Red Wine Braised Short Ribs is the best recipe for tender fall apart bone-in beef short ribs slow cooked with gravy in a Dutch Oven. This is a perfect comfort meal you can make at home for your friends and family!
This is one of my most favorite recipes for bone-in beef short ribs, slowly braised in red wine sauce in a Dutch oven! While it takes some time to cook in the oven, the meat comes out perfectly tender and falls apart.
Similar to my Instant Pot Boneless Short Ribs and Instant Pot Lamb Shanks the meat is cooked in red wine sauce that brings the most aroma to the whole dish. The trick is to reduce the wine first, so it becomes more concentrated and brings a rich and deep flavor.
Table of contents
How to make this recipe
To start, let’s preheat the oven to 350°F.
Rinse and pat dry the meat and generously season with salt and pepper.
Heat olive oil in 6 Qt Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Brown the meat in two batches for 5-6 minutes on each side, then transfer to a plate and set aside.
Add diced onions and cook for 8-10 minutes or until they are translucent and softened. Then add celery and carrots, and cook for 3-5 minutes more.
Add garlic and tomato paste and cook for a few more minutes.
Stir in the wine, bring to boil, lower the heat to medium and simmer until it reduces in half, about 15-20 minutes. (Photo 9-10).
NOTE: I like to use Cabernet Sauvignon to braise the meat, as it provides the best flavor. My favorite one is Decoy (NOT sponsored)
Add beef broth and stir.
Transfer the meat back to the pot, add bay leaves, thyme and oregano.
Cover with the lid and transfer to the oven.
Cook at 350°F for 2 ½-3 hours or until the meat is tender.
NOTE: You can start testing the meat after 2 hours of cooking. Simply pierce the meat with the fork to see if the meat is tender and fall of the bones.
How to make Red Wine Sauce
Transfer the meat to the plate and cover with foil.
Strain the sauce and discard the vegetables.
Pour the liquid back to the pot and simmer until it thickens.
NOTE: I usually just strain the sauce and discard the vegetables. If you want to keep the veggies, there is no need to strain the sauce. Just bring it to boil on the stove and reduce the liquid.
NOTE: If the sauce it too liquid, add 1 tablespoon cornstarch mixed with 2 tablespoons water, and stir. Cook for a couple of more minutes.
Serve the meat with red wine sauce on top of homemade mashed potatoes and some vegetables on the side.
Tips for Best Results
Red Wine. 99% of the alcohol will evaporate while you reduce and slow cook the wine, so you don’t taste it in the final dish. It just provides a richer deeper flavor.
Short Ribs. For this recipe, I prefer to use bone-in short ribs. However, you can easily use boneless short ribs or even beef tips.
How to store and reheat
Storage. When it’s cooled off, transfer to an air-tight container and refrigerate for 4-5 days.
Reheat. I prefer to reheat it in the oven because of the even heat distribution. You can also do it on a stove top over medium heat.
Freezing. You can freeze it in a freezer friendly bag or an air-tight container for up to 3 months. To defrost, just leave it in the fridge overnight and reheat as mentioned above.
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes! This recipe is based on my popular Instant Pot Boneless Short Ribs. You can just follow that recipe and cook bone-in short ribs on manual high pressure for 45 minutes with 15 minutes natural pressure release.
Yes! You can cook it a day before and just reheat it in the oven before ready to serve. They actually taste even better on the second day as all the flavors melt together.
If you don’t want to use alcohol in your meal, you can substitute it with beef broth. Just skip the step with adding and reducing the wine and add 5 cups of broth instead of 3 cups.
How to serve
Potatoes. The best way to serve braised beef is with some good homemade potatoes. These are my favorite recipes:
Vegetables. Vegetables and greens are always a good addition! Because the braised meat is very rich and quite heavy, it’s good to have some veggies on the side to lighten up the meal.
- Honey Roasted Carrots and Parsnips
- Oven Roasted Cherry Tomatoes
- Green Beans Amandine
- Roasted Broccoli with Parmesan
Bread. There is nothing better than freshly baked homemade bread!
MORE COMFORT MEALS YOU MIGHT LIKE:
- Instant Pot Mashed Potatoes
- Instant Pot Boneless Short Ribs
- Oven Baked Buffalo Wings
- Instant Pot Pot Roast
- Borscht Soup with Beef
- Instant Pot BBQ Pulled Pork
- Pasta with Meat Sauce
- Dutch Oven Beef Stew
- Kotleti
- Instant Pot BBQ Ribs
Did you make this recipe?!? I’d love to know how it turned out! leave a comment and a rating below👇 thank you!
Red Wine Braised Short Ribs in Dutch Oven
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 3-4 pounds bone-in short ribs 8-10 pieces
- Salt pepper to taste
- 1 large onion diced
- 2 stalks celery diced
- 2 carrots diced
- 3 cloves garlic crashed
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste
- 2 cups wine Cabernet Sauvignon
- 3 cups beef broth
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 spring thyme
- 1 spring oregano
Instructions
- To start, let’s preheat the oven to 350°F.
- Rinse and pat dry the meat and generously season with salt and pepper.
- Heat 2 tbsp olive oil in 6 Qt Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Brown the meat in two batches for 5-6 minutes on each side, then transfer to a plate and set aside.
- Add 1 diced onion and cook for 8-10 minutes or until translucent and softened. Then add 2 stalks diced celery and 2 diced carrots, and cook for 3-5 minutes more.
- Add 3 cloves smashed garlic and 2 tbsp tomato paste and cook for a few more minutes.
- Stir in 2 cups wine, bring to boil, lower the heat to medium and simmer until it reduces in half, about 15-20 minutes.
- Add 3 cups beef broth and stir.
- Transfer the meat back to the pot, add bay leaves, thyme and oregano.
