Jamaican Oxtails Recipe

This Jamaican Oxtails Recipe is fall off the bone tender and full of amazing flavor. It can be made in about an hour with your pressure cooker or cook it low and slow in a slow cooker.

 

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The full recipe with ingredients/instructions is available on the recipe card at the bottom of the post. Important tips/tricks are also included in the blog post.

If you ever ask me what my favorite Jamaican dish is, I’ll probably say oxtail. It’s a recipe that my mom would make for special occasions. I wish we could have eaten it weekly, but oxtail can be so darn expensive. So it became one of those special Sunday dinners or “let’s celebrate something” dinners. 

Oxtails usually take hours to cook. But wow, the flavor and the tenderness the oxtail brings are worth it. Lucky for me, I’m a pressure cooking fanatic and found that using a pressure cooker cuts the time of cooking oxtail by a ton.  For this recipe, you can use a pressure cooker or even a slow cooker.

Ingredients Needed

Ingredient amounts and full recipe instructions are on the printable recipe card at the bottom of the post.

• Oxtail - Choose beef oxtail that is medium in size and of similar size. Try and choose oxtail pieces that do not have too much fat on them.
• Marinade Ingredients - Brown sugar, soy sauce, Worcestershire Sauce, salt, garlic powder, black pepper, allspice.
• Other Ingredients - vegetable oil, yellow onion, green onion, garlic, carrots, scotch bonnet pepper (or habanero), beef broth, thyme, cornstarch, water, butterbeans

How to Make Jamaican Oxtails and Gravy

First, I mise en place my ingredients by chopping my onions, garlic, and scotch bonnet or habanero pepper. Make sure to remove the seeds and membrane from the hot pepper, or your oxtail will be too spicy. 

Then prepare your oxtails by cleaning them with a little bit of water and vinegar, and then dry them off with some paper towels. I know I know, they say not to wash your meat but my mom would literally cuss me out if I didn’t. So I do. 

Next, season your oxtails with brown sugar, salt, black pepper, garlic powder, allspice, soy sauce, Worcestershire sauce, and browning. Use your hands and mix, ensuring that your oxtail pieces are fully covered. 

Now you can decide at this point if you feel like marinating or not. If I’m pressure cooking or slow cooking, I usually skip this step, and the flavor is still pretty amazing. If you choose to marinate, marinate in the fridge for 8 hours or overnight. 

Pressure Cooking Instructions

Turn the pressure cooker on the “high sauté” setting. If using an Instant Pot, select “Sauté and press the “+” button until it is the “more” setting. Once your Pressure Cooker is “Hot”, add your vegetable oil to the pot. 

Next, add your larger oxtail pieces to the pot, flat side down about ¼ inch apart, and brown on each side for about 2 minutes. Make sure you’re watching the oxtails at this browning stage, as you don’t want to burn the oxtail. If you do, your oxtail gravy will taste bitter later on. 

You can choose to brown all your pieces of oxtails but I usually only brown the larger pieces of the oxtail. The smaller pieces usually don’t need browning. 

Once you’ve browned your oxtail, deglaze your pressure cooker by adding about 2 Tablespoons of beef broth to the insert. Take a wooden spoon and deglaze your pot by removing the brown bits at the bottom. Then add your yellow onions, green onions, carrots, garlic, and scotch bonnet pepper. Stir and sauté for about 5 minutes or until the onions have softened. 

Add dried thyme, oxtails (and the liquid from the marinade), remaining beef broth, and ketchup to the pressure cooker insert. All the broth will not cover the oxtail. You don’t need it to. 

Press “Cancel” on your pressure cooker. Cover with lid, making sure the valve is set to “Seal.” Set your pressure cooker to cook on High Pressure for 45 minutes. 

Once your timer goes off, allow the pressure cooker to naturally release. All this means is that you don’t touch it. If you’re like me, you may anxiously stare at the pressure cooker waiting for your oxtail goodness. After about 25 minutes, all of your pressure should have been released. Double-check by making sure that the pin button has dropped or switch the valve to “Venting” to ensure all the pressure has been released. Press “Cancel” on the pressure cooker and then open the lid. 

Remove the oxtail pieces and vegetables from the Pressure Cooker and place in a bowl and set aside. I use a spider strainer for this step.

Then press the “Sauté button on your pressure cooker.

Once your liquid starts to boil, make a cornstarch slurry by whisking the cornstarch with water in a separate bowl. Slowly stir in the slurry into the pressure cooker. Add drained butter beans to the pressure cooker as well and stir them in. Cook for about 5 minutes until the sauce has thickened a little and the butter beans are warmed.

Return oxtails and vegetables to the pressure cooker. Serve and enjoy.

Notes on Pressure Cooker Oxtails

• It’s best if all your oxtails are medium sized oxtails that are similar in size. If you can’t get them the same size, no worries. It’ll still work. 
• Oxtail that is too fatty will lead to fatty gravy. You want some fat, just not too much fat. If your oxtail is extremely fatty, use a paring knife to remove some of the excess fat. 
• Scotch Bonnet is typically used for this recipe. If you can’t find a scotch bonnet, a habanero can be substituted. You could also use about 1-2 teaspoons of this scotch bonnet pepper sauce. 

Looking for recipes to serve this Jamaican Oxtails with? Try these out:

• Jamaican Rice and Peas (Pressure Cooker Recipe)
• Jamaican Rum Punch
• Sauteéd Jamaican Cabbage

Other popular Jamaican recipes:

• Jamaican Curry Chicken
• Brown Stew Chicken
• Curry Goat

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If you've made this oxtail recipe or any other recipe on the blog, I'd love to hear your thoughts! Please leave a comment below. Your feedback is always appreciated!