French Provincial Cooking (89 page)

Before serving ladle off some of the excess liquid, and let the meat stand a few minutes before carving. Enough for eight people. Veal cooked by this method but without the potatoes is also excellent cold.

For four
médaillons
(see page 370) peel 16 very small pickling onions; cook these gently in a frying-pan in a mixture of 1 oz. of butter and a little olive oil to prevent burning. When golden, remove the onions and keep warm. Slightly flatten out the
médaillons,
season with salt and pepper; brown them lightly on both sides in the butter from the onions. Pour a good glass of white wine into the pan, let it bubble a few moments, turn the flame low; return the onions to the pan with the meat, add 4 oz. diced lean cooked ham. Cover the pan and simmer very gently about 20 minutes. Serve on a hot dish, with the sauce from the pan poured round. Enough for four. These little cuts of veal (shown in the drawing on page 368) are, in kitchen terms, alternatively called
noisettes
; when flattened out to an oval shape and
piquéd
all over with pork lard to resemble a miniature
fricandeau
they become
grenadins.

Paupiettes, or
alouettes sans tête,
are to be found everywhere in France and, indeed, in Belgium and Italy as well, but every cook has a different recipe for them.

They are primarily designed to use up small quantities of cooked meat which go into the stuffing, although this does not by any means imply a makeshift dish; with good veal and a nicely blended and seasoned stuffing they often make a ‘speciality of the house’ in France, and at restaurants there is a great demand for them when the
patron’s
recipe is known to be a good one.

For this particular version the ingredients are 6 slices of veal cut as for small escalopes, beaten out thin, and weighing between 2 and 3 oz. each. For the stuffing about 2 oz. of unsmoked bacon and the same quantity of cold boiled beef or chicken or a mixture of both, parsley, a small clove of garlic or a shallot, 2 tablespoons of fine breadcrumbs, 1 egg, seasoning, a few drops of cognac if possible. To cook the paupiettes, 1 oz. of butter, a small glass of red or white wine, a small onion, a little stock or broth.

Chop all the ingredients for the stuffing quite small (mincing them makes too close-textured a mixture), season with salt and pepper, add the breadcrumbs, the beaten egg and the cognac. There should be enough stuffing to fill a teacup, closely packed. Spread the veal slices out flat; season them with salt, pepper and lemon juice. Divide the stuffing into six portions and put one on each slice of veal. Roll them up, tuck in the ends to prevent the stuffing escaping, tie each round with two circles of string. In a sauté pan melt the butter, put in the finely-sliced onion; as soon as it turns very pale yellow put in the paupiettes; leave them over a moderate flame a minute or two; pour over the wine, let it bubble, then add the stock. Transfer the dish to the oven, and cook gently, uncovered, for just under an hour, Gas No. 3, 330 deg. F. The sauce should be fairly reduced and does not need any thickening. Simply transfer the paupiettes, minus their string, to a heated serving dish and pour the sauce over them; add a very little chopped parsley. Enough for three.

The same dish can be made with beef (very thin slices of topside or skirt steak) and, of course, the stuffing can be varied according to what is available, but don’t resort to sausage meat, which makes too heavy a stuffing. If you like, a very light purée of potatoes can go with the
paupiettes,
or triangles of fried bread.

The preliminary preparation of onions in butter which forms the basis of the sauce is, I think, particular to this recipe from a Bourbonnais cook.

For a piece of breast of veal weighing about 4 lb. before boning, the ingredients for the stuffing are
lb. of minced lean pork, a thick slice of white bread without the crust, a little milk, 8 to 10 stoned black olives, a big bunch of parsley, a clove or two of garlic, basil, pepper, nutmeg and 1 egg. Other ingredients are an onion, 2 tomatoes, 1 teacup each of white wine and water or alternatively 2 teacups of good meat broth, a little olive oil.

