Think On It

Test kitchen report

March 23rd, 2007

I had an idea and decided to test it yesterday.

The participants were a large piece of fresh uncured ham and crusca or miller’s bran. This ham is part of the artisanal pork I bought a few months ago. This is not a pig who lolled around in the sunshine, but one who trotted around the farm eating what he liked. The texture of the meat is therefore nothing like cured ham or fresh ham from a factory farm

The crusca I already know can be used in place of bread crumbs. It tastes more like whole wheat bread than daily bread, but that’s OK with me. It is great on a diet because it fills you up a bit, adds fiber and has virtually no calories. Go look in your markets and see where the miller’s bran is, because it is nothing like those cereals made of bran. They have their place, but they don’t do what just plain bran, the outer covering of a wheat berry, does.

So, the project was to try the meat “breaded” with crusca and unbreaded, beaten or flattened with my battecarne (which I will photograph later, but it is like the flat side of your meat hammer.) What makes a difference, and how much difference? To be fair, I seasoned all with the same salt and herbs mixture.

I first cut two thin cutlets off the end of the meat to try them just as they come. I mixed up some crusca with seasoning in a pasta bowl, and dipped one of them into it. Knowing this would be a chewier meat, I heated a frying pan to medium and added a little oil. I sautéed both pieces side by side until they were just done. I cut into them.

They were both delicious, but very chewy. Some might say tough. The only difference between the two was the whole wheat flavor of the crusca one. It apparently did nothing to moderate the affect of the heat on the thin meat.

I cut two more, and on the chopping board using my trusty metal beater, flattened them to very thin indeed and about three times as large in area as they began. One was dipped in seasoned crusca, the other not. Both were cooked.

This time there is a great difference. Maybe it is because with more surface, the crusca taste was more pronounced, but it really tasted almost like a sandwich. The uncoated one was perfect. It had become very tender, had cooked very quickly because of the flattening, and was juicy to an extreme.

I would still use the bran for variety, but the tale that breading holds in juices and protects the meat from the toughening affect of heat just didn’t happen for me. The beaten plain piece was better than the other one, and better by far than the natural one.

So if you don’t have a battecarne, go get one. I’ve several recipes in which it is required, and just simple sautéed cutlets are very much improved with it. That’s it, folks.

Entry Filed under: Uncategorized, Food, Italy