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Veal Fricassee
Cut from the leg as many rather thin slices as are needed, or use any small pieces of the clear meat from other parts and cut them in nice slices. Have slices of salt pork fried until crisp, or 2 tablespoonfuls of beef drippings. Put the slices of veal in the hot fat, not as many at a time as to prevent browning on all sides. Keep turning the slices as fast as they brown on the outside. A few thin slices of onion fried with the meat are an improvement. Take out the veal, and while the fat is still hot stir into it a tablespoonful of flour, stirring until very smooth and of a rich brown color. Add a pint of boiling water, season with salt and pepper, a blade of mace, and a few drops of kitchen bouquet. Lay the slices of veal in this gravy and simmer twenty minutes, or until quite tender, and serve.
Boiled rice, macaroni, or spaghetti are good to serve with veal cooked in this way. It may be served around a mound of well-seasoned boiled macaroni.
A brown fricassee rather than the pale, cream-thickened kind: the veal is seared, the fat turned into a roux in the same pan, and the whole thing simmered briefly. The hinge is the flour — it must go into hot fat and be stirred to a genuine nut brown before liquid touches it, or the gravy tastes raw and pasty.
- Cut and thickness"Rather thin slices" from the leg suggests something in the region of a quarter inch, cut across the grain — closer to a cutlet than to a stewing cube. Thick chunks will not be tender in twenty minutes; if you only have stew-cut shoulder, expect an hour or more of simmering.
- A pint of boiling waterTwo cups. Adding it boiling keeps the roux from seizing into lumps; add it in a thin stream while whisking. Light veal or chicken stock in place of water gives a much better gravy.
- Beef drippingsTwo tablespoons of rendered beef fat. Lard, bacon fat, or a mix of butter and neutral oil all work; if you use the salt pork option, cook it until crisp, lift the scraps out, and brown the veal in what is left.
- Blade of maceA blade is a piece of the dried outer covering of the nutmeg, and it is genuinely different from nutmeg — brighter, more floral. If you cannot find whole blades, a pinch of ground mace stirred in near the end approximates it. Remove whole blades before serving.
- Kitchen bouquetA commercial caramel-and-vegetable browning liquid, still sold in the United States. It colours the gravy and adds a faint savoury depth; a teaspoon of soy sauce or a little dark caramel does the same job. It is optional if the roux is properly browned.
- Browning in batchesThe instruction not to crowd the pan is the difference between browned veal and steamed grey veal. Work in two or three batches over medium-high heat and let each slice sit long enough to colour before turning.
- YieldThe recipe fixes no quantity of meat: cut "as many slices as are needed." A pint of gravy will coat roughly 1 1/2 lb of veal, which would serve about four with rice or macaroni. Salt at the end — salt pork and any stock will already have contributed.