I braised beef cheek birria 3 times over 3 days

I'm mostly a griller, smoker, fryer, and instant pot/ pressure cooker user. I generally don't braise or bake things in the oven. However, for this batch of beef cheek birria, I wanted to verify the outer crust on meat that comes with oven braising instead of instant pot pressure cooking.

However, because I genuinely can't remember the last time I manually braised something, I basically guess worked it on intuition. Which did not work out.

Sliced and cubed into 1-in pieces, then fried for a sear. The final half pound was thrown in raw for a a textural difference lol yeah nah I was just lazy and sick of the smoke after five batches.

Added the birria marinade (Chiles and beef-lamb bone broth), covered with foil, then baked @300 for 3 hours, thinking that's enough time to break down such small pieces.

It wasn't. I already ate my OMAD so this rested in the oven overnight. The next morning, I popped the foil and took a look at the slightly browned stew then started poking around. Around 1 out of five of the meats were some semblance of tender and braise edible, the rest were still chewy. So I threw it back in the oven at $300 for another 2 hours to break down some more.

After 2 hours, I checked on it, and progress was made. While not fork tender or pot roast tender or Crock-Pot tender, all of the pieces could be chewed and swallowed with complaint from me. It was slightly chewy but edible and enjoyable. Plus I was hungry. After taking two bites and realizing it needs more time, I threw it back in the oven for another hour, then turned it off for another overnight rest because I decided to eat something else. This is where slight anxiety about overcooking and if I actually manage to overshoot the breakdown window started coming into play and second guessing myself on whether the meat was just undercooked and tough or overcooked and dry (not to flex, but I haven't had dry / overcooked meat in years and have trouble recognizing it.)

Day 3 it came together. I assessed the chew from last night's work and it was still there. However, I could tell that it was noticeably more tender across the board and needed that final push. Normally my birria is able to be squished in between fingers break apart easily, but only one out of five pieces achieved this at this point. So I started one last run in the oven for 2 hours. Pulling it out. Opening it up. Seeing that dark brown crust on all of the meats was definitely a hype moment. Picking up a random piece, even before squeezing fully I knew it was going to fall apart easily.

All in all, this was an experimentation and learning experience. I learned that you can interrupt and resume the braising/ collagen breakdown process successfully, and that a long continuous cook is not a requirement. I will be utilizing this information in a mindset shift about caring less about maintaining temperature in smoking and barbecue, and more about just getting it to the end probe tender result. I also learned that steam braising does produce a very noticeable bark that comes out through the steaming, and I realize I have been underrating oven cooking in comparison to the ease of the instant pot pressure cooking.