All you need to know about … Beef cheeks
Beef cheeks frequently feature on restaurant menus and are prized for their rich and full flavour and meltingly tender texture but they’re not a cut that home cooks often use. If you would like to add something new to your cooking repertoire then they are definitely worth trying.
What cut are they?
Beef cheeks, unsurprisingly, come from the facial cheek muscles of the animal. As they come from a working muscle they are tough cut that needs proper cooking to get great results.
So how do I cook them?
Really the only way to cook them is slow-cooking. This will ensure that they achieve the desired melt-in-your-mouth texture. Beef cheeks absorb the flavours of the liquid they are cooked in, resulting in a flavoursome meat with a texture that melts in your mouth like butter.
Tips for buying
When you buy beef cheeks they will be trimmed. Each cheek usually weighs around 300-400 grams but during cooking you will find that they shrink to about 200 to 300 grams. If buying for four people we recommend purchasing 1 kilogram of beef cheeks, this will leave you with a cooked weight of approximately 150g of meat per person.
