the Sunday lunch. No these should not only be eaten in the Winter, sometimes an unexpected dish like this in a cold spring, late summer or early autumn can be a welcome sight indeed. The suet pudding, enveloping the long cooked and rich steak, with an additional pour of red wine or other gravy can be just the dish needed at any time of the year. If you are using something other than the braised beef from this site then I will create a pop up on how to cook the beef.
Ingredients
- 4 x 375g/13oz beef cheek (braised)
- 1 large onion, sliced and softened in a frying pan.
- 375g/13oz self-raising flour, plus extra for dusting
- butter for greasing
- 200g/7oz beef suet
- pinch of dried thyme
- pinch dried sage
- 1 tsp sea salt
- 110-150ml/4-5fl oz cold water
- 1 free-range egg yolk, plus 1 egg, beaten, for egg wash
Method
- Allow the beef to cool, or remove from the freezer and let it thaw out thoroughly.
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Suet puddings: grease eight small pudding basins with butter and line the base of each with backing paper
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In a bowl, mix together the flour, suet, thyme, sage and salt mix them all until completely combined. Gradually add just enough water until the mixture comes together as a firm dough (you may not need to use all of the water and don’t overwork it. Then add the egg yolk and knead the lot into the dough until well combined.
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Cover the bowl and chill the dough in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.
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When the dough has chilled, pinch off eight equal portions of the dough. Roll the first portion of dough into a ball and pinch off about a quarter of it (and do the same with the rest). Roll each of the larger balls of dough out onto a lightly floured work surface into a large thin circle, put it into one of the prepared pudding basins.
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Fill the lined pudding basin with some of the beef, onion and red wine sauce until it is three-quarters full.
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Roll out the smaller portion of suet pastry onto a lightly floured work surface until it is just larger than the top of the pudding basin; then brush the rim of the lined pudding basin with a little of the beaten egg and cover with the lit. Trim off any excess. Complete all of the puddings.
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Brush the pastry ‘lid’ all over with a little more of the beaten egg.
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Wrap each pudding basin tightly in two sheets of aluminium foil. Prepare a steamer large enough to hold all of the pudding basins (alternatively, cook the puddings in batches). Steam the puddings for 25-30 minutes, or until cooked through.
- Serve and pour with some red wine sauce or beef gravy.
Cooking At Zero Degrees 