In Italy, veal is served frequently. In fact, when I was there almost every dinner I ate had veal in it. If you’ve been around here for a while, you’ll notice a lot of veal recipes.

I grew up on veal, and love it for its tenderness and flavor. It’s always been considered a delicacy growing up and is most often served with elegant sauces. It can also be considered a romantic, special occasion choice, especially, when prepared with brandy, wine and puff pastry.

I chose a brandy, white wine melange of shallots and mushrooms inside of a puff pastry with prosciutto and fontina cheese. It’s a divine mixture of elegance that would be a distinct dinner party entree or starter.

Veal itself is lean and nutritious, not calorie or fat laden like beef, and a good choice for a healthy diet. One of the most important things to me is that it is raised humanely.

Cedar Springs veal family farmers use best practices and as part of a promotion, they sent me some veal cutlets to create a recipe. I wanted to step outside the box of the typical veal dishes and made a sort of modern day, savory veal pop tart, which is elegant, and richly satisfying.

I was very pleased with their veal and impressed with their practices. Mountain States Rosen veal growers have come together to establish protocols which focus on animal quality of life and well being. This is important to me.

Veal can be found in many cuts and is very versatile. While playing around I also made very healthy stuffed veal rolls, which I’ll post at another time, but for the contest, I wanted to go all out and make something very luxurious.

Quick Puff Pastry Recipe with Veal, Prosciutto, Fontina, Mushrooms

Quick puff pastry stuffed with prosciutto and veal is tasty, elegant, and will get a few bravos.

This is a romantic recipe, easy to prepare in advance, and comforting without being too heavy. It pairs well with charred carrots. Simply microwave peeled sliced carrots to soften and then throw into a hot frying pan with butter or olive oil for a few minutes.

The good news is how easy this quick puff pastry recipe is to make. Starting with a defrosted puff pastry,  this can made in under 30 minutes.

You roll out a puff pastry sheet to 14 x 14, and and then cut four pieces. Layer fontina cheese, prosciutto, veal, mushrooms, herbs. Fold and bake seam side down. Easy and elegant, this is a super quick puff pastry recipe.

I mixed some brandy into white wine to create a more complex flavor for the minced mushroom/shallots mixture.

Prosciutto brings flavor, and the fontina cheese brings creaminess, but is mild enough to not disturb the balance of the dish.

This veal was sent to me from Mountain States Rosen, which makes veal under the Cedar Springs Veal name.

Cedar Springs Veal has been provided for this post for contest entry.

So tell me do you ever make veal cutlets. I grew up on them, fried in Italian breadcrumbs and served with lemon. They were always a treat.

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Quick Puff Pastry Recipe with Veal and Prosciutto

Veal, Prosciutto, baby bella mushrooms and Fontina cheese stuffed into puff pastry for a very elegant meal.

Course Entree

Cuisine Italian

Prep Time 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes minutes

Total Time 30 minutes minutes

Servings 4

Author Angela Roberts

Ingredients

• 4 oounces veal cutlets
• 1/4 cup flour
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 4 tablespoons butter
• 2 cups baby bella mushrooms finely chopped
• 2 shallots finely chopped
• 4 slices fontina cheese
• 4 slices prosciutto thinly sliced
• 1/3 cup white wine
• 1 tablespoon brandy
• 8 sprigs thyme or 1 tablespoon parsley
• salt
• pepper
• 1 egg

Instructions

• Defrost puff pastry sheet.
• Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees.
• Pound veal cutlets with meat pounder until very thin.
• Dredge in flour.
• Put 1 tablespoon oil and 1 tablespoon butter into frying pan. Add more oil if you need to.
• Fry cutlets until browned (but not too brown). Drain on paper towels. Set aside.
• Set cutlets aside.
• In clean pan, use remaining oil and butter to soften shallots and mushrooms (over medium low heat). Don't brown shallots, just soften.
• Add in wine and brandy. Be careful and use a lid immediately to prevent a grease splash. Remove lid to continue cooking.
• Simmer until alcohol has evaporated and there is a sauce, but no juice.
• Roll out puff pastry to 14 x 14 square. You may need to flour your surface first.
• Cut into 4 pieces.
• Layer cheese prosciutto, veal, mushroom sauce, and garnish with some time or chopped parsely).
• Add black pepper.
• Fold and using water crimp edges closes.
• Place on baking sheet seam side down.
• Brush with egg wash.
• Bake for 15 minutes at 400 degrees.

More Recipes with Veal from Spinach Tiger

Veal Bolognese

Veal Meatballs

Veal Osso Bucco

Veal Stew with Onion Sauce, Sage and Peas

Veal and Beef Shepherd’s Pie

Veal & Turnip Stew with White Wine

Veal Sugo

The post Quick Puff Pastry Recipe with Veal and Prosciutto appeared first on Spinach Tiger.

During college I served manhattans and gimlets to a rather older crowd, always working in station number 4. I loved my regular customers who tipped very well, considering they lingered a bit to listen to the organist who was also planted in my station. The tea room was lucky enough to employ some old school staff from a high-end hotel, and we served classics like fried oysters and seafood in puff pastry, followed by rum raisin ice cream or creme de menthe parfaits. I appreciated those days, when as a college girl waitress, I ate like a queen.

As I was preparing this dish, cutting the puff pastry into large circles and stacking one (with a center cut out) on top of another to create a puff pastry bowl, I thought about the tea room and my appreciation for taking the time to make a food event special.

Described in Le Cordon at Home, the book used to make this dish “Boucheés are literally, mouthfuls of puff pastry filled with meat or fish in a creamy sauce.”

Well how delightful is that, or should I say delicious. I served these with a side of white beans, seasoned with fresh garlic, lemon, black lava salt, and chili pepper.  My husband and I both agreed that when the beans made their way into the dish, the flavors together were just right. It was French with just a little bit of Italian.

This dish takes less than 30 minutes, if you have the puff pastry made ahead of time, but count on a lot longer for cleaning up, because you use a lot of pans. I thought wouldn’t this make the best amuse-bouche, using a tiny puff pastry and one shrimp, the perfect one-bite hors d’oeuvre. Bookmark this for your next dinner party.

Puff Pastry
I use Trader Joe’s artisan puff pastry. The recipe asked for a 4” cookie cutter to cut out each tart. I made four of them, (for two servings), and for two of them cut holes with a 3” diameter cookie cutter, and then, using an egg wash, stacking one on top of the other. Just remember to work with it very cold (even if you are using store bought).

Shrimp Filling
I purchased fresh wild shrimp, and boiled them in salted water for about 4 minutes. But, you could buy pre-cooked shrimp to save time.

The mushrooms get a very fine chop and if you like cream of mushroom soup (who doesn’t) you will love this sauce.

I remembered that my favorite restaurant serves a seafood dish with a chili amaretto cream sauce that is absolutely delicious and expensive. I wanted to see if I could use this recipe to get me closer to that dish. That would be happiness. The taste test proved that a little discipline gets its reward.

Ingredients for Beans

• 1 can cannellini beans, rinsed
• splash of olive oil
• juice and zest of one lemon
• 1 clove garlic chopped
• sea salt
• freshly ground black pepper (although white pepper might be better)
• dash chile pepper (or dash chili powder or similar hot sauce to taste)
• 3 leaves basil chiffonade (rolled up, sliced into ribbons)

Instructions

1. Put everything in sauce pan, except basil. Heat. Garnish with chiffonade of basil. Don’t forget to taste along the way and season appropriately. (meaning when YOU like it)

Notes:
• The cannellini beans, also known as white kidney beans, are my addition to this dish. I have them served on the side, but they would be equally good cooked and then mixed into the seafood filling.
• The beans are wonderful left over, sprinkled with a bit of sheep’s milk feta, pita crackers.

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Puff Pastry with Shrimp and Mushrooms and a Side of Cannellini Beans

Recipe for shrimp in puff pastry (adapted from Le Cordon Bleu at Home)

Course Entree

Cuisine French

Servings 2

Author Angela Roberts

Ingredients

• puff pastry made into bouchées
• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter divided
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 2/3 cup cold milk
• 1/3 cup heavy cream
• salt pepper
• 5 ounces mushrooms chopped finely
• 3/4 pounds cooked shrimp
• 2 tablespoons amaretto
• pinch of paprika
• chervil or parsley for garnish
• hot sauce chile powder or whatever you prefer to add heat to dish (optional)
• Have puff pastry ready to go. Keep warm.

Instructions

Large Saucepan – Cook Shrimp

• Peel, devein, rinse
• Bring salted water to boil.
• Add shrimp, cook approx. 4 minutes or until shrimp turn pink.
• Medium Saucepan
• Put butter in saucepan. Heat.
• Add flour, take off heat, whisk, don’t brown.
• Add milk until thickened.
• Add cream, boil 1 minute. Keep warm over pot of simmering water. Set aside.

Medium Saucepan

• Sauté mushrooms in butter.
• Add Shrimp.
• Add amaretto or cognac. Flambé or continue to cook on low until alcohol burns off.
• Once flame goes out or alcohol is burned off, add cream sauce.
• Pour into puff pastry. Serve Immediately with side of white beans, green salad dressed with olive oil and lemon.

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