Zürcher Geschnetzeltes

This is one of the all-time classic European dishes, at least in German-speaking countries, so I was surprised that my well-traveled dining companions had never heard of it. It's a great winter dish and relatively easy, though pricey if you use veal as in the original.

Geschnetzeltes just means cut up, and this veal dish is to Zurich what Fegato alla veneziana (calves' liver, Venetian style) is to Venice. The recipe in the Swiss cookbook I've been carrying around for decades (Cooking in Switzerland by Marianne Haltenbach) was too vague. For instance, she neglected to mention that the veal should be cut in narrow strips, perhaps because she figures, wrongly, that everyone knows this. So I scoured the Web and settled on a recipe by Manuela Darling-Gansser carried at sbs.com.au/food as my guide.

She calls for veal back strap, whatever that is. Since American supermarkets carry very few cuts of veal, I just got scaloppini from the leg, buying 1-1/2 lbs for 4 people. I cut 3/4-in. strips cross-wise to get strips 2-4 in. long. Alone among the recipes, this one calls for flouring the veal, and since this works so well for scaloppini, I thought it made sense. However, the flour burned on the skillet and I had to change pans, so I would probably skip this the next time.

You sautée the veal quickly in butter and oil to brown the strips and set them aside. Add more butter and oil and sautée a finely sliced onion, 2 sliced cloves of garlic and 15 fresh sage leaves, chopped. After a few minutes, add a half-pound of "Swiss brown mushrooms" (I used cremini), thickly sliced. When the mushrooms are softened, add a cup of dry white wine, deglaze skillet, add the veal back in and cook until the wine evaporates, check seasoning. I stopped here to save the finish for just before serving. To finish, add 10 oz. of heavy cream and let bubble a couple of minutes, then serve.

The traditional accompaniment is rösti, a simple Swiss version of home fries. You are supposed to boil Yukon gold potatoes, let them cool, and then refrigerate covered for at least 4 hours and up to 2 days. I barely made the minimum and it probably works better if you can do it a day ahead of time. You peel and grate the potatoes in the large-hole side of the grater, and toss with salt and pepper. You heat butter and oil in a skillet, put in the potatoes, press into a flat "cake" with a spatula. Mine did not come out quite right (still tasted good because you can't really screw up with those ingredients). I used a skillet that was too big instead of the 9 to 9-1/2 in. called for. Other recipes call for it to be covered, but perhaps that was a mistake with this one, since it gets turned. Anyway, after 10 min. or so, a brown crust should form on the bottom of the cake, and you flip it onto a plate and slide the cake bakc into the skillet (with more butter and oil) with the uncooked side down and form a crust on that side for another 10 min. To serve, you cut into wedges.