Grilled Veal with Horned Melon Sauce

I was walking through the completely cleaned-up fruit aisle at Seasons grocery store on Central Avenue (in Long Island, New York) and I found this fruit that I had never seen before. It was spiky and actually hurt to pick up! The sticker on the fruit said that it was a horned melon and I was immediately intrigued. Did it taste like a melon? How should I eat it? What kind of recipe could this crazy fruit inspire? I placed a few horned melons in my cart and warned the checkout cashier to watch herself while ringing them up…so she wouldn’t hurt herself! Seems silly that a fruit can hurt you, but it’s pretty sharp, so watch out. Surprisingly, the melon tastes like a sweetened cucumber and I definitely recommend picking one (or more) up and trying this recipe. 

Grilled Veal and Horned Melon Sauce Ingredients

Horned Melon Sauce

1 horned melon

3 Tbsp lime juice

1 Tbsp mustard (I used 3-pepper mustard but I think honey mustard would also be delicious)

1 tsp vegetable oil

1/4 tsp cumin

1 garlic clove, minced

salt and pepper to taste

Veal

1 pound veal, on or off the bone

steak or chicken seasoning (my favorite is Montreal Steak or Chicken Seasoning)

cumin

Salad

shredded lettuce

cucumber

red pepper

*avocado, which I didn’t put in my salad because I am on a diet, but I highly recommend it

To make the sauce, I cut the horned melon in half lengthwise and used a spoon to scoop out the pulp. I combined the melon pulp, lime juice, mustard, oil, cumin, garlic, salt and pepper in a food processor and processed until well blended.

Once the sauce was combined, I gave it a quick taste to make sure I liked the flavors. You can add more salt and pepper to taste, or even more mustard if you want a thicker sauce.

Once the sauce was made, I prepared the veal. All I had to do was sprinkle the steak seasoning, which is pretty spicy, and cumin on the meat and then I asked Justin to place it on the grill. I’m not really sure how to use our new grill yet.

Since I have no idea how long you should grill veal, I will just say to cook the meat until it is ready then let it sit for 5 minutes on the counter to give the juices a chance to redistribute. If you cut the meat right off the grill, all of the juice will run out on to the cutting board and you will end up with dry veal. And no one wants to eat dry veal!

I cut up the lettuce, pepper, cucumber and some extra horned melon pulp then placed the sliced veal on the salad and spooned the sauce over the top. And that’s it! The horned melon sauce was citrusy, savory and a wonderful compliment to the spicy veal.

I would love to find some more interesting horned melon recipes! If you have any ideas, please send them my way.