You can imagine our excitement when, in Seattle, on May 7, 2006, Lorenzo and I opened the Sunday New York Times Magazine and saw the wonderful picture of Signor and Signora Masuelli in the featured picture above, with their profile under the heading “The Originals: They Do It Their Way.”

As I recall, we were immediately on the phone to congratulate them on the terrific portrait, and a fax machine was even turned on to send a copy immediately.

Since then, their son Max (or Massimiliano as his apron reads) has taken over the restaurant and allowed his parents to retire to their beloved Piedmont. And the family tradition for warmth and excellence has carried on.

I will therefore let Max, from pictures posted by the restaurant, take us through the preparation of cotoletta alla milanese.

Step 1.

The official City of Milan recipe calls for four veal chops.

If there is fat on the edge of the chop, slit the fat border to the meat so the chop will not curl during cooking.

Pound the meat to flatten and reduce the thickness of the chop. (The surface area of the chop will expand.)

Step 2.

Prepare bread crumbs (using quality bread and grissini), and spread out the crumbs in a pan.

Beat two eggs.

One chop at a time, dip the chop in the beaten eggs to coat, and then roll the chop in the bread crumbs, ensuring the  surface is well covered, and patting the coating to be sure it sticks. (For a thicker, crunchier crust, you can perform the coating two times, as they do at Trattoria Masuelli.)

Step 3.

After coating each chop, let the chops rest at least 15 minutes.

Melt one stick, or 4 ounces, of butter in a skillet.

Note: For best results, clarify the butter first so that it has a higher smoking point.

Just as the butter reaches its smoking point, saute each breaded chop until the breading is golden and crunchy on each side (six to eight minutes total).

Step 4.

Pat each chop quickly with a paper towel to absorb any excess butter.

Salt and pepper the chop as desired.

Serve immediately, together with a lemon slice.

Popular accompaniments are potatoes roasted with rosemary, or chopped cherry tomatoes and arugula.

For More Information

The City of Milan granted Costoletta alla Milanese status as an authentic and historic dish from Milan, with the recipe available as a downloadable pdf. (In case you’re wondering, costoletta is the Italian word for chop or cutlet, and cotoletta is the same in Milanese dialect.) The recipe for cotoletta in English, together with instructions for clarifying butter, can be found here.

Trattoria Maseulli has been run by the Maseulli family since 1921 at Viale Umbria 80, Milan. Quite obviously, I recommend. But you don’t need to take my word for it. In addition to the earlier New York Times profile, the New York Times wine critic Eric Asimov reported on a visit in December, 2019; and Trattoria Maseulli has been recommended by English language reviewers in CNN travel, The Guardian, The Independent, The Sunday Telegraph, and The South China Post, to name just a few. Pictures of Trattoria Maseulli come from their Facebook page.

The Postcard is the Basilica di Sant’Ambrogio, where the first recorded dinner in 1134 of cotoletta with the monks took place. Because I want to give you, my readers, the most accurate information, I dug into the sources. The primary source usually given for this event is the History of Milan | Storia di Milano by Pietro Verri, first published in 1783. Verri cites Count Giulini as his source, and suggests the information is inconclusive. After some hunting, I found the Memoirs | Memorie of Count Giorgio Giulini, first published in 1760, where he discusses the dinner. It’s complicated. First, it took place in 1148, not 1134. Second, the dinner was the source of much contention, since the monks were demanding from the abbot not only a nine dish, three course feast to celebrate San Satiro, but also wanted candles and an offering of money. An archbishop was sent in to mediate the contentious dispute. The result: the monks got the dinner with cotoletta, but no candles, no money. When I asked Lorenzo to read Giulini’s account to be sure I was understanding it correctly, his response was, “This could be a Saturday Night Live sketch.”

Per gli Italiani | For Italian speakers:

In the process of searching for the authentic recipe for cotoletta, I discovered:

A lovely collection of traditional recipes from Lombardia | Lombardy, Per un codice della cucina lombarda, assembled by the regional agricultural department, and available as a downloadable pdf.

Gastronomia Moderna by Giuseppe Sorbiatti (third edition, 1888) in the digital library of the Biblioteca Nationale Centrale di Roma, and available to view here. The cotoletta recipe is #768 in this version.

Feature photo of the Masuellis:  Credit The New York Times, Robert Maxwell.