Veal Chops with Mustard Sauce

I have just returned from a Christmas time visit to my family in the San Francisco bay area, and what a gift I brought home with me! My adorable Mother has recently moved from her 4 bedroom home of 60 years (!!!) to a lovely but very small apartment in Palo Alto.  The downsizing was radical and painful of course, and so the decisions about which things made the cut for the moving van were intense.  As we sat in her cheerful living room watching both of our favorite football teams go down in flames in back to back games, I opened a cabinet and discovered binders and envelopes containing a lifetime’s collection of recipes clipped from newspapers and magazines – a treasure trove.  She said she couldn’t bear to throw them away – this was the cooking history of her life -but hadn’t looked at them once since the move, and knew she never would .  Would I please take them?  Are you kidding me?

When I got home, after my first pass scanning what must be several thousand recipes;  the most interesting thing to me is how similar my taste and cooking style is to my Mother’s.  Is it in our DNA or was it the meals I was served growing up in her home?  Brittany and I also seem to choose the same recipes and favor the same ingredients, so maybe it’s a combination of both.  As I’m always on the lookout for recipes to try, what better gift could I have than this windfall?  Her handwritten notes and suggestions will be guiding me.  I am creating a new category labelled “Virginia’s Cookbook”  for posts gleaned from her archives, and trust me; they will be delicious!

This first one was a yellowed newspaper clipping by Morris Wood.  I googled him and learned he was a cookbook author and wrote a man’s cooking column.  His book “With a Jug of Wine” is out of print,but after reading rave comments about it I this minute ordered it for about nothing on Amazon.  Here’s what he says about this recipe..”Of all the hundreds of recipes Mrs. Woods and I have gathered in Europe, there is one that we use more frequently than any other..It is so delicious,so absolutely simple to make, that we have it at least once a month and never tire of it.”

I rarely cook veal, and used pork chops instead. He is correct; this is easy, the ingredients are in your pantry, and the flavor is rich and wonderful. A keeper from a 1956 cookbook!

2 ounces butter, divided

1 ounce olive oil

4 loin or rib veal chops (or pork)

salt and pepper

1 small onion

1 tsp. flour

3 ounces dry sherry

2 tsp. Dijon mustard

4 ounces cream (or half and half)

1/2 tsp. Worcestershire sauce

Heat one ounce each, butter and fine olive oil in a heavy skillet.  In this slowly brown the chops on both sides until tender.  Salt and pepper them to taste, then remove to a heated platter and keep hot.

The sauce is very simple to prepare, and can be made in advance, or while the chops are cooking, or in the same pan while they are resting.  Heat one ounce of butter in a saucepan and add one small onion, minced.  As the onion begins to brown, add 1 teaspoon flour and blend in well.  Then add 3 ounces dry sherry, 2 tsp. Dijon mustard, 4 ounces cream, a tiny pinch of salt, a sprinkling of freshly ground black pepper and 1/2 tsp. Worcestershire sauce.  Stir and blend everything well, then add the sauce to the fat in the skillet the chops were cooked in. Heat, stirring well, then pour sauce over chops and serve.