Betty Lives!

Eat Italian Once a Week

Vernon Jarratt

1967

Doug and I joke that when we check out at Costco our cart always has the least amount of stuff of anyone who shops there.  When the kids were little I bought diapers, wipes, crabmeat, racks of lamb and, at Christmas, a rib roast.  Now it’s the same list minus the diapers and wipes. Occasionally I swap out a boneless leg of lamb for the racks. That’s it.  The lamb from Costco is from New Zealand and it’s terrific, I highly recommend it.  This is a very long way of saying that when I went to Costco last week I saw that they had Osso Bucco veal and because they almost never carry bone-in cuts, I bought it.

Jarratt’s recipe is very simple but it was all I could do not to change the order of how he cooks the ingredients.  In most stews the meat is browned and then the vegetables.  Then your saucepan, which should be nice and brown by now,  is de-glazed with liquid.  Jarratt’s recipe calls for browning 1 lb of fresh button mushrooms in 2 oz of butter, shoving them over, and then browning the veal.  I knew this was wrong but I just grit my teeth and did it his way. After the veal is browned the pan is de-glazed with one glass of “any good red wine” and then two cups of water and 1 lb of canned tomatoes are added.  Season with salt and pepper and cook, covered for two hours.

I thought that the lack of braising flavors (carrots, onions, celery, bay leaves, peppercorns etc…) would make for a rich and soulful sauce but actually it came out quite flat.  Also, the veal from Costco is not nearly as good as the lamb.  It was kind of chewy and tasteless.

The cauliflower, however, was amazing.  First steamed whole, broken into florets and served with the warm sauce over it, I loved it.  The sauce is made by cooking 3 Tbl wine vinegar, 5 chopped anchovy fillets, 4 Tbl olive oil, salt and pepper until the fillets dissolve. A note here: I am a HUGE anchovy fan but even for those that don’t partake, this sauce is very harmless due to the cooking.