We’ve already written about couscous. The same applies to chicken, baccalà and pasta carbonara. Today is the day dedicated to veal in tuna sauce, the fifth and last dish which will find its location under the roof of Eataly on the days dedicated to the Roma Food and Wine Festival – 17-19 May – with its interpretations from the past, present and future. Let’s proceed with logic.
Despite the French sounding name, the origins of vitel tonnè are not French but very Italian. To be precise, it comes from Piedmont, where for the first time people had the brilliant intuition of marinating Fassone round steak in white wine, then cutting it in thin slices and soaking it – when cold – in the tuna sauce, usually obtained by blending the tuna with capers, anchovies, oil, white wine and some herbs. So who can better interpret the veal with tuna sauce from the past than Ugo Alciati? The chef from Guido – a restaurant which has just moved from Pollenzo to Villa Contessa Rosa, in the Fontanafredda estate in Serralunga d'Alba (Cuneo) – has this recipe in his DNA, after having seen his parents, Guido and Lidia Alciati, masters of the great cuisine from Piedmont, prepare it so many times.
Yesterdy's vitello tonnato by Ugo Alciati
How will
Ugo Alciati prepare it? «I will bring a version from a remote past, and one from a more recent one», he reveals, «In the distant past, veal was over-boiled, it was ugly because it was very dark and very dry. And the sauce had no tuna: the aroma of fish was only given by the anchovies, together with capers and mayonnaise». Things changed thanks to
Lidia: «It was more or less in 1962: my mother was going upstream, choosing raw materials of the highest quality. She introduced some tuna in the sauce, the exceptional one that arrived from Erice. As for the veal, she used the round steak cut, supplied by the best butchers of those times – the only one which is still open being
Martini in Boves. Great care in the preparation followed: veal was not boiled but delicately roasted with capers and anchovies». To discover the rest, attend the event on Friday 17th at 7-10 pm.
On Saturday 18 May, at 12-3 pm, it will then be the turn of his majesty Heinz Beck from Friedrichshafen – though he can be considered 100% Roman, now, having acquired the honorary citizenship thanks to his habit of giving a new, splendid interpretation to many dishes of Italian and Roman tradition, such as lamb with artichokes or coda alla vaccinara. And how about veal in tuna sauce? «It’s been a mania for some time», the chef from La Pergola tells us «already 11 years ago I would serve it as an amuse-bouche, cooked in the traditional way, using a veal tenderloin with a pink sauce». And at Eataly? «I will bring a Grilled tuna with a veal jelly with herbs». Sounds like a truly delicious tuna in veal sauce.
Marco Stabile and his vitello palamitè
Finally, on Saturday 18th at 7-10pm, the interpretation of the future will join the fray with the
Vitello palamitéby
Marco Stabile of
L’Ora d’Aria in Florence. The name is already exciting: «Instead of tuna, I will use
palamita fish, a worthy substitute that lacks the ethical perplexities due to the tuna depopulation in our seas», he says. «The veal, instead, will be that of a young female specimen from La Granda cooked at very low temperature and seasoned with Tuscan oil, honey and vinegar. On top, I will add a fake tuna egg made with some tuna agar agar put in an egg shell with a liquid egg yolk made with capers and anchovies». High quality meat with a 2.0 sauce. So beautiful and tasty that we will soon provide both photo and recipe. Just be patient.
For info on the programme and to purchase tickets for the Roma Food&Wine Festival click here.
See also
Monosilio's, Roscioli's, Costardi's and Scabin's carbonara
Esposito’s, Vitale’s and Cedroni’s salted codfish
Cerea’s, Scarello’s and Bowerman’s chicken
Ferrari’s, Delcourt’s and Apreda’s couscous
