Asian Braised Short Ribs with Daikon Cake

I recently had beef short ribs on the cruise I was on a couple months ago.  Was highly disappointed, but I have heard so many great things about beef short ribs.  I have been telling myself for a while now that I was going to make it at home, but never remembered to purchase when I am at the market.  

All I knew was that beef short ribs are tough piece of meat and requires a long slow process to prepare.  The other dilemma was what am I going to pair it with to make it a complete dish especially the Asian marinade that I had planned for it.  

The night before, I marinaded the short ribs and set it in the fridge.  I thought long and hard about what to pair the short ribs with.  Then something clicked in my head and it was to make the pan fried daikon cake found at most dim sum restaurants.  I luckily did have a daikon in the fridge that I needed to use and happen to have dried shrimp and Chinese sausage as well in the freezer.  

The daikon cake is a long drawn out process.  I grated the daikon and reserved the liquid and boiled it with some broth, the sausage and dried shrimp.  I let it simmer for a little while to fuse all the flavors together.  As the mixture is still hot, slowly add in the rice flour.  The mixture should be in a way, a very thick batter.  Pour into a mold and steam it for about 45 minutes it.  This needs to be done in advance prior to serving so it cools and sets.  Needless to say, I was up till about 2 AM preparing this.  

The next day after work, I began braising the beef short ribs for about 3 hours.  This was such a tease because I was starving and had to wait for it to braise.  

Once the short ribs are close to being complete, slice the daikon cake into rectangles and pan fry it until crispy on the outside.  

Between the daikon cake and short ribs, it was the perfect pairing.  Typically the daikon cake is served with soy sauce, but paired so much better with the marinade that I used to braise and then reduced to make the sauce.  The sauce was a perfect balance of salty and sweet and paired very well with the flavors of the daikon cake.  The beef short ribs turned out amazing too!  I am officially a believer in beef short ribs if done correctly!  

I could not decide which of the two plates looked better so I went ahead posted both.  I look forward to hearing some feedback on the plating!