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Veal sweetbreads with snails, kassler, roast garlic and chilli

Australian Gourmet Traveller recipe for Veal sweetbreads with snails, kassler, roast garlic and chilli

By Dietmar Sawyere
  • 20 mins preparation
  • 1 hr cooking plus cooling
  • Serves 4
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Veal sweetbreads with snails, kassler, roast garlic and chilli
"I love veal sweetbreads," says Sawyere. "Make sure you get the sweetbread from the heart; it has a more delicate flavour and is rounder and creamier in texture. Peeling the grapes isn't essential but it results in a more refined finished product."

Ingredients

  • 1 head garlic
  • 200 ml chicken stock
  • 4 veal sweetbreads (see note), sinew trimmed
  • 200 gm butter, coarsely chopped
  • 100 gm piece of kassler (see note), cut into batons
  • 12 canned snails, drained
  • 1 small red chilli, thinly sliced
  • 12 seedless white grapes, peeled
  • To serve: chervil sprigs
Garlic sauce
  • 100 ml chicken stock
  • 3 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
  • 100 ml pouring cream
  • Squeeze of lemon juice, or to taste

Method

Main
  • 1
    Preheat oven to 150C. Wrap garlic in foil and roast until very tender (30-40 minutes), then cool, halve horizontally, squeeze cloves from skin into a small bowl (discard skin), stir to form a coarse paste, then set aside.
  • 2
    Meanwhile, bring stock to the simmer in a saucepan over medium-high heat, add sweetbreads, cook for 1 minute, remove with a slotted spoon and drain on absorbent paper (discard stock), cool to room temperature.
  • 3
    For garlic sauce, bring stock and garlic to the boil in a saucepan over medium-high heat, cook until reduced by half (1-2 minutes), add cream, reduce by half (1-2 minutes). Strain through a fine sieve into a clean saucepan, season to taste with lemon juice, sea salt and freshly ground pepper, keep warm. Froth with a hand-held blender just before serving.
  • 4
    Heat half the butter in a frying pan over medium-high heat, add sweetbreads and cook, turning and spooning butter over sweetbreads occasionally, until golden (3-4 minutes). Drain on absorbent paper, set aside and keep warm.
  • 5
    Heat remaining butter in a separate frying pan over medium-high heat, add kassler, snails, chilli and 2 tsp roast garlic paste and stir occasionally until kassler is crisp (2-3 minutes). Add grapes, warm through, season to taste.
  • 6
    Divide sweetbreads among serving plates, season to taste and spoon over kassler mixture, then garlic sauce. Serve hot scattered with chervil sprigs, with extra roast garlic paste.

Notes

Sweetbreads are available from select butchers and may need to be ordered ahead. Kassler, a German style of cured and smoked pork, is available from select butchers and delicatessens. If it's unavailable, substitute lightly smoked bacon.
This recipe is from the July 2012 issue of
.

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  • undefined: Dietmar Sawyere