Veal

The title of this dish, alla sorrentina, means it comes from Sorrento, across the bay from Naples. You may have had this dish prepared with mozzarella cheese, which is the cheese of the area, but I am showing you an alternative way here, using Fontina. Use whichever you like, and whichever you can get. By the way, alla sorrentina is a good indicator that the dish you order will contain eggplant in some form or another. If you prepare this dish without the eggplant, you’ll have scallopine alla bolognese. You can add a little elegance to the dish by straining the sauce as you spoon it onto plates. That is something I do in my restaurants. But in my home—and most likely in yours—the sauce is just fine the way it comes out of the baking dish.

Cerignolas are large green olives, each the size of a plump almond, with a very nutty, buttery flavor. They are usually kept in brine. If you cannot find them, other brined green olives will do. But use the ones with pits, which you will remove. They have more flavor.

This meat filling is similar to the one for cannelloni on page 165. You can use them interchangeably.

Allspice is the secret ingredient here. In Italian cooking, it is VITAL to have a secret ingredient in your meat sauce.

I make this dinner every Christmas. I have included it in other books, but I cannot finish any year without it. I have made some small improvements in the recipe over the years, so it’s faster and easier to make than ever. You can eat it all year long as do I. For Italians, after all those fishes on Christmas Eve, this dish, with four different meats in it, is especially nice on Christmas night. This is the greatest gift I can give to myself and those I love: a big bowl of pasta with the works. Have a great year! Serve with tomato, basil, and mozzarella salad (the colors of the season and the Italian flag).

This meal is a combo of two favorite preparations: francese and piccata. Francese are egg-battered cutlets or fillets, and piccata are simply flour-dredged or plain cutlets or fillets sautéed with lemon and wine. I was never good at making decisions, especially regarding dinner, so I made up this two-for-one dinner. Serve with wilted fresh spinach or green salad.

Polpette are baby meatballs and these are stuffed with a pine nut (buttery, slightly crunchy surprise) and a currant or raisin (to keep the meat moist).

This dish is one buttery, delicious, edible ode to spring. (Also, the flavor is so sexy, it could bring on some serious birds-and-bees action!)

This stoup is a one-pot Swedish meatballs and egg noodle supper, but soupier!

Veal breast is a flavorful and economical alternative to the traditional veal shanks used to make osso buco. In fact, it produces a better yield and makes portioning a heck of a lot easier. We’ve braised the breast in apple cider and added some horseradish for a bit of heat and spice. We like to serve this with Sourdough Spaetzle (page 87), but it’s equally delicious with buttered egg noodles, risotto, or a stew of salt-roasted root vegetables. Alternatively, season the veal with nutmeg, lemon zest, ground fennel, and black peppercorns to change up what is soon to become a staple in your kitchen.

This Veal dish is a big favorite of butcher Jacques Geismar’s Jewish clientele. You can substitute matzo for the bread at Passover, and, if you like, add raisins and apples to the stuffing. This dish is popular for the Sabbath or the high holidays in France, the way brisket or stuffed turkey is in America. Try the stuffing for your next turkey.

It is common knowledge that Jews should usher in the Sabbath with a little bit of fish. But in the village in Poland from which Danielle’s mother hailed, they often could not get carp in the winter, because the lake was frozen. The story goes that the Jews thought they could make an arrangement with God to create falshe fish (Yiddish for “fake fish”). So they made meat patties, shaped in ovals or balls, depending on the family tradition, and simmered them in a broth with salt, sugar, pepper, and a little carrot, so they would look and taste like sweet-and-sour gefilte fish. “Because the intentions were good, the benevolent God agreed with the Jews and said that he would make believe that it was fish,” said Danielle. (In this recipe, sugar is used as a seasoning, as it was in past centuries.)

“To be Jewish is to be conscious of what one says and what one does,” Jacqueline Meyer-Benichou, who cooks some of Paris’s most elegant kosher food, told me. The head of a real-estate company, with a degree from Les Beaux Arts in architecture, Jacqueline treats cooking as her avocation and considers the presentation of food to be as important as the menu. Living near branches of great gourmet stores in Paris, such as Lenôtre, she window-shops, looking at their food preparations and presentations, and tries to replicate the recipes for kosher dinners at her home. For dessert, she often fills little golden cups with soy-based iced soufflés, as Lenôtre does. “I love perfection,” she said. At Passover, Jacqueline makes beef cheeks or even veal shanks seasoned the Algerian way, with hot pepper and cilantro, and serves them as a main course, accompanied by her Algerian take on cabbage with cilantro and hot pepper. If you can’t find beef cheeks, use veal shanks, stew meat, or flanken—any slightly fatty cut will do. Slow cooking makes the meat tender and delicious. Since it tastes even better prepared a day in advance, reheat just before serving.

A quick and simple dish to be served with rice, bulgur, or potatoes, or with bread.

This dish can be made with lamb shanks, knuckle of veal (osso buco), or with cubed meat such as shoulder of lamb. Butchers sell fresh lamb shanks from the foreleg weighing about 10 ounces and frozen ones from New Zealand from the back leg weighing from 14 to 16 ounces. Lamb shanks cooked for a long time have a wonderful tenderness and texture without being stringy, and they produce a rich stock. Although they take a long time to cook, they don’t need any attention. The sauce is the classic Turkish egg and lemon terbiyeli sauce.

Traditionally, the Berbers first made couscous with barley, and barley couscous is still very popular, especially in the south of Morocco. It is now available in precooked form from some Middle Eastern stores. You can substitute ordinary couscous. You can make the broth with lamb, beef, or veal (preferably shoulder, neck fillet, or knuckle) and with a choice of vegetables. According to local lore, seven is a magic number that brings good luck. Onions, tomatoes, and chili peppers count as flavorings, so you must have seven more vegetables. I have listed eight, so drop one. The number of ingredients makes it seem a scary endeavor, but it is only a matter of throwing things into a pot, and it makes a spectacular one-dish meal for a large party. You will need a very big pot.