Beef Short Ribs: Threat Or Menace?
For the thirteenth or fourteenth time this year, a restaurant planning a dinner for the Eat Club has proposed beef short ribs as the entree. And for the as-manyeth time, I told the chef to think of something better.
Can anyone distinguish short ribs (even Kobe beef short ribs, whose pedigree is often used as a selling point for these near-scraps) from the kind of beef you'd cook for a long time and then spoon (you can't slice them) onto French bread for a poor boy? They'd be good for that. But not acceptable as an entree in a big-deal dinner.
That is my opinion, anyway. My wife loves the things. But she also thinks macaroni and cheese is beyond reproach. (I have a feeling this may kick up a fuss, but that's my job.)
My theory is that some meat purveyor out there has been selling short ribs very assiduously to every restaurant in town. That's why so many of them are running it.
Why? Because the markup on short ribs is a lot higher than that of a straight steak. I suspect the purveyor makes most of the money, but the restaurants probably do well, too--given that a steak sometime carries as high as fifty percent food cost. Based on menu prices I see for short ribs, my guess is that its food cost percentage (the price paid for it divided by the menu price) is down in the twenties, and maybe the teens. (I will here short-circuit the inevitable response from somebody out there pointing out that there are many other expenses a restaurant carries other than the food cost by saying, yes, I know--but food cost is still an important index.)
The funniest part of all is that all the chefs serving short ribs--all 134 of them--indicate that this amounts to hipness and innovation.
Short ribs--bah. You may have all of mine.
Other perspectives are invited and will be respected, as long as they stay away from my plate. Please post your thoughts, and read those of others, on our .