Milanese Cuisine

About Milanese Cuisine

By the ULTIMATE Milan Editorial Team

Editor-in-Chief: Jai Michael

What to order in Milan, from the pasticceria counter to the trattoria and the aperitivo bar, and where to taste it: our guide to the dishes that define the city.

Milanese cuisine

Milanese cooking is the food of the north: butter rather than olive oil, rice rather than pasta, and dishes built to be lingered over on a foggy winter evening. It is generous but exact, and it belongs as much to the old trattorias as to the city’s grand dining rooms.

Risotto alla milanese

The city’s signature is a risotto gilded with saffron, made with a good stock and finished with butter and Parmigiano until it flows, all’onda, across the plate. It is eaten on its own as a first course, or alongside ossobuco, the one time the Milanese allow rice to share the plate with meat.

Butter, rice and saffron: the Milanese kitchen is the food of the north, rich, golden and unhurried.

The cotoletta

The cotoletta alla milanese is a veal cutlet, traditionally on the bone, dipped in egg and breadcrumbs and fried in butter until golden. Order it with a squeeze of lemon and a green salad; some kitchens pound it thin into an “orecchia d’elefante”, an elephant’s ear, that hangs over the edge of the plate.

Ossobuco and gremolata

Ossobuco is a thick slice of veal shank, braised slowly until the meat falls from the bone; the marrow in the bone is the cook’s reward. It is finished with gremolata, a fresh scatter of lemon zest, garlic and parsley, and served with risotto alla milanese.

Winter dishes

In the cold months the trattorias cook cassoeula, a hearty stew of pork cuts and Savoy cabbage, and mondeghili, Milanese meatballs fried in butter. Look for them on the menus of the city’s classic addresses from late autumn.

Panettone

Panettone, the tall, domed Christmas bread studded with candied orange, citron and raisins, is Milan’s gift to the Italian Christmas. From November the pasticcerie, Marchesi 1824, Cova and Peck among them, fill their windows with it; buy one wrapped in paper to take home.

The aperitivo

At the end of the working day Milan pauses for the aperitivo: a Campari, a spritz or a Negroni Sbagliato, the “mistaken” Negroni made with sparkling wine, with something to eat alongside. Take it at the counter of Camparino in Galleria, where the aperitivo has been served since 1915, or at Bar Basso on the Via Plinio, where the Sbagliato was born.

Where to taste it

For the classics, the MICHELIN Guide selects Ratanà in Isola and Il Cairoli near the Castello for Milanese cooking, and the Trattoria del Nuovo Macello and Antica Osteria il Ronchettino for Lombard and Milanese dishes. For panettone, go to Marchesi 1824, Cova or Peck; for the aperitivo, Camparino or Bar Basso.

Our advice: order risotto alla milanese and ossobuco together at least once, and save panettone for the journey home.

Opening hours, prices and seasonal openings change, so please check with Milanese Cuisine before you go.