1 calf’s head, ready prepared (ie boned, shaped and rolled)
1 onion, cut in half
1 celery stalk, cut in half
1 carrot, cut in half
1 bay leaf
50g plain flour
1 wine glass of white wine vinegar, plus 3 tablespoons
5 tablespoons Shallot vinaigrette (see page 52)
3 bunches of large spring onions, thinly sliced lengthways
bunch of chives, finely chopped
pepper
Cook the calf’s head with the onion, celery, carrot, bay leaf, flour and glass of vinegar in the same way as the ox tongue (see page 132). Leave it to cool completely in the liquid, then put it in the fridge until it sets to make a jelly.
Slice through the calf’s head, including the jelly, as thinly as you can.
Sharpen up the Shallot vinaigrette by adding the 3 tablespoons of white wine vinegar and a few twists of freshly ground black pepper.
Mix the spring onions with 2 tablespoons of the Shallot vinaigrette and arrange on serving plates. Lay the thinly sliced calf’s head on top and finish with the rest of the vinaigrette and the chopped chives.
Insalata di piedino di vitello Calves’ foot salad
This can be made with pigs’ trotters as well. If you buy whole feet, you will need to open them out once they are blanched. Alternatively, you can sometimes buy feet that have already been boned and opened up.
If you don’t have a deep-fat fryer, use a deep saucepan no more than one-third full of oil – and don’t turn away and forget about it while it is heating up. If necessary, cook the calves’ feet in batches: preheat the oven before you start the preparation, then switch it off, and as you cook each batch, put them into the oven to keep warm.
If you wanted to serve this for a party, then rather than make the salad you could just serve the deep-fried strips with the mustard fruits (see page 482) in a pot, for people to dip the fritters into.
4 whole calves’ feet
400ml white wine vinegar
1 lemon
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 eggs
100g plain flour
100g breadcrumbs (made from bread that is 2-3 days old)
500ml sunflower oil for frying
50g Mostarda di Cremona (mustard fruits, see page 482), finely diced if large
2 handfuls of mixed salad leaves
salt and pepper
Put the calves’ feet into a large pan of cold water, bring to the boil, then drain. Put them into fresh cold water and bring to the boil again. Reduce the heat and simmer for about 2 hours, until tender. The meat will start to come away from the bone, but not completely. Leave to cool down in the water for about half an hour, to let the meat firm up a little.
Peel off the skin and remove any small hairs that might have been left behind. Take the meat off the bone with a knife, open it out and lay it flat on a tray. Cover it completely with the vinegar. Put another tray on top and weight it down, so the meat is pressed flat; that way it will be easier to cook and will look more attractive. Leave overnight in the fridge – up to 2 days if you want a more pronounced vinegary flavour.
With a vegetable peeler, remove the zest from the lemon, taking care to leave the bitter white pith behind. Then cut the zest into julienne strips. Squeeze the lemon, mix the juice with the olive oil and set aside.
Bring a small pan of water to the boil, put in the strips of lemon zest, then remove straight away with a slotted spoon. Bring the water back up to the boil, put the zest back in and remove it again straight away – this will soften it and take away a little of the bitterness.
Cut the meat from the calves’ feet into strips or squares, or whichever you prefer.
Lightly beat the eggs in a bowl and season them. Put the flour on a plate and the breadcrumbs on another, then dip each piece of meat first in the flour, then into the eggs, then into the breadcrumbs. Do this carefully, because the meat needs to be completely coated with flour before dipping it into the egg, but any excess flour should be shaken off, otherwise the egg will only stick in patches. Then make sure you dip the meat completely into the egg, again shaking off any excess – so when you dip it into the breadcrumbs you get a nice even coating. (Don’t be tempted to do another coating of egg and breadcrumbs as it will be too thick, and all you will taste is breadcrumbs.)
Preheat the sunflower oil to about 180°C (to the point where if you put in a little morsel of bread it will start to fry). Put in the pieces of breaded calves’ feet and fry for 2-3 minutes, moving them around with a fork or metal spoon, until golden all over. Remove, drain on kitchen paper and season with a little salt.
Drizzle your serving plates with the mustard fruits. Mix the salad leaves with the lemon zest, season with salt and pepper and toss with the reserved lemon oil. Pile the salad up on the plates and arrange the pieces of calves’ feet around.
My father goes seven kilometres to buy the bread every day. In our house, like most houses in Italy, bread is the first thing that goes on the table. It is such a big part of the meal – at one time, in poor families, it was the meal, supplemented by whatever else you had to hand.
When I was in Sicilia I learned a new expression, il conpanatico. I was out in the olive groves at the Planeta estate near Menfi, tasting the oils we buy from Alessio Planeta and his family, and they had some agricultural students from Roma working there. At about eleven o’clock, one of them asked, ‘Che cosa c’è per il conpanatico?‘ ‘What are you talking about?’ I asked them. Of course the word conpanatico must mean ‘with the bread’ – but I had never heard the expression before. In this area, they told me, bread is considered so important that you don’t ask ‘What is for lunch,’ but ‘What are we going to have with the bread?’
I thought it was a brilliant expression that really shows the way that Italians, like most Europeans, value bread. It is something that is difficult for many people in Britain to understand, because, despite there being a new wave of artisan bakeries and a big interest in different kinds of bread, the bestselling loaf is still the commercially made white square one that goes in the toaster, and is only eaten at breakfast time, or for sandwiches. When my father first came to London,