Soak the bread in milk until it is soft, then squeeze it dry. Chop it together with the garlic and parsley and a leaf or two of basil, either fresh or dried; add the minced pork and the roughly-chopped black olives. Season with freshly-milled pepper and grated nutmeg. Add the well-beaten egg. Spread this stuffing over the boned and flattened out breast of veal. Roll it up into a large sausage and tie securely.

Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a wide shallow pan or baking dish. In this cook the sliced onion until it is pale yellow, adding some sliced garlic if you like. Put in the meat and let it brown very lightly. Add the skinned and chopped tomatoes. Pour over the wine and let it reduce a little. Add the water, a little salt and the bones from the meat. Cover with oiled paper or foil, and the lid. Transfer to a low oven, Gas No. 3, 330 deg. F., and cook for about 3 hours.

Personally, I think this dish is best eaten cold, and is certainly more economical that way. Cut in the finest possible slices and served with a salad it should be enough for three meals for four people. The sauce should be strained and left to set to a jelly. Remove the fat from the top and put the chopped jelly round the meat. This dish should not cost more than ten shillings,
¹
including the wine and the ingredients for the stuffing, and provides a good demonstration of how a little extra trouble with a cheap cut of meat is amply repaid.

The Marengo fashion of cooking veal calls for ingredients and methods very similar to those of the famous Milanese
ossi buchi
. Allow two tendrons, or
côtelettes parisiennes;
cut as explained on page 370 (they are also shown, in the dish, in the drawing on page 368), weighing about 6 oz. each, for each person. A sliced onion and a clove of garlic are first gently cooked in 2 tablespoons of olive oil, then removed while the meat is browned on each side. For four tendrons a coffee-cupful of white wine and 2 tablespoons of stock are then added, plus 1 lb. of tomatoes chopped but unskinned, the onion and garlic returned to the pan, seasonings and a bouquet put in, the pan covered and the whole cooked 1
to 2 hours.

¹
Those were 1960 prices. Now (1965) it will cost about three shillings more. The meat is then kept hot in the serving dish while the sauce is sieved and reheated. Pour it round the meat and serve very hot.

The dish is much improved by an unorthodox addition of finely-chopped parsley, lemon peel and garlic sprinkled over it before serving. Rice can be served with it, although small glazed onions, mushrooms and triangles of bread fried in oil are the traditional garnishes. Tendrons must always be very well cooked indeed; the meat and sauce should have that slightly sticky quality characteristic of stewed veal.

For four people buy 1
lb. of shin of veal cut lengthways from the bone in strips weighing about 3 oz. each. First prepare a sauce from
lb. of skinned and chopped tomatoes stewed down to a pulp without the addition of any other liquid, but well seasoned with salt, pepper, sugar and dried basil or marjoram. Now brown the veal in a good tablespoon of meat dripping or olive oil; season it, add the tomato sauce and a little under
pint of meat stock. Simmer uncovered on top of the stove for 15 minutes, then put in a very low oven for an hour, with the lid on the pan. When the veal is tender, strew on the top 3 tablespoons of breadcrumbs mixed with a finely-chopped clove of garlic, a scrap of lemon peel and a tablespoon of parsley. Leave uncovered in the oven for another 10 to 15 minutes. There should be only a small amount of thickish sauce, and, as in the preceding recipe, the meat should have that sticky quality peculiar to stewed veal.

Serve with rice.

Buy a piece of boned and rolled leg of veal weighing 2
to 5 lb. Rub the meat all over with a mixture of 1 large tablespoon of coarse salt and half a teaspoon of saltpetre (to be bought from the chemist) which will give the finished dish a good pink colour. Put it in a bowl or earthenware casserole and add 3 sliced onions, 2 bayleaves, half a dozen each of peppercorns and juniper berries, half a lemon cut in slices, a branch of thyme and tarragon if possible, and pour over about half a tumbler of wine vinegar. Cover the bowl, and leave for 4 days, turning the meat every day. To cook it, put it in a saucepan with its brine, and all the onions, herbs, etc., cover with cold water and simmer, covered, extremely gently for 4 hours. Take the meat from the pan, put it in a bowl, cover with paper and a plate and weight it.