Flanken substitute

Best substitute

English-cut short ribs

Use the same amount by weight as the flanken you are replacing

Best for beef soup

Close match

Any short rib is the right meat, so English-cut short ribs work weight for weight, they just need an extra 30 to 60 minutes because each piece is much thicker. Cross-cut beef shank is the best alternative cut, since it brings bone, marrow and collagen in the same cross-section shape. If there is no bone-in beef at all, cubed chuck roast works at 1:1 but the broth will lack body, so add a marrow bone or a teaspoon of gelatin per cup of liquid. The easiest place to find genuine flanken outside a kosher butcher is a Korean grocery, where the identical cut is sold thin-sliced as LA galbi.

Other flanken substitutes

Ranked, with the exact amount to use

2Cross-cut beef shank (osso buco cut)
Different texture
Use the same amount by weight
Rounds of beef shin, each with a marrow bone in the middle and a collar of very collagen-rich meat.
What changes
Cheap and widely available.
Best for
beef soup, cholent, stock, pho, braises
The broth this makes is arguably better than flanken's, deep and glossy from all the collagen and marrow. The meat is leaner and stringier, shredding into fibers rather than staying in tender slabs, and there is less fat, so a soup made with shank tastes cleaner and less rich. Excellent value and the closest thing in shape.
3Beef chuck roast, cut in 2-inch cubes
Different texture
Use the same amount by weight, plus 1 marrow bone or 1 teaspoon gelatin per cup of liquid
The standard braising cut, well marbled and full of connective tissue but with no bone at all.
What changes
Best for
cholent, stews, beef soup, braises, goulash
The meat becomes beautifully tender in about the same time and tastes properly beefy. The gap is body: with no bone, the broth stays thin and does not coat your lip the way a flanken broth does. Add a marrow bone, a knuckle bone or a teaspoon of unflavored gelatin per cup of liquid and it comes very close. Also nothing to gnaw on, which for some people is the whole appeal of flanken.
4Beef brisket, second cut or point
Different texture
Use the same amount by weight
The fatty end of the brisket, laced with connective tissue and available at every kosher butcher.
What changes
Best for
cholent, beef soup, braises, Shabbat main
Rich and fatty with excellent flavor, and it slices neatly rather than falling into strips. No bone, so again the broth has less body. Brisket also cooks slightly faster and can go from tender to dry if the liquid runs low, whereas the bone and fat in flanken protect it. Skim the fat before serving.
5Oxtail
Close match
Use the same amount by weight, buying generously
Cross-sections of tail, each a ring of collagen and fat around a bone.
What changes
Structurally the closest thing on this list to flanken.
Best for
beef soup, cholent, stock, braises
This makes the richest, most gelatinous broth of any option, noticeably glossier than flanken gives, and the flavor is deeper and slightly sweeter. Two drawbacks: it costs considerably more per pound and about a third of the weight is bone, so buy roughly a third more than the recipe's flanken weight. It also needs a full three hours.
6Korean LA galbi (thin cross-cut short rib)
Different texture
Use the same amount by weight
This is genuinely the same cut, cross-cut short rib, sold thin-sliced at almost any Korean or pan-Asian grocery, usually frozen.
What changes
Best for
quick braises, grilling, soup where thin strips are fine, when no kosher butcher is nearby
It is flanken, just thinner, typically a quarter to a half inch instead of an inch or two. That means it cooks in 60 to 90 minutes rather than three hours, and it will overcook into stringiness if you treat it like a long braise. Check for marinade on the package, since much of it is sold pre-marinated in soy, pear and garlic, which will change your soup completely. Buy plain if you can.
7Beef plate or navel short ribs, or bone-in beef spare ribs
Close match
Use the same amount by weight
The same rib region from further back on the animal, sold at most non-kosher butcher counters and often labeled simply beef ribs.
What changes
Best for
cholent, braises, soup, barbecue-style dishes
Very close in flavor and texture, generally fattier than chuck-end short ribs, which makes the pot richer and means more skimming. Ask the butcher to cut them across the bones and you have flanken in all but name. Bone-in beef back ribs are the one rib cut to avoid here, since they are mostly bone with very little meat.
8Lamb neck or lamb shoulder chops
Different taste
Use the same amount by weight
Cross-cut bone-in lamb, which behaves in a pot exactly the way flanken does: bone, collagen, fat and meat that shreds.
What changes
Best for
stews, soups, braises, cholent
The cooking behavior is right and the flavor is unmistakably lamb, sweeter and more mineral, which will redirect the whole dish. In a barley or bean stew this is a genuine pleasure. In a traditional Ashkenazi beef soup it will taste wrong to anyone expecting beef.

What is Flanken?

Flanken is Flanken, also called flanken ribs or flanken-cut short ribs, is not a different animal part but the same beef short rib sawn across the bones into strips an inch or two thick, so each piece shows three or four small bone cross-sections instead of one long bone.

Cooking tips

The words to use at the counter are cross-cut short ribs or short ribs cut flanken style. Plenty of butchers do not know the word flanken, and almost all of them know cross-cut. If they only have English-cut in the case, they can usually run it back through the saw for you.
Cross-cut is not just a shape, it changes the cooking. All those exposed bone ends and severed muscle fibers mean gelatin and marrow leach out faster, so flanken gives a bodied broth in about two and a half hours where an English-cut rib wants three and a half. Adjust your timing whenever you switch.
Brown the meat hard before it goes in the pot for a stew or cholent, and skip browning entirely for a clear Jewish beef soup. Browned bits cloud a broth you want golden and clean, which is why traditional soup recipes tell you to blanch the meat and dump that first water instead.
Chill the pot overnight if you can. The fat sets into a solid cap you can lift off in one piece, which matters a lot with flanken because cross-cut short rib is a fatty cut and an unskimmed soup is greasy.
Flanken is a kosher-butchery term because the forequarter of the animal is what is used in kosher beef, and cutting short ribs across the bone is how that region is traditionally portioned. That is why the word turns up on kosher labels and rarely in a supermarket case, and why a Korean grocery, which sells the same cut for grilling, is often the easiest source.

Frequently asked questions

What is the difference between flanken and English-cut short ribs?

The same meat cut in two directions. English-cut runs parallel to the bone, giving one thick block of meat on a single bone. Flanken runs across the bones, giving a strip with three or four bone cross-sections. Flanken cooks faster and releases gelatin more quickly because more bone and more muscle ends are exposed; English-cut needs 30 to 60 minutes longer.

What is the best substitute for flanken?

English-cut short ribs, weight for weight, cooked longer. It is the identical cut. If your butcher has none, cross-cut beef shank is the closest alternative because it is also cross-cut and full of marrow and collagen, and it costs less.

Can I use boneless beef instead of flanken?

Yes for the meat, no for the broth. Cubed chuck roast or brisket becomes just as tender, but without bone the liquid stays thin instead of turning silky. Throw in a marrow or knuckle bone if you have one, or stir a teaspoon of unflavored gelatin into each cup of finished broth to make up the body.

Where can I buy flanken if there is no kosher butcher nearby?

A Korean grocery. The cut sold as LA galbi is cross-cut short rib, which is flanken, usually thin-sliced and frozen. Buy the unmarinated version, and remember that thin slices cook in about half the time. Any butcher will also cut English-cut short ribs across the bone for you if you ask.

Can I just leave the flanken out of my soup or cholent?

You can, but you lose most of what makes the pot taste like anything. Flanken contributes the beef flavor, the fat and the gelatin all at once. If you are going meatless, build body with plenty of barley and beans, a generous amount of browned onion and a spoon of tomato paste, and accept that it is a different dish rather than a substitution.

Related substitutes

More meat & protein substitutes

Flanken substitute

Other flanken substitutes

2Cross-cut beef shank (osso buco cut)

3Beef chuck roast, cut in 2-inch cubes

4Beef brisket, second cut or point

5Oxtail

6Korean LA galbi (thin cross-cut short rib)

7Beef plate or navel short ribs, or bone-in beef spare ribs

8Lamb neck or lamb shoulder chops