- Cover with the lid and transfer to the oven.
- Cook for 2 ½-3 hours or until the ribs are tender.
- Transfer the meat to the plate and cover with foil.
- Strain the sauce and set discard the vegetables.
- Pour the liquid back to the pot and simmer until it thickens.
Notes
- I usually just strain the sauce and discard the vegetables. If you want to keep the veggies, there is no need to strain the sauce. Just bring it to boil on the stove and reduce the liquid.
- I like to use Cabernet Sauvignon to braise the meat, as it provides the best flavor. My favorite one is Decoy.
- You can start testing the meat after 2 hours of cooking. Simply pierce the meat with the fork to see if the meat is tender and fall of the bones.
- If the sauce it too liquid, add 1 tablespoon cornstarch mixed with 2 tablespoons water, and stir. Cook for a couple of more minutes.
- Red Wine. If you don’t want to use alcohol in your meal, you can substitute it with beef broth. Just skip the step with adding and reducing the wine and add 5 cups of broth instead of 3 cups.
- And just for insight, if you decide to cook with wine, 99% of the alcohol will evaporate while you reduce and slow cook the wine. Also, you don’t taste the wine in the final dish. It just provides a richer flavor.
- Short Ribs. For this recipe, I prefer to use bone-in short ribs. However, you can easily use boneless short ribs or even beef tips.
Made this for the third time yesterday, seriously so good! Only way I want to make short ribs now. I would just suggest starting making this no later than 3pm if you want to eat it by 6-7pm. You want the ribs to fall off the bone type of tender & that requires time.
As some have mentioned, the cook time is not realistic. Prep may take 20 minutes, but there’s about an additional hour of stovetop time prior to the 2.5-3 hours in the oven. I cut the meat to 1.5-2lbs, but left the liquid and vegetables at the listed quantities. A full 3 hours in the oven had the meat tender and delicious!
This is my new favourite meal for company. So easy to make and the flavour is outstanding! Having it for Easter dinner this year!
I made this recipe exactly the way you wrote it and I found the meat to be rough. Can I make this in the crock pot? I just feel like a slow cooker will make the meat more tender cooking over several hours.
Try actually timing this without having all of the ingredients literally layed out in front of you as if your a TV chef. Then add a sprinkle of “I’m a home chef” and give a real time estimate. To be so far off in claimed time is rather out of touch with the world. If the flavor blows my mind or if it was terrible I’ll post again, otherwise it was probably just okay.
So you gave a 3 star rating because the prep time is off? In your comment you didn’t even try it, so you are commenting on a recipe you haven’t tried.
I find that out of touch with the ‘real world’. You could have looked at the recipe and calculated the minutes in each step.
Delicious dinner! The sauce was excellent – I thickened it with a slurry of approx 1 tsp of cornstarch & water. Meat was cooked perfectly after 2.5 hours. The meat fell off the bones but I took the time to remove the fatty/grizzle layer once finished cooking so not to struggle with it at the table. Excellent!
This was really good:). Thank you! I couldn’t get my sauce to thicken like yours (I did put some corn starch in it too) but it was still flavorful and yummy!
Making this for the second time this afternoon. The first time was a hit, that’s for sure. Wondering if you (or anyone) has used a hand blender to blend the vegetables into a paste/sauce, to make a thicker sauce – and if there was any success. I may try it today and see how it goes!
We have used the immersion blender to blend the veggies into the sauce! It worked well to thicken it and to not waste the veggies (perfect way to hide them from the kids- haha!). We use it as a gravy and serve the meat over mashed potatoes. Yum!
I tried this recipe with my family and everyone loved it. Just read through the instructions because the estimated time is very off. The prep itself is closer to an hour between dicing, browning the meat, cooking the vegetables, and reducing the wine. Not a big deal just a little deceiving when you’re trying to plan.
You are 100% right. I was just coming to post this. I allow myself 5 hours for prep and cooking and finishing. And even then it’s usually close.
To the lady who felt prep time was off . Buy a vegetable chopper. They are amazing and gets the job in minutes . I wouldn’t wanna live without mine now. I am trying this recipe for the first time today. My first time cooking short ribs.. can’t wait to see how they turn out. But my kitchen sure is smelling wonderful.
I found that there was not a lot of liquid left after braising for 2.5 hours. The liquid that was left was mainly grease. So I removed the bay leaves and put all the vegetables and juice into my ninja. The mixture was a little tick so I thinned it out with some beef stock. So good!
Hi Dara, if you notice that you don’t have enough liquid, you can add a little bit more broth.
I purposefully do not let 1/2 of the wine cook off for this very reason. We always have plenty after the 2.5 hours. 🙂
I have made the recipe a handful of times and always pleased with the results! It’s a hit with family and friends. When getting the ribs from the butcher, I always ask for English cut as they present nicely 🙂
Thank you so much, Denise!
I don’t have a dutch oven, could I do this in a cast iron skillet? I am new to cooking and trying to use what I have for now. Thank you!
Hi Marie, If you don’t have a Dutch oven, you can sear everything in a skillet, then transfer everything to a deep baking dish, cover with a lid or foil, and bake according to the instructions. Hope that helps.
Quick question- my store only had 1.5 pounds of the short ribs. Should I adjust the liquid ingredients or still use as listed?
Going to make this today!
Hi Katy, you can keep all the ingredients as listed.
My husband “So tasty..so good you out did yourself again!” Easy recipe we will having this again and again. I left in the veggies.
Thank you so much, Tesie! So happy your husband loved the recipe 😉
I made this for Christmas dinner, my five-year-old granddaughter asked for thirds! This dish was so flavorful and rich! I did add wine and followed the instructions exactly very delicious!
Thank you so much, Sandra! Glad your granddaughter approved it 😉