First Osso Buco

Another crisp sunny winter morning saw me off to the market with some friends. It was the first Saturday of the month so the SMH Food Growers Market was on in Pyrmont.



I used to be a regular here ever month, until I discovered a weekly market closer to home. It was good to be back. This is a bigger, classier market and I was surprised how many more stalls there are now. The number of new meat and fish vendors was impressive and the quality of their produce was even more impressive.

I just love this Market and the only thing that stopped my buying up everything in sight was that I just couldn’t physically carry it. I waited until near the end of our visit to purchase my flowers but even then I was trying to make purchases while knocking everyone in sight with my big bunch of native Australian flowers.

My best purchase of the day was some fabulous Venison Osso Buco from a lovely couple at the Mandagery Creek Venison Stall. These guys were great fun and a pleasure to talk to. I was tempted to go for the Venison Shanks as there was a recipe I wanted to make but they convinced me to go for some Osso Buco. Not only have I never cooked Osso Buco but I have never even eaten it before. It has become very popular on menus in Sydney in the last few years but I have never ordered it myself.

So, laden down with all my market goodies I headed home and got out the cook books to look for some Osso Buco recipes. There was even a recipe for Veal Osso Buco in the Newspaper. I guess it’s the season for it because it’s so chilly at the moment. I went for a recipe in Food We Love that sounded like what I was looking for. It was for Veal but how different could Venison be? Well, apparently 45 minutes in the oven different. When I followed the recipe exactly the meat was still a little chewy but after putting it back in the oven for an extra 45 mins it was perfect. We enjoyed a nice hearty Venison Osso Buco with green lentils and a bottle of Moorebank Private Vineyard 2002 Merlot and some crusty warm bread.

Osso Buco

90g Butter
2 medium carrots, chopped finely
2 large brown onions, chopped finely
3 trimmed celery sticks, chopped finely
2 cloves garlic, crushed
2kg Veal Osso Buco
1/3 cup flour, for dusting
2 tblsp olive oil
2x400g chopped tomatoes
½ cup dry red wine
1 ¾ cups beef stock
1 tblsp finely chopped fresh basil
1 tsp finely shopped fresh thyme
1 bay leaf
2.5cm strip lemon rind

Heat a third of the butter in a large saucepan; Cook carrot, onion, celery and half of the garlic until onion is golden brown. Remove from heat; transfer vegetables to a large ovenproof dish.
Coat veal with flour; shake away excess. Heat the remaining butter and oil in same pan. Add veal; brown well on all sides. Carefully pack veal on top of vegetables.
Preheat oven to 180C
Drain fat from pan. Add undrained tomatoes, wine, stock, basil, thyme, bay leaf and strip of melon rind; bring sauce to the boil
Pour sauce over veal. Cover dish; bake in oven about 1 ½ hours, stirring occasionally.
[Note: I used some preserved lemon instead of the lemon rind and it was delicious. We could definitely taste it in the sauce.]