Gary does Gordon

I promised a while back to show how the veal stock is made, which is rather crucial to this project given nearly all meat related dishes use this stock in some way. I will confess to using bought stock sometimes when my veal stock supply has run out, but to be honest after having cooked the same dish using both bought and home made stocks, the difference between the two is actually not as great as you may think. Bought stock nowadays (The liquid proper stuff, not the granules or stock cubes) is very good and although the home made stuff definitely does add that little bit extra, you can’t knock the convenience of the bought variety, especially when it does the job pretty well.

The main problem I have always had with veal stock is purely the fact that obtaining the bones necessary to make the stock in the first place are hard to come by. Veal has a bad rep here in the UK after news broke a few years ago over the way in which calves were housed prior t slaughter, and the press and public whipped themselves into a frenzy over the situation. Consequently veal has a massive stigma attached to it here in the UK, and therefore demand for it is low… which means that butcher’s don’t necessarily stock it. Those that do, don’t stock much of it and when it is in stock it costs a bomb as it is UK bred and not imported from other European countries which use ‘cheaper’ practices in rearing veal in the first place.

Restaurants obviously have more opportunity to get the veal they need (e.g. Mr Ramsay for instance), but for Joe Public like myself, as you can imagine this is quite difficult, and what is even more difficult it getting the bones themselves, hence why I don’t often get the opportunity to make this stock.

Today however was a good day though as I got a phone call from my butcher to say he has some veal bones waiting for me. It always pays to have such relationships with your butcher… I was there in a flash and was presented with the entire leg bone of a calf. It was way too big and after much negotiation (I don’t know why) I managed to get Mr Butcher to chop the bone up into more manageable pieces. Time to make the stock.

Now contrary to other methods of making veal/beef stock that you see in other cook books the method which Gordon Ramsay uses makes for a very rich stock which is quite vibrant in colour. This is primarily because of the use of tomato paste as well as madeira and port in the process. The end result is a wonderful aromatic stock, which is almost velvety in texture… it is worth the effort.

You start by roasting the bones themselves on a relatively high heat for about an hour and a half. Once roasted, you then start sweating off the base vegetables and herbs (Onion, carrot, celery, bay leaf, thyme) in a heavy based pot, and then stirring in the tomato paste. Once this is done, you then deglaze with the port and madeira, reduce a bit and then add the bones. Top up the pot with water and then let it simmer for about 6 hours.

Vegetables and port and maderia

Stock simmering

It is as simple as that. Once it has finished simmering, you then strain the stock through some muslin and hey presto you have your stock. I tend to store a couple of ladles worth in some air tight containers and then freeze them till needed. It seems to work quite well.

Stock to be stored

Veal stock… Done!

Next up: Caramelised apple tarte tatin with vanilla icecream

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