Lombardia Food
Typical Recipes
OSSOBUCO

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Ossobuco alla Milanese

Milanese Veal Shank recipe

Braised veal shanks (ossobuco) are a favorite on Lombard tables; serve the ossobuco alla Milanese, with saffron risotto for a truly Milanese feast.

 Preparation

Ossobuco: prepare the ossobuco (veal shank) by tying it with string and flouring it. Sauté over medium heat in a sauté pan. Remove from sauté pan and season with salt and pepper. Meanwhile, prepare the sauce by combining the onion, carrots, celery, garlic, tomatoes, porcini mushroom broth and saffron in a roast in pan for two hours in a 350 degree oven.

To serve, grill the Polenta cake for three minutes. Plate and serve The Ossobuco with veal and vegetables.

As an alternative to polenta you can serve the ossobuco in the traditional way with "risotto alla milanese", or also with mashed potatoes.

A bit of history.

Ossobuco, cut from the shank of veal, is a classic of Milanese cuisine. The word ossobuco means hollow-bone. This famous dish probably had its origins in a farmhouse during the late nineteenth century and almost certainly did not originally include tomatoes, a New World discovery, which  were probably added by restaurant chefs. Ossobuco came into its own in the many osterie of Milan, which were traditionally neighborhood restaurants in big cities which catered to the locals of the immediate neighborhood and never to travelers or tourists.

Ossobuco (ossobuchi or ossibuchi is plural) probably is not an old dish. Although ossobuco is mentioned approvingly in the fourteenth edition of Pellegrino Artusi’s Scienza in cucina e l'arte di mangiar bene published in 1920 "ossobuco" does not appear at all in the anonymous La vera cucina lombarda published in 1890 for housewives. This leads to believe that the dish may always have been an invention of an osteria.

Ossobuco is sometimes called Osso Buco.