Zest for life

Inject some freshness into your winter dishes with a squeeze of juice, a sprinkling of grated peel, or a slice of bright citrus. Here's how to make use of those oranges, lemons and limes in your kitchen.

- JOHANÉ NEILSON

Oxtail stew with gluhwein flavours

Serves 6

Preparation time 30 minutes

Cooking time 3 hours

You need

• 2 kg oxtail, excess fat removed

• salt and freshly ground black pepper

• oil, for shallow frying

• 12 small pickling onions, peeled and halved

• 3 cloves of garlic, roughly chopped

• 500 ml red wine

• 1 cinnamon stick

• 3 whole cloves

• 3 allspice berries, bruised

• 1 tin (410g) chopped tomatoes

• 1 cup meat stock

• juice and peel of 1 orange

• 3 bay leaves

• 2 tablespoons flour

Here's how

1 Preheat the oven to 160°C. Season the meat with salt and black pepper. Heat the oil in an ovenproof pot and fry the meat until golden brown. (If the oxtail has a lot of fat, use that instead of adding extra oil.) Once the meat is seared, remove it from the pot but retain 1 tablespoon of fat. Fry the onions and garlic for a few minutes until glossy. Stir in the red wine and scrape any browned pieces from the bottom of the pot. Close the lid and cook for 5 minutes.

2 Return the meat to the pot and add the spices, tomatoes, stock, orange peel and juice, and bay leaves. Close the lid and cook for about 3 hours in the oven or until the meat is tender.