Healthy and Delicious Ways to Cook Veal Cutlets Without Breading

If you can’t decide between beef or chicken, try my veal scallopini recipe! I changed my chicken piccata recipe to make this. It has the same lemony white wine and caper sauce on top, but this time there are thinly sliced veal cutlets on top. Think classic bright and buttery vibes like the chicken version, except more flavorful. This dish is great for a fancy event or a special weeknight, even though it only takes 20 minutes to make.

Why You’ll Love My Veal Scallopini Recipe

• Veal that melts in your mouth—This is a simple way to start cooking veal if you’ve never done it before. It’s juicy and tender, and tastes better than chicken but not as strong as beef.
• Zesty lemon caper sauce—that balance of sour lemon and salty capers against the creamy butter…so rich!
• Simple pantry ingredients—I wanted great results without having to make a lot of trips to the store, so my recipe has a short list of ingredients. And you don’t need flour.
• This dish comes together quickly and looks great at the same time. It’s a great way to spend time with your date instead of cooking on a date night.

This part talks about how to pick the best ingredients for my veal scallopini recipe, what each one does, and what you can use instead. For measurements, see the recipe card below.

• Veal Cutlets: Veal is the meat from a baby cow. It is soft and has a mild flavor. Most of the time, I can find it at the butcher shop near me or in the meat section of the grocery store, next to the beef. See my chicken piccata recipe for how to make this dish with chicken breast that has been pounded very thin.
• Olive Oil – For searing. Even though I like the taste of olive oil better, avocado oil will do just fine.
• Sea Salt & Black Pepper

• Garlic: For the best taste, use fresh garlic. If you don’t have any, 2 teaspoons of minced garlic from a jar will work. You can also add diced onions, but they will take a little longer to cook.
• To make veal piccata taste even better, add white cooking wine. It also helps make the meat more tender. But you can use chicken broth and a little white wine vinegar instead. It’s not quite the same.
• Broth—I love the deep flavor of my homemade bone broth, but you can use store-bought in this dish and it will still taste great. You can use regular chicken broth instead of bone broth if you’d like, but I like the bone broth better.
• Lemon Juice – Adds a fresh, zippy kick. I recommend freshly squeezed if you can.
• Butter: This adds richness to the sauce and helps cook the garlic. I recommend unsalted, as several other ingredients are already salty. For a dairy-free option, this butter-flavored coconut oil has worked well in other recipes.
• Capers—for that classic salty, briny piccata taste! Make sure to drain them first.
• Fresh Parsley—You can add this at the end if you want to add some color. I used curly parsley, but you can use Italian parsley or thyme instead.

How To Cook Veal Scallopini

This section shows step-by-step photos together with the instructions, to help you visualize the recipe. For full instructions, including amounts and temperatures, see the recipe card below.

• Pound the cutlets. Pound the veal with a meat mallet until it is 1/8-inch thick. Season both sides with salt and pepper.
• Brown the veal. Warm the oil in a big pan over medium-high heat until it shimmers. Working in groups, cook the veal slices in a single layer until the juices run clear. (I can usually fit 2 in the pan at once. ) Put on a plate and cover with foil to keep warm.

• Make the piccata sauce. Turn the heat down to medium, add the butter and garlic, and cook until the garlic smells good. Add the white wine, bone broth, and lemon juice. To deglaze the pan, scrape up any cooked food in it and add it to the sauce. (Use a wooden spoon, so you don’t scratch your pan. ).
• Simmer. Bring the sauce to a boil after adding the capers. Then reduce the heat and let it cook until it’s half gone. Add more butter and taste to see if you need to add more salt or pepper.

• Combine. Put the cooked veal scallopini back into the pan and turn it around so that all the pieces are covered in sauce. Don’t forget to add the fresh parsley and maybe some lemon slices too.

• Pound the veal cutlets very thin. Scallopini, which is also written as scaloppine in Italian, means “thinly sliced meat,” which is an important part of this recipe. I recommend 1/8 inch thick. It helps the meat get tender and take on the flavors of the sauce, and it lets the pieces cook quickly and evenly.
• Grab the largest skillet you have. When you pound veal cutlets thin, they take up a lot of room, so a bigger skillet is better. I love my cast iron skillets, but for my veal scallopini recipe, I like to use nonstick or stainless steel skillets instead because they are easier on the sauce.

• I don’t use white flour and I don’t like most thickeners. The sauce tastes great the way it is. It can be thicker if you don’t want to use white flour, though. Just lightly dust the veal cutlets with cornstarch or one of my other cornstarch alternatives before cooking.
• Creamy: When the sauce is done, add a splash of heavy cream and let it cook for a few minutes to thin out. Then, add the veal back to the pan.
• Marsala: I chose to make my veal scallopini taste like chicken piccata, but you can also make these thin veal slices that taste like chicken marsala. Just use veal cutlets instead of chicken in my chicken marsala recipe.
• Triple or double—My recipe only has enough sauce to cover the meat, but you can double it to add more on top. Also, make three or even four times as much sauce as you need if you want to serve your veal over noodles or rice.

Keep leftovers in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 3-5 days. You can reheat them in a hot skillet again, or simply in the microwave. I don’t recommend freezing this dish.

Not sure what to eat with veal scallopini to make a full meal? Here are some sides that go well with this special dish:

My meat tenderizer makes it so easy to make quick cutlets! Use the flat side to pound thin slices of veal (or any meat), and the textured side for tenderizing tougher cuts. Recipe Card

This piccata-style veal scallopini recipe is coated in a light, buttery lemon caper sauce. It may look fancy, but it takes just 20 minutes!.

Tap underlined ingredients to see the ones I use.

Tap on the times in the instructions below to start a kitchen timer while you cook.

• Use the flat side of a meat tenderizer to pound the veal cutlets to an 1/8-inch thickness. Season both sides with salt and pepper.
• For 12 inches, heat the olive oil over medium-high heat until it shimmers. Adding the veal cutlets in a single layer one at a time Sear each side for 30 to 45 seconds, or until the juices run clear. Put on a plate and cover with foil to keep warm. Do this again with all of the veal cutlets. If you need to, add more olive oil halfway through.
• Reduce the heat to medium. Add a tablespoon of butter to the pan. Put in the minced garlic and cook for one minute, until the garlic smells good.
• Add the white wine, broth, and lemon juice. Use a wooden spoon or spatula to scrape the bottom of the pan to get rid of any browned bits. This is called deglazing. Add the capers. Turn up the heat and bring it to a boil. Then, lower the heat and let it simmer for 7–10 minutes, until the liquid has reduced by half and become slightly thicker.
• Stir in the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter, until melted. Simmer for three to four more minutes, or until half of the liquid is gone. Taste and adjust salt and pepper to taste, if desired.
• Return the veal to the pan and coat in sauce. Serve with fresh parsley, if desired.

Veal Scallopini – Crispy Breaded Veal Cutlets Recipe | Cooking with Maria