Chopped!!!!!!!!!!!

The other day at the Cajun Cleaver, in addition to last nights beautiful tuna they had 2 huge veal chops in the cooler. I looked at them and oh how delicious they did look, then I looked at the price and walked away and paid for the lovely tuna. We had almost made it out of the door when the chops screamed at me. "You know you want us! Come back!!!!!" Being one who always obeys talking veal, I decided to go ahead and buy them.

I figured by the total cost, the chops were a little over a pound each, more than enough for the 3 of us. They were about 2 inches thick and I had already decided a couple of slices would be as much as I would eat. My dad is currently out of town and Mom is lonely, so I invited her to eat with us. Even with the additional diner there was still more than enough veal for all of us. The veal was so beautiful I wanted it to be the focus of the meal and decided to serve it with new potatoes and a tossed salad. Simple fare, but then the more I thought about it the more I wanted to amp up the flavor of the veal without doing something screwy to it. One of our favorite restaurants in New York has a delicious veal picatta but I was not about to cut the chops and pound them flat so i decided to do a simple beurre blanc sauce with some sauteed mushrooms thrown in just because I had them.

Officially and for the record I have cooked veal and I have cooked veal loin chops but have never tried the rib chops before. So I am counting this as a new recipe even though it is more or less just instructions on how to properly cook a rib chop. The beurre blanc is a standard and I make it often. It is a wonderfully flexible sauce ( but a tiny bit touchy) you can add or subtract to or from with slight differences in taste.

Beurre Blanc The Gourmet Cookbook edited by Ruth Reichel


1/4 cup dry white wine
1/4 cup white vinegar
2 tablespoons minced shallots
1 tablespoon cold water
1 stick butter cut into 1/2 inch cubes
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon white pepper

Combine wine, vinegar, and shallots in a small heavy pan. Bring to a simmer over a moderate heat and cook until the liquid is reduced by half. Remove from heat and stir in water. Return to heat that has been reduced to low. Whisk in the butter one piece at a time. Make sure each piece is melted and incorporated before adding the next piece. Lift the pan occasionally to cool the mixture. it needs to be hot enough to melt the butter to a creamy state but not hot enough for the butter to separate. ( It takes about 10 or so minutes of stirring to get to this state).

I sauteed some baby portabellos that I had sliced fine, let them cool and then added them to the finished beurre blanc

The Perfect Chop

I got the recipe? for this from Peter the Butcher at Sanagan's Meat Locker (Youtube video)

Following Peter's instructions I rubbed olive oil on both sides of the chops. I put a small amount of oil in the bottoms of a large skillet and put the pan on the burner of my stove top. When the pan reached a medium high heat I put them in the pan and let them cook for 2 minutes then turned them. I left them on the heat for 2 more minutes and then put the pan in a 375 degree oven for 13 minutes. When I took them out of the oven I let them rest in the pan for about 5 minutes. After carving them at the table I put the mushroom beurre blanc on the meat. Unbelievable!!!!! After we took the first bite I am pretty sure we heard music from Heaven. I can't wait to try this again, unfortunately I will have to wait quite a while. The wallet suffered a lot of damage buying them, but I will make it happen at least a couple of times a year. ( Yes it was that delicious)

Chow Ciao