I found ground veal on sale for $2/#, so naturally I bought a few packs. I’ve never cooked veal in my life.
I’ve been looking at recipes online but maybe someone here has tried and true ideas?
Mix with an equal amount of ground pork, some breadcrumbs, a bit of milk, and two or three eggs to produce meatballs.
To make Swedish meatballs, season with some salt, pepper, parsley, and a little ground cardamom.
To make Italian meatballs, season with salt, pepper, parsley, and a little oregano.
Arrange the meatballs on a non-stick cookie tray and bake in the oven until browned. Allow to cool.
Heat the Swedish meatballs in gravy made from chicken or veal stock and sour cream. Serve with buttered boiled potatoes, green peas, and some lingonberry jam on the side. (Cranberry sauce can be used instead of lingonberries.) Sprinkle some dill or parsley on the meatballs and potatoes as desired.
Heat the Italian meatballs in marinara sauce and serve over pasta. They can also be used in lasagna, deep-dish pizza, and torpedo sandwiches.
I should have mentioned that a 1# : 1# ratio of veal and pork will yield at least a dozen meatballs.
In the Swedish meatballs, allspice can be used with or in place of cardamom. Adjust the seasoning to your taste.
The Italian meatballs can be jazzed up by adding some hot pepper flakes and/or Parmesan and/or Romano cheese.
I was going to chime in with a meatballs suggestion, as well. I do 1/3 veal, 1/3 pork, 1/3 beef OR 1/2 veal and 1/2 pork or 80-20 chuck (beef). I find the veal gives meatballs a more delicate/softer texture without making them squishy. Almost every time I make meatballs with veal, somebody comments on their lightness and pleasant texture. Similarly, you can do the same thing with meatloaf or similar things if you wanted to, but I particularly like ground veal for meatballs. If you want a suggestion outside Italian and Swedish meatballs, I particularly like Romanian meatball soup (Ciorbă De Perisoare). That recipe calls for pork, but use one of the mixtures above. 50-50 veal and pork is better. And I’d personally make twice the meatballs called for, so double that part of the recipe (it only calls for 8 oz.) I notice that someone in the comments made the same observation. Also, if by some great coincidence you happen to grow lovage or know somebody who grows lovage, use that instead of parsley as the herb. Lovage is a traditional Romanian herb, but American recipes for the soup almost invariably substitute parsley, as lovage is pretty rare in the US. I happen to have a giant bush of it in the backyard, and I use it most often for this soup. Also, the souring agent in the recipe is lemon juice, but you can also use vinegar or, traditionally, a fermented wheat liquid called borș is used. I’m just adding that for completeness’ sake–I don’t expect you to hunt it down, unless perhaps you live somewhere with a large Eastern European population where you can find that or something called zakwas or żurek, which is the Polish version of the same thing.
My version of Spaghetti Bolognaise:
Grate or finely chop a small red onion, a carrot, a stalk of celery, and several cloves of garlic. (I usually puree them in a blender.)
Cut around 150 grams of pancetta into fine chunks and sauté in EVOO at the bottom of a large enameled pot over medium high heat until browned. Remove and set aside. Sauté 1# of ground veal in the same pot until browned. Remove and set aside as well.
Sauté the vegetables in the same pot for several minutes, adding more EVOO if necessary. Return the meats to the pot and season with salt and pepper.
Pour in a cup of rich red Italian wine and add a large can of plum tomatoes, peeled and seeded. (Use fresh tomatoes if you want.) Stir well. Add a small can of tomato paste and stir well until incorporated. If you want thicker sauce, stir in a medium-sized can of crushed or pureed tomatoes.
Simmer over low heat to allow some of the liquid to evaporate. Stir constantly. Add Italian seasoning (oregano, basil, parsley, sage, rosemary, thyme) to taste. Some hot red pepper flakes will add a little zing to the sauce.
When the sauce has thickened to your taste, serve over pasta. Some chefs add a bit of milk to the sauce as it simmers.
When I say “I usually puree them in a blender,” I mean all of the vegetables, at once, and not just the garlic.
You can use ground veal as filling for stuffed peppers and stuffed cabbage. I use the same mix for both. 1 lb. ground meat + 1 cup cooked rice with some chopped onion, garlic, oregano, basil, rosemary, and parsley. Add parmesan cheese for the peppers and top them with tomato sauce. For cabbage add some tomato sauce and sugar to the mix and baked them in sauce.
The main reasons reasons people enjoy veal – the tenderness, and light taste compared to beef making it a suitable vehicle for delicate sauces-- are rendered somewhat moot when it is ground. There’s basically no difference between ground veal and ground chicken in terms of taste and texture (ground veal made into balls and stuck on sticks was once known as “city chicken” because city people couldn’t get chicken for an affordable price before large-scale chicken processing). So almost anything you like to use ground chicken for, you could use veal instead.
I use it as an ingredient in bolognese sauce (very similar to what terentii described but I use pureed tomatoes), meatballs and meatloaf. In my neighborhood they sell a package that comes with a blob each of beef, pork, and veal as “meatball mix”.
This sounds yummy! I normally make stuffed peppers and cabbage with more of an East European palette of seasonings: Hungarian paprika (sweet and hot), caraway seed (whole and ground), garlic, basil, parsley, and dill. (In Russia, you always get the last three when you buy a packet of fresh herbs at the supermarket. If you want things like fresh oregano or cilantro, you have to go visit the Central Asians and Caucasians at the nearest open-air market.)
Stuffed cabbage is more of a northern European dish with with varying seasonings, but I don’t use a specific recipe. There’s some similar dish in most cultures, stuffed grape leaves is a Greek version. I like the idea of Hungarian paprika and caraway seed, I think I’ll try that next time.
[QUOTE=Hello Again;17809268 There’s basically no difference between ground veal and ground chicken in terms of taste and texture [/QUOTE]
I’ve made the same types of meatballs with ground chicken, and it just doesn’t have the same sort of tenderness. Believe me, I would rather use ground chicken if possible.
I agree with this.
How interesting. Some good ideas to try, and a reminder that I forgot to buy cabbage today…always, always I forget the damned cabbage.
I stuck it in the freezer for now because I’m making vegetable soup for my son’s birthday, and I’ll have a chance to let ideas percolate for a bit.
Thanks!
One more simple idea for you is breaded veal cutlets. Basically, you prepare up a ground veal patty with some bread crumbs or bread, spices, and egg as a binder (in other words, a Salisbury steak type mixture), dip it in an egg wash and then breadcrumbs, and fry. Serve with gravy.
Italian Burgers:
Mix the veal with some chopped onion, garlic, green and/or red pepper, Italian seasoning, and some salt, black pepper, hot red pepper flakes, and a drizzle of EVOO. Form patties and grill.
Put the patties open-faced on toasted Italian buns and smother in marinara sauce, mozzarella or provolone, and some parmesan. Stick under the broiler until the cheese is browned and bubbly. Put the rest of the bun on top and serve.
Add some fennel and/or anise seed to the patties to make them taste like Italian sausage!