Œufs pochez à la Princesse - Princess Poached Eggs

Princess Poached Eggs.
Start by dissolving sugar [simple syrup], cooking until it takes a consistency of syrup; break eggs, using only the yolks, put each one in an eating spoon, & hold in the syrup, until they are cooked; make as many and as cooked [hard or soft] as you like, & when your dish is filled, sprinkle with sugar, and when they are served, pour a little Orange flower water over them and add a grating of candied lemon peel.

Interesting taste, one of those items of which you close your eyes before you take a bite--reminds me of what I thought was crazy when the boys in the cafeteria at college in East Texas poured pancake syrup on their eggs--but it actually tastes good. Evidently it is still appreciated in Quebec where they pour maple syrup over eggs.

*****Œufs pochez à la Princesse.
On commence par faire fondre du sucre qu’on cuit, jusqu’à ce qu’il ait pris une consistance de syrop; on casse des œufs dont on ne prend que les jaunes, qu’on met l’un aprés l’autre dans une cuilliere à bouche, & qu’on tient ainsi dans le syrop, jusqu’à ce qu’ils soient cuits, on en fait tant qu’on en veut de cette maniere, & lorsque le plat est rempli, on les poudre de sucre, puis on les sert, piquez d’écorce de citron confits, avec de l’eau de fleur d’Orange, qu’on verse pardessus.

Le Menage de la Ville et des Champs, et le Jardinier François, Louis Liger & Nicolas de Bonnefons. Chez Jean Leonard, Brussels, 1712, p.156-157.

Echaudés - Boiled Pastry

One of La Varenne's editions of The French Cook was translated into English in 1653, and over one hundered years later, the 10th edition of La Nouvelle Maison Rustique uses the same recipes, almost word for word to describe not only the ingredients, but the method of the previous century--it only adds another sweet variation and a second boiling, this time in oil or lard. Truly, nothing is new under the sun. And those of us in America are familiar with this boiled pastry technique, as well. Celebrate the past each time you eat your bagel and cream cheese.

Depending upon your region of France, your echaudés will have one of several appearances: Lyon, jeannots, craquelins and those with anise.

Le Cuisinier François, de La Varenne. Unzieme Edition, Chez Jacquez Canier, 1680, p. 308-311.

The method of making échaudéz [boiled or scalded pastry], or craquelins with butter.

Place a pint of flour on your table, make a small well in the middle, & put approximately a half glass of warm water mixed with beer yeast, & stir it together until a fine paste results which will become the leavening agent to incorporate into your échaudé pastry, which is why it will be necessary to allow this paste to rise [proof] in a warm place, so that it doubles in bulk, & if it is in Summer it can be inflated sufficiently in fifteen minutes.

While you are waiting for the leavening to proof, you will put on a table a quart of fine [pastry] flour, make a well in the middle and work in a pound of sweet butter, which is cold but not too hard, & mix in an ounce or a bit more of well-pounded salt, mix it altogether, adding what it will be necessary of cold water to mix this pastry [to the right consistency], & when your leaven has risen sufficiently, incorporate it into your butter pastry and work it well.

And when it is mixed sufficiently, you will roll it out and cut it into small triangles with a serrated roller [jagger or pastry wheel] which will then be stretched by hand to form echaudez.

It will be necessary to have a cauldron [copper confiture pan] full of boiling water where you will drop in your echaudez, & leave them until they resurface; & then you will take a skimmer with which you will turn your echaudez until they are done to the touch, & then you will remove them from the water, & will put them to cool and dry on a wire netting; then you will bake them in the oven: it takes about 15 minutes to bake small echaudez. But it is necessary that the furnace is hard, i.e. as hot as in cooking large pastries.

If echaudez do not take sufficient color while cooking, it will be necessary to do a little clear fire on the end, near the sides of the furnace, so that the higher will color them.

Notice well: if you do not put butter in your echaudez, & make them only with salt & water, you will have a common variety that most people know [pretzels or craquelins].

