Comfortable and easy to prepare, carpaccio is the ideal meat for the summer season if you want to consume something fresh, tasty and stunning.
The only secret is to have a meat of good quality to your disposal, since this dish is quick to prepare if there is not a lot of time.
What is carpaccio
Despite versions having been invented with fish now, carpaccio is an Italian apperitif made from raw meat of the beef, cut into very thin slices and seasoned in different ways, like with olive oil and lemon, aromatized mayonnaise, shaved parmesan or truffle… ingredients that must not be very strong, since they would otherwise dissimulate the taste of the main igredient, the meat.
How carpaccio is prepared
To prepare a good carpaccio, the following rules should be respected:
- The meat should be very fresh and of the best possible quality.
- The condiments should be mild
There are two ways of preparing carpaccio:
- The first is the carpaccio alla Cipriani, named after the inventor of the dish. It is prepared with mayonnaise, Worcester sauce and milk.
- The second consists of elaborating the carpaccio in the traditionnal way from beef, garnished with rocket salad and Grana cheese.
As we explained before, the dish must be simple and the condiments should be mild, since the principal taste must be that of the meat.
As for the type of meat, for the carpaccio, it is necessary to choose a lean piece with few tissue. When going to the butcher, you should ask for the best quality, which is why fillet is highly recommended, as it is taken from the muscle of the sirloin, which comes from the lumbar part of the ox or the beef.
Finally, to elaborate the classic carpaccio, you only need to cut the meat into very thin slices and add the seasoning, in this case, rocket salad and Grana cheese. Over the meat, we will add some salsa elaborated with lemon, oil, salt and ground pepper.
As you can see, this is a creative and high quality dish that is very simple to prepare.
History
To discover the origen of this dish, we must go back in time all the way to 1950, when Giuseppe Cipriani, the owner of Harry’s Bar in Venice, a legendary bar of the 30’s of the XX century, known for its exclusive clientele, created a recipe for the countess Amaia Nani Mocenigo, a friend of his. Recently, doctors prohibited her from eating cooked meat, so that Giuseppe created a recipe with raw meat for her.
As for the name, Giuseppe chose it in honor of the famous painter Vittore Carpaccio, which at the time was presenting an exhibition in the Ducal Palace in Venice. In fact, the color of the raw meat reminded him of the intense shades of the artist’s paintings.
Quite curious, isn’t it?
Steer loin carpaccio at Agust Barcelona
If we have inspired your appetite to taste this delicious dish, we invite you to try it at Agust Barcelona. You can find our famous steer loin carpaccio in our Appetizers menu. The red shade of the meat contrasts with the white of the stone on which it is served.
This delicious meat of the highest quality matches perfectly with the sauces and the cheese that accompany it, which is why now, in the summer, it is a perfect starter to work up an appetite.
We wait for you at Agust Barcelona!