Drinks advice

Oxtail soup with Wenneker Oude Jenever

On the plates is a clear oxtail soup, skimmed four times, with winter carrot, leek, clove, bay leaf, thyme and madeira, with the picked meat returned to the broth and parsley over the top. Set against it is an old jenever from a family business in Schiedam that began in 1693, which meets the caramelised meat and the madeira with grain sweetness.

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Oxtail soup
Photo: Raimond Spekking, CC BY-SA 4.0

From the shelf

The bottle

Wenneker Oude Jenever is an old jenever of 36% vol in a 100 cl bottle. Wenneker Distilleries was founded in 1693 and is still a family business. The description gives no precise malt wine share or ageing time, and we therefore do not state them. For the designation old jenever, the law requires at least 35% vol and at least 15% of the alcohol from malt wine, with at most 20 grams of sugar per litre; at 36% vol this bottle is above the minimum.

Wenneker Oude Jenever

The combination

Why this works together

Oxtail soup is four hours of patience in a bowl: the connective tissue melts into gelatine, the broth turns thick on the tongue and the seared meat gives off a roasted, almost caramel-like depth. The madeira in the recipe adds an aged, nutty sweetness to that. A young jenever has nothing to set against this and would disappear into such a bowl as cold alcohol. An old jenever, with its malt wine, has exactly the grain-sweet, slightly nutty roundness that the madeira in the soup already announces, and the juniper and spiciness meet the clove and the bay leaf in the pot. The alcohol also works on the gelatine and leaves the mouth clear again after every spoonful. That turns a long soup with a small glass alongside into a course rather than a heavy start.

At the table

The dish

  • For 4 people
  • Ready in 30 minutes, plus 4 hours and 40 minutes on the heat
  • Type starter

What you need

  • 1 kg oxtail from the butcher
  • 1 tablespoon mild olive oil
  • 1 winter carrot
  • 1 onion
  • 4 whole cloves
  • 1 leek
  • 2 cloves garlic
  • 2 dried bay leaves
  • 6 sprigs of fresh thyme
  • 1.5 litres beef stock
  • 100 ml Madeira
  • 5 g fresh parsley
  • a slotted spoon and a clean kitchen towel

How to make it

  1. Sprinkle the oxtail with pepper and salt. Heat the oil in a soup pot and brown the oxtail all over for 10 minutes over medium heat.
  2. Meanwhile cut the carrot into pieces, make four incisions in the onion and stick the cloves into them. Wash the leek and cut it into pieces of 2 cm. Take the oxtail out of the pan.
  3. Halve the garlic cloves. Fry the carrot, the onion, the leek, the garlic, the bay leaf and the thyme for 10 minutes over low heat in the fat left behind, stirring regularly.
  4. Put the oxtail back, pour in the broth and the madeira and bring everything to the boil. Turn the heat low, put the lid on the pan at an angle and let the soup draw for 4 hours. In the meantime regularly skim fat and foam off the top.
  5. Take the meat out of the pan. Strain the soup through a colander into a second pan. Rinse out the tea towel, lay it in the sieve and strain the soup once more.
  6. Pluck the meat from the bones and discard the hard fat and connective tissue. Put the meat back in the soup and heat everything through.
  7. Roughly chop the parsley and sprinkle it over the plates.

In the glass

Serving

Serve the Wenneker at room temperature in a tulip glass, filled to the brim. Beside a hot soup, cold jenever is the wrong combination: the tongue jumps from hot to cold and you taste neither. At about 18 °C the jenever sits closer to the soup and the malt wine and juniper come out. Stick to one small glass beside the plate.

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Wij verkopen geen alcohol aan personen onder de 18 jaar. NIX18