Cachopo

As tradition built it

Serves 2. About 30 minutes.

Ingredients

• 2, 120 to 150 g each veal rump fillets
• to taste salt and black pepper
• 50 g serrano ham, sliced
• 60 g Havarti or another mild melting cheese
• as needed flour
• as needed beaten egg
• as needed breadcrumbs
• two fingers deep olive oil, for frying

Method

1. Flatten the fillets with a meat mallet and season both sides.
2. Lay the ham and cheese between the two fillets, or on half of one and fold it over.
3. Coat in flour and tap off the excess, dip in egg, then in breadcrumbs.
4. Fry in a wide pan, in two fingers of olive oil over a medium heat, 2 to 3 minutes a side, tilting the pan in circles so it cooks evenly.
5. Drain on kitchen paper and serve.

Notes

The recipe is Joaquín Palazuelos's in El Español's Cocinillas; he serves it with fried potatoes and roast peppers. Karlos Arguiñano folds a single 200 g fillet over cecina and cheese. No Asturian recipe was found, and neither source gives the Bar Pelayo cazuela finish.

What a modern chef changes

The frying temperature controlled precisely, since this is a breaded dish that lives or dies on it.

Not tied to a single rung

Method

1. Hold the frying oil at a genuinely fixed 175°C using a probe thermometer, rather than judging by eye, since the thin veal cooks through quickly and an oil that has crept too hot burns the crumb before the centre is done.
2. Rest the fried cachopo briefly on a rack, not on paper, so trapped steam does not soften the base of the crumb.
3. Use a genuine Idiazábal rather than a generic melting cheese, letting Rung 4's respect for a real cave-aged or DOP product carry through even into a dish that was never traditionally built around a named cheese.

Notes

This dish's elevation is a straightforward matter of frying discipline rather than one of the chemistry-driven techniques here.