Slow Cooker Asian-Style Beef Short Ribs

Why This Slow Cooker Asian-Style Beef Short Ribs Works

During the long, low cook, the short ribs sit in the soy sauce mixture and slowly soak it up. The meat has a lot of tough connective tissue, and over 8 hours that tissue breaks down and softens. Instead of staying chewy, the ribs become very tender and start to fall off the bone, but they don’t dry out because they are sitting in liquid the whole time.

As the hours go by, the brown sugar, soy sauce, garlic, ginger, and sesame oil spread through the cooking liquid and into the meat. The fat from the ribs melts and mixes into the sauce, so the sauce becomes richer and coats the ribs better.

Once the ribs come out, the cornstarch slurry goes into the hot liquid. With the slow cooker on high, the cornstarch swells and thickens the sauce. After a short time, the thin cooking liquid turns into a glossy, clingy sauce that sticks to the ribs instead of running off, so every bite is covered.

Mistakes To Avoid

Letting the ribs cook on high instead of low for the full time often makes the outside stringy while the inside stays a bit tough. The meat doesn’t slowly break down, so it never reaches that fall-apart stage and can feel chewy and dry around the edges.

Crowding the slow cooker with ribs stacked tightly in one big pile keeps the sauce from reaching everything. The top pieces sit half exposed, so they cook unevenly and end up less tender and less coated, while the bottom ones can turn mushy.

Pouring off or thinning the cooking liquid before adding the cornstarch slurry leaves the sauce weak and watery. With less starch to work on, the liquid never really thickens and just runs off the ribs instead of clinging to them.

Skipping the cornstarch slurry step and serving the sauce straight from the slow cooker means the liquid stays thin and soupy. It slides across the plate, so the ribs taste sauced in spots and bare in others instead of being wrapped in a glossy coating.