Meaning
A rich, slow-braised stew of beef tail, simmered for hours until the meat falls off the bone, in a deep brown gravy with butter beans, browning, thyme, scotch bonnet, and flour dumplings ('spinners'). One of the best-loved and most prized of all Jamaican dishes, oxtail is a Sunday-dinner and special-occasion centrepiece, its long cooking turning a humble, gelatinous cut meltingly tender and full of flavour. Served over rice and peas, it is comfort food of the highest order.
Examples
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Wi cook oxtail wid butter beans fi Sunday.
We cooked oxtail with butter beans for Sunday.
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Di oxtail tender an fall off di bone.
The oxtail is tender and falls off the bone.
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Oxtail an rice a di best.
Oxtail and rice is the best.
Origin
From English 'oxtail' (the tail of cattle); once a cheap cut, it became a treasured centrepiece of Jamaican cooking.
How it’s used
A hearty, prized dish, slow-cooked for hours. The butter beans and spinners are near-essential companions.