Boeuf à la Mode Pepita

Some of the best meals I’ve ever had with Claude, our extensive restaurant-going aside, have been at his apartment on the avenue Gambetta, with Pepita doing the cooking. One of her best dishes—a French classic now difficult to find in Parisian restaurants, much less in the United States—is boeuf à la mode. This is her recipe, and it is very French, complete with larding for the beef (you’ll need a larding needle), a calf’s foot in the sauce for texture, and not one but two instances of flam