Echaudez with eggs in the pastry, it is made with a quart of flour & fifteen eggs, & you will use only one half pound of butter. Echaudez with eggs, must be carefully handled and is more delicate than that of the other echaudez. It still should be noted that one must bake in a slower oven echaudez with the eggs, than those which are only of salt & water, or with butter.

La nouvelle maison rustique par le Sieur Louis Liger. Paris : Saugrain, 1755, Tome II, IV. Part. LIV. IV. Chap. III. La Pâtisserie. p. 861.

Echaudez glazed [with icing sugar]. Take echaudez made with eggs after they leave the water, let them drain & harden, then cut them in half between the two crusts, put to soak in milk with sugar, cover them & put them on hot ash during four or five hours to hold them warmly: it is not necessary that they boil, for fear they may disintegrate; then draw them from the milk & put them to drain [on a wire netting], then fry in new lard [I would use olive oil]: when fried & well coloured, draw them out with a skimmer, powder them with confectioner’s sugar, first on one side & then the other, & serve them warmly.

Rissoles

Take whitemeat [breast] of poultry or fillet of veal cooked, chop it on a table [cutting board] with a little parsley & Welsh onion [scallions], add a little bacon & some small mushrooms; after it’s well chopped together, crush it in the mortar while adding egg yolks to bind the forcemeat, season it well. Cut small undercrusts of fine paste [squares or triangles], & wrap each undercrust around a small nut [tablespoon] of forcemeat, & when your rissoles all are prepared, fry in lard or [graisse] which is hot like making fritters: when the crust turns golden on one side, turn the rissoles on other side with a small stick without bursting them, & when they are well [colored] on both sides, withdraw them from the fat with a skimmer, & serve warm.
On fast days, fill [rissoles] with a fish farce, & fry them in butter [fish and butter are not considered meat or meat grease, which is not allowed on a fast day].

La nouvelle maison rustique, ou, Économie generale de tous les biens de campagne: la manière de les entretenir & de les multiplier : donée ci-devant au public / par le Sieur Louis Liger. Paris : Saugrain, 1755, Tome II, IV. Part. LIV. IV. Chap. I. La Cuisine. B., p. 845.

RissolesPrenez du blanc de volaille ou de la rouelle de veau cuite, hachez-la sur une table avec un peu de persil & de ciboule, mettez-y un peu de lard & quelques petits champignons; le tout bien haché, pilez-le encore dans le mortier, mettez-y des juanes d’œufs, le tout bien assaisonné, faites de petites abaisses de pâte fine bien minces, & enveloppez dans chaque abaisse gros comme une petite noix de farce, & lorsque vos rissoles seront toutes façonnées, il faudra les frire dans du sain-doux qui soit chaud comme pour faire des beignets: quand la croûte paroîtra juane d’un côté dans le sain-doux, vous tournerez les rissoles de l’autre côté avec un petit baton sans les crever, & quand elles seront bien rissoles des deux côtés, il faudra les tirer à sec avec une écumoire, & les server chaudement.
On en peut faire en maigre avec une farce de poisson, & les frire dans du beurre.

Tourte of foie gras

Make an undercrust of fine paste & put it in a tart plate, put grated bacon on the bottom, season it with salt and pepper & a little sweet herbs, arrange the livers next & finish with tips of mushrooms, morels, will foams & truffles; season like the lower part, & cover the whole with very thin veal slices & bacon slices, cover the tourte with a second crust, gild it with eggs & put it to bake in the oven; once cooked, take it out and remove the top section of crust [carefully], remove the sections of veal & the slices of bacon [save these for hash or a farce], degrease it & add a little ham essence, replace the upper crust, reheat it & serve.

La nouvelle maison rustique, ou, Économie generale de tous les biens de campagne: la manière de les entretenir & de les multiplier : donée ci-devant au public / par le Sieur Louis Liger. Paris : Saugrain, 1755, Tome II, IV. Part. LIV. IV. Chap. I. La Cuisine. B., p. 849.

Tourte de foies gras
Dressez une abaisse de pâte fine & la mettez dans une tourtiere, mettez dessus