Perfect Prime Rib With Red Wine Jus Recipe

Prime rib is and perhaps always will be the king of holiday roasts. There is nothing so primal, so celebratory, so downright majestic as a hunk of well-marbled beef, served medium rare on the bone, with a crackling, well-browned exterior.

If you've been following The Food Lab since the beginning, this won't be the first time you've heard about prime rib. Heck, I've been talking about how to reverse-sear a prime rib to maximize the tender, medium-rare interior since the dawn of The Food Lab, way back in 2009.

It's a dish that looms large in my family legend. My mother requests it at Christmas each year. I've even got a dedicated prime rib–aging fridge in my shed. Point is, I know a thing or two about beef and regularly test and retest my techniques.

Here's the good news: Despite years of intervening testing, my recommendations on how to cook the perfect prime rib have not significantly changed.

Here's the better news: I've written a step-by-step guide, which you can find below, that you can use to guarantee that your holiday centerpiece comes out perfect.

Step 1: Brown Shins or Oxtails

To make a rich red wine jus to serve with our prime rib, we start by browning three pounds of oxtails, beef shin, soup bones, or a mixture of any or all of those in a hot Dutch oven with a little bit of canola oil. Deep color is what you're going for here—it's all going to add flavor to the sauce in the end.

Step 2: Brown Mirepoix

After you brown and set aside the bones and meat, in go a large carrot, a couple of stalks of celery, and a large onion, all roughly chopped and cooked until lightly browned.

Step 3: Add Wine

A full bottle of wine goes into the pot. The best wine for a sauce like this is a dry red. I typically cook with Montepulciano d'Abruzzo, a relatively inexpensive Italian DOP red that is also great paired with food.

Step 4: Add Aromatics and Reduce

Bay leaves, parsley, and thyme round out the aromatics. Once they're added, bring the pot to a simmer and cook down the wine until it's reduced by about half. (Check here for some science on why you should reduce your wine before adding your other liquids.)

Step 5: Add Stock

In goes a full quart of chicken stock. If you have good homemade stock, that's the best option. If not, a high-quality store-bought low-sodium stock will do. I use Swanson or Kirkland organic if I need to go with store-bought. Dissolving a couple of packets of gelatin on the surface of the stock before adding it to the pot will improve the finished texture of the sauce if you're using store-bought.

Step 6: Season Prime Rib

Generously season a bone-in standing rib roast (a.k.a. prime rib) with plenty of kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper. You want to get it on all sides.

Step 7: Prepare the Roasting Pan

Place the seared bones/oxtails/shins in the bottom of a roasting pan. (There's no need for an expensive one—I explain why you don't need an expensive roasting pan here.) Then pour all of the liquid on top of them, along with the vegetables. Set a V-rack directly on top of the vegetables and liquid.

Step 8: Place Beef in Pan

Place the beef in the roasting pan with the bone facing down and the fat cap facing up.

Step 9: Roast

Place the pan in an oven set to 250°F (120°C). Slow roasting at a very low temperature is the key to meat that is perfectly evenly cooked from edge to edge, with a very tender interior texture.

Step 10: Use a Thermometer!

At this low temperature, the average prime rib roast will take four to five hours to reach medium rare (130°F (54°F) internal temperature). The only way to tell when a prime rib is done is to use a thermometer. A leave-in probe is a good early warning system (set it for about five degrees below your target final temperature), but you should always use an accurate instant-read thermometer and test for final doneness in multiple locations to make sure there aren't any especially cool spots hiding out.

Step 11: Rest the Meat

Tent the roast lightly with aluminum foil (it may still appear quite pale on the exterior at this point—that's okay), then transfer the oxtails and/or shins to a medium saucepan.

Step 12: Strain the Liquid and Finish the Jus

Strain the liquid through a fine-mesh strainer into the saucepan. Simmer the shins/oxtails in the jus on the stovetop until the meat is tender enough to easily shred off the bones. This should take about 20 to 30 minutes. Remove the meat and bones from the pot (that shredded meat makes for a great appetizer or side dish when spread onto toast), season the jus to taste with salt and pepper, and whisk in four tablespoons of butter off-heat.

Step 13: Brown the Beef

When you're about ten minutes away from serving, return the beef to the cleaned-out roasting pan and blast it in an oven set at the highest possible temperature (that's 500 to 550°F (260-290°C) for most home ovens—use convection if you've got it) until the exterior is browned and crisp. This should take between six and 10 minutes. Once browned, the beef is ready to carve and serve.

Step 14: Remove Bones

To carve the beef, start by removing the bones with a sharp knife, lifting the beef with one hand and following the contours of the bones with your knife.

With the bones removed, the beef should be ready to slice.

Step 15: Slice and Serve

Slice the beef thinly and serve it with the jus. I like to sprinkle each slice with a little coarse sea salt to ensure that it's seasoned throughout.