Clear oxtail soup

Ingredients for 8 servings:

• ¼ liter of water
• 100 g carrot(s), diced
• 100 g celery, diced
• 100 g leek, thinly sliced
• 300 g minced meat (beef)
• 3 egg whites
• 2 onions, sliced
• 1 kg oxtail, cut into pieces
• some olive oil
• 200 g carrot(s), diced
• 100 g celeriac, diced
• 250 g leek, diced
• Salt
• 2 tomatoes, peeled, cut into pieces
• 1 pinch(s) of sugar
• 1 sprig(s) thyme, fresh (or dried)
• 1 small bay leaf
• 1 kohlrabi, thinly sliced
• 1 thick carrot(s), cut into thin slices
• 300 ml red wine
• 2 liters of meat broth
• 2 tbsp Madeira
• 1 tbsp whiskey
• 1 bunch chives, finely chopped
• Pepper from the mill

Instructions

Working time approx. 1 hour 30 minutes; Rest time approx. 1 hour; Total time approx. 2 hours 30 minutes

my star piece

A word about the quantity: This recipe is intended for 8 servings as a starter soup. As a main course, it equates to about 4 servings. First, prepare the clarifying broth: Whisk the egg whites (do not beat!) and mix with 100g each of carrots, celery, and leek (the clarifying vegetables), the ground beef, and 1/4 liter of water. Chill in the refrigerator until ready to use. For the soup, brown the oxtail pieces all over in hot olive oil. Add the diced vegetables and sliced ​​onion, season with salt and pepper, and sauté until translucent. The vegetables should take on some color. Add the tomato pieces, thyme, sugar, and bay leaf, and simmer for about 30 minutes. Then deglaze with the red wine and reduce the liquid by half. Add the meat broth and simmer the soup gently for 2.5 hours. The meat should then be tender. If too much liquid evaporates during cooking, add a little water. Let the soup cool. In the meantime, you can prepare the vegetable garnish. To do this, use a small star-shaped cookie cutter to cut out stars from thin slices of kohlrabi and carrot. This will look absolutely festive in the soup later. Boil the vegetable stars in salted water until al dente. Then set aside. Now fish out the oxtail pieces from the soup, making sure no pieces of vegetables are stuck to them. Remove the meat from the bones and cut into small cubes. Then pour the soup through a sieve into a pot. Dispose of the collected vegetables in the trash. The soup should be completely cooled before adding the clarifying solution. If you’re in a hurry, you can do this quickly with a cold water bath. Now add the clarifying solution, bring to a boil once, stirring constantly, and then let it simmer for 30 minutes. At the end of the boiling time, you can already see that the liquid is actually clear, except for the minced meat crumbs still floating in it. Now pour the soup through cheesecloth into a pot (this works best if you line a large sieve with the cheesecloth). Reheat the soup and season with salt, pepper, Madeira wine, and whiskey. Place the star vegetables, diced meat, and chives in soup bowls and fill with the soup. Serve with cheese flutes. Preparation takes quite a while due to the cooking and cooling times, so this soup is certainly not a quick meal. I always shorten the cooling time by putting it in a water bath; otherwise it takes hours. However, it is ideally made the day before or can be frozen. This soup has become so popular in my family that I always make double the batch so that I can give each guest a portion to take home.