Short ribs with roast celery vinaigrette

The celery apple vinaigrette balances the creamy fattiness of the meat. The recipe comes from Peter Gunn of Porirua who scooped the first San Pellegrino Young Chef title for Australasia from nine fellow finalists, selected from hundreds of entries.

Beef

3 kgs	Beef short ribs, at room temperature (Main)
250 g	Onions
125 g	Wholegrain mustard
200 ml	Water

Marinade

600 g	Celery, reserve leaves for celery salt (Main)
100 g	Canola oil
100 g	Caramelised apple balsamic, see notes
300 g	Sweet apple vinegar, see notes
100 g	Mustard oil
70 g	Citric acid

Salt and to serve

100 g	Celery leaves (Main)
100 g	Sea salt flakes
8 leaves	Chicory
15	Onion flowers, or garlic flowers
100 g	Oil, mustard, see notes

Directions

1. Heat oven to 160C. Allow ribs to come to room temperature. Slice onions and place on the bottom of a deep roasting dish, place ribs on top. Season heavily with salt and black pepper, and rub the top of the ribs with mustard.
2. Cover the dish with foil, place in oven and cook for 75 minutes. Remove the foil, add the water, increase oven heat to 180C and cook for a further hour. Once cooked, cover the dish with foil and allow to sit for 30 minutes. Strain off the fat and reserve.
3. Peel the stringy bits from the celery, toss in canola oil and season with salt. Lay flat on a roasting tray and roast at 150C for one hour until it is evenly cooked.
4. Remove from oven, allow to cool, then cut into 1cm dice. Place in a bowl with the balsamic, sweet apple vinegar, olive oil and citric acid and season to taste. Allow to marinate for as long as possible
5. Combine celery leaves and salt in a mortar and pestle and grind to a fine pasty salt. Store in an airtight container.
6. To serve, remove the woody stems from the chicory leaves, wash in iced water and dry on paper towels. Remove ribs from the beef, cut into 80-90g portions, brush with the reserved onion/fat and warm in an 80C oven. Place chicory leaves on plates, top with beef, glaze with more apple balsamic and salt well. Top with two large tablespoons of celery vinaigrette, add wild onion flowers, drizzle with mustard oil and season the dish with the celery salt.

Notes

• Caramelised apple balsamicandSweet apple vinegar: Peter used Australian brand Lira'H available onlinelirah.com.au. Here Sabato suggest their Emiliani apple must vinegar may be a good substitute for sweet apple vinegar and Ricardo Giusti balsamic, or Caligiuri Vincotto, for the balsamic,sabato.co.nz.
• Mustard oil: Peter uses Yandilla mustard oil. Hereunclejoes.co.nzdo a good one.