France

Couzeix

Carne al piatto is an Italian way of cooking meat without a pan: very thin slices of beef or veal are seasoned with salt, a thread of olive oil and a squeeze of lemon, laid on a plate, and the plate is set over a pot of boiling water and covered with a second plate, so the meat cooks in the gentle heat that comes up through the ceramic. The method belongs to home kitchens, convalescent cooking and the pre-dietetic tradition of cucina leggera in Lombardy and the Veneto, where it is still prescribed by grandmothers for anyone who is unwell; it produces meat that is pale, soft and barely cooked, without browning, fat or fried flavour. It is rarely on restaurant menus and is closer in spirit to a carpaccio that has been warmed than to a steak. The dish is a technique more than a recipe, and the same plate method is used for fish fillets and for veal with a little butter in place of oil.

The meat has to be sliced thin, two or three millimetres, from a tender cut such as fillet, sirloin or the eye of the rump, and it is best cut by a butcher on a machine; a thick slice will not cook through before the plate cools. The slices are laid in a single layer without overlapping on a plate large enough to sit on top of a saucepan, brushed or drizzled with good olive oil, salted, and finished with lemon juice, a few drops of balsamic or a scatter of chopped parsley, rosemary or garlic. The pot beneath is brought to a hard boil, the plate goes on, a second plate inverted on top as a lid, and the meat cooks in its own thin layer of oil and juice for two to five minutes depending on thickness, until it has turned from red to a uniform pale pink or greyish pink. It is eaten from the same plate, with the oil and juices that have collected, and with bread or boiled vegetables.

Judge it on tenderness and restraint. The slices should be just cooked through, uniformly pale, soft enough to cut with a fork and still moist, bathed in a spoonful of oil and meat juice that tastes of lemon and the herb; the flavour of the meat should be forward, since nothing has been added to mask it. Mark down slices that are grey, dry and curled from being left too long or cut too thick, meat that is still raw in the middle because the water was not boiling, a plate swimming in oil, a dressing so sharp with lemon or vinegar that the meat is pickled rather than seasoned, and a version cooked in a pan and presented under the name, which will have a browned edge the true dish never has. It is light by design; a portion of 120 to 150 grams is normal and a large one is not a virtue.

Carne al piatto

Au deux demi n'oeuf

“Basse Côte” 
Clasico filete de ternera, muy bien cocinado con un increible sabor ahumado. Corteza perfecta y nivel de sal excelente. Ademas, con salsa de queso Roquefort asombrosa. Lo unico que cambiaria es el tipo de sal, con sal escamada fuera top

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Carne al piatto

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