Straccetti di Manzo con Rucola

the Roman trattoria plate of beef torn into rags and seared in seconds, thrown straight onto raw rocket so the leaves wilt in the pan juices, with shaved grana and lemon

Origin: Rome, Italy

From the journey of Rocket.

Straccetti means little rags, and the name describes both the shape of the meat and the spirit of the dish. It is Roman trattoria cooking of the plainest sort: beef sliced or torn very thin, thrown into a screaming pan for less than a minute, and tipped whilst still bloody over a bed of raw rocket, which collapses in the residual heat without ever being cooked. The whole thing takes about four minutes from cold pan to table, which is why it appears on so many Roman lunch menus and so few cookbooks. Its interest for the plant is that it uses rocket in two states at once. The leaves directly under the meat wilt, darken, and lose their aggression, turning soft and almost spinach-like as the hot fat and pan juices run into them. The leaves at the edge of the plate stay raw and keep their full pepperiness. A forkful therefore delivers both, and the contrast is the dish. This is a very different treatment from the northern habit of laying cold rocket over cold cured meat, and it is also different from the Pugliese practice of boiling the leaf outright. Romans argue about the cut. The dish began as a way of using up the thin, awkward trimmings from better joints, and it is still best made from something with a little chew rather than from prime fillet, which turns to nothing at this speed.

Ingredients

Beef

  • 500 g beef rump, sirloin, or flank, well chilled
  • 3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
  • 2 cloves garlic, lightly crushed but left whole
  • 1 sprig rosemary (optional)
  • 60 ml dry white wine
  • 1 pinch sea salt and coarsely ground black pepper

To serve

  • 150 g rocket (arugula), washed and thoroughly dried
  • 60 g Parmigiano Reggiano or Grana Padano, in shavings
  • 1 whole lemon, cut into wedges

Method

  1. Put the beef in the freezer for twenty minutes until it is firm at the edges but not frozen. Slice it as thinly as you possibly can against the grain, then tear or cut the slices into irregular strips a couple of fingers long.
  2. Spread the rocket over a large warmed serving platter in an even bed.
  3. Heat the oil in your largest, heaviest frying pan over the highest flame with the garlic and rosemary until the garlic is fragrant and just colouring, then remove and discard both.
  4. When the pan is genuinely smoking, add the beef in a single layer, in two batches if necessary, and cook for forty to sixty seconds, turning once. Season with salt and pepper as it cooks.
  5. Pour in the wine, let it bubble hard for fifteen seconds whilst you scrape the base of the pan, and immediately tip the meat and every drop of the juices over the bed of rocket.
  6. Scatter the shaved cheese over the top and serve at once, with lemon wedges alongside.

Notes

Rump, sirloin, and flank all work and all keep a little texture; fillet is the classic mistake, going grey and woolly in the seconds this dish allows. Some Roman versions add a handful of cherry tomatoes to the pan with the wine, and some finish with a spoonful of balsamic instead of lemon, which is a northern habit rather than a Roman one. The dish will not wait: it must be eaten within a minute or two of leaving the pan, or the rocket goes uniformly limp and the beef overcooks in its own heat. A rocket with real pepperiness is worth having, since it has to stand up to both the beef and the cheese.

The Gastrographer

The Gastrographer

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Ingredient originTrade or transit route
Became a culinary stapleColonial / trade control
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