Thanks Thomas Keller for the fattening sandwich I cant get enough of....

My boyfriend listens.  He listens when I think I'm just talking out loud to myself.  He must have an awesome memory or makes mental notes when I say in passing I want something.  He's rad. For Christmas, he bought me both Thomas Keller's cookbooks that I probably mentioned I wanted at some point at some time who knows when.  They are big, beautiful and really easy to follow.  Now there are certain things I am scared of making, scared of fucking up, scared of failing at so badly.....one of them is oxtail.  I love to eat it, oxtail marmalade with bone marrow, oxtail ravioli, oxtail enchiladas etc....but it just looks weird and I don't know what to do with it.  It is a tail after all....Thomas Keller, however makes it sound so easy.  "Oh, I'll give this a try and see if I suck at cooking." I casually mentioned to the boyfriend to pick me up some oxtail after work, but I was keeping my mission secret.  So yesterday, I opened the big beautiful cookbook and went to work on the oxtail.
Season them. Check. Brown on all sides in oil for about 5 min. Check. Place in a covered pot with beef stock ( I only had chicken stock) coming halfway up and cook for 2 1/2 to three hours. Check. EASY. After about 50 minutes I noticed some smoke and pulled out the pot.  Thomas Keller lied to me and told me to put them in a 400 degree oven. He neglected to tell me to turn the oven DOWN. Sooooo, most of the liquid was gone and the bottom of the pot was burning.  I decided to save it since the oxtails themselves weren't burning.  I added some water and some rosemary sprigs since I was out of stock.  Put the lid back on and placed in back in the oven, at 200 degrees this time.  I let them cook for another hour and a half then let them rest.  I let them rest a while.  About an hour.  I was scared to see what was in the pot.  It was probably awful. Finally, I took off the lid and pulled out beautiful little oxtails falling off the (tail) bone.

TK instructs to pull off the meat discarding the fat and membrane-y type stuff.  You don't get a ton of meat but what you do get is tender and oh so flavorful.

You can basically do whatever you want with this glorious meat.  Add it to pasta, tacos, make a stew, eat it as is with some veg....I was going to make a sandwich TK calls  "Oxtail and Mushroom Tartine" .  I had to sautee some mushrooms until brown with shallots ( I didn't have a shallot on hand but I did add some dried thyme) .

Drizzle some bread with olive oil and toast or gill it, add all ingredients and voila, oxtail and mushroom tartine!  I however, took it a step further and added a bazillion more calories.  After the mushrooms were done sauteeing, I added a splash of heavy cream and a drizzle of truffle oil.

 I then assembled the sandwich and topped it off with some parsley........

To quote my mom-mom, "Jesus, Mary and Joseph" this sandwich was ridic.  Thomas Keller is brilliant but I think I might have added a little something to it (the mushroom toast at my work inspired me) .  So if the occasion calls for fancy, delicious, fattening sandwiches....make these.