Oxtail Is Gaining Fans. Not Everyone Is Happy About That.

When the chef Lerone Mullin opened the Jerk Grill, his fast-casual restaurant in Redlands, Calif., in 2021, customers told him they loved his Caribbean classics, like brown stew chicken, and his Caribbean-Mexican mash-ups, like a jerk chicken burrito. But they asked for one addition.

“Everybody just wanted oxtail,” he said, adding, “I didn’t even know it was that popular.”

So, inspired by smash burgers, Mr. Mullin created a version that spoke to his Jamaican roots: a burger griddled with sliced onions, topped with a portion of stewed oxtail meat, American cheese and aioli on a toasted hamburger bun.

“It’s taken on a life of its own,” he said.

Long a featured ingredient in soups, stews, pastas and braises across the world and in the American South, oxtail was often overlooked in the United States, where it was considered merely a meat byproduct. Now, the cut, stewed until tender, shreddable and unctuous, in the Jamaican-style preparation, is becoming a more common sight on American menus and in food-focused social media posts.

“Two years ago, I saw oxtail moving in the same direction as matcha or kale and becoming really popular,” said the chef Osei Blackett, the owner of the Everything Oxtail food stalls.Credit…Kelsey Cherry for The New York Times

There are the viral oxtail-topped slices of pizza at Cuts & Slices in New York City. In Baltimore, Waiting to Oxtail puts the tender meat into a number of dishes, including birria tacos and chopped cheese. At Crav’n Caribbean in North Carolina, an “oxtail cheesesteak” sub is a signature menu item. Even vegans can’t resist the siren call of a plate: Voxtail, 12 ounces of plant-based oxtail, can be ordered online and shipped for $22. (Gravy, sold separately, is $9.)

“Two years ago, I saw oxtail moving in the same direction as matcha or kale and becoming really popular,” said the chef Osei Blackett, the owner of the Everything Oxtail stalls at Smorgasburg in Brooklyn. The chef, known as Picky, estimates that he buys 300 to 400 pounds of oxtail a week for his empanadas and a burrito made with Trinidadian-style roti. “People are always excited when they see my menu of all oxtail,” he said.