Originally an Austrian dish, bécsi szelet was among the top 10 in the mains category in a 2010 online vote to find Hungary’s favorite dishes. It is traditionally made from veal but can also be made from pork. Hungarians usually eat it on holidays. This is a translation of a recipe published on austria.info.
Ingredients:
4 veal slices
400 milliliters oil for frying
For the breading:
100 grams flour
2 eggs
150 grams breadcrumbs
Method:
Make cuts around the edge of the slices of veal (This is to prevent them from curling up while frying.) Using the flat side of the tenderizer, hammer the meat and add salt. Bread the meat by dipping both sides in flour, then eggs, and then breadcrumbs. Fry both sides for two minutes in hot oil until golden brown or use a deep fryer. To make them even better, place the fried meat into a hot oven for a minute. Serve with potato salad and lemon circles or potatoes with parsley and cranberry jam.
The bad news is that Hungarian restaurants often make the Wiener Schnitzel in the fryer – together with their potato chips, which is not a very good idea …
I even think that the original recipe calls for butter, not oil in the frying pan.
For the worst wiener schnitzel on the planet visit Wolfgang Puck’s restaurant at MGM Grand in Vegas.
Herr Puck is a famous “celebrity chef” from Austria. Obviously wiener schnitzel is not his forte…
But do not forget there’s somebody who says that Bécsi szelet is the Austro-hungarian version of the Italian-made “Cotoletta milanese” (or Milanoi szelet).
IT is the only thing that Austrian general Josef Radetzky brought back from Italy after his long staying as Governor of the Italian provinces.
AFAIK the “piccata milanes” is made with cheese instead of breading and served with noodles and tomato sauce – so it seems way different from the Austrian variety.
PS: It’s still very good though and if you want it cheaper you can always use chicken breast instead of veal.
… served with noodles????????????????
Yes, piccata milanese is fried in a mixture of breadcrumbs a nd grated cheese and served with tomato sauce (=Milanese sauce) and “pasta”: spahgetti, maccaroni, fusilli, you name it …
We always put some parmesan on top …
This was one of the first Italian dishes my wife didn’t know but was quick to adopt on her international menue.
wolfi means Veal (or Chicken) Parmigiana.
Wiener Schnitzel is normally served with parsley potatoes.
@Dolfi:
Whatever you call it – I like it. On the other hand, Wiener Schnitzel with often more breadcrumbs than meat is only for masochists …
wolfi.
Wrong.
The meat must be hammered very thin, the breading should be thick and tasty.
The secret: add my special flavoring to the flour, egg and breadcrumbs. Dip the meat into the flour once, and twice in the eggs and breadcrumbs. Make it nice and thick.
Don’t deep fry the thing in oil, pan fry it in lard. Yummy.
The meat can be replaced with cheese or eggplant or zucchini or whatever. The breading is the good part, if done right.
@Dolfi:
Obviously we have different tastes …
Now that the weather is better we’ll have a lot of grilled meat and grilled vegetables – without any batter or breading.
PS: My wife is also considering the calories in that breading …