the chic brûlée

Here is my grandmother’s tried-and-true recipe for the best Italian-style stuffed peppers. Although I have made a few modern variations on stuffed peppers recently (some unsuccessful, I must admit), I wanted to take it back and make the *real* stuffed peppers my family and I have enjoyed for years so I asked my grandmother for her recipe.

The peppers are stuffed with a tasty mixture of ground beef, pork and veal, along with onions, cooked rice, bread, Parmesan cheese, fresh parsley and garlic. It’s full of traditional Italian flavors and almost tastes like a meatball. The cooked rice adds texture and heartiness, and the mixture of meats adds a ton more flavor and richness than if you only used ground beef. We have a special way of cooking it that doesn’t dry out the filling, but still allows the stuffed peppers to retain their shape. These stuffed peppers make for a lovely meal. Enjoy!

Last weekend we visited my family in America and I was delighted to help my mom and grandmother cook up a Milanese classic, veal Osso Buco. A traditional Osso Buco consists of thick-cut, bone-in veal shanks that are braised for several hours in a white wine, tomato and herb sauce, and finished with a piquant gremolata topping.

“Osso Buco” translates in Italian to “bone’s hole,” – you can see how this dish got its name once the veal is cooked up to perfection and all of the marrow has seeped from the bones, thus creating a rich, decadent sauce, and, yes, leaving a “bone’s hole” in the center of the shanks. Because the veal is slow-cooked in this sauce, the meat becomes tender and succulent and falls easily off the bone.

This is a timeless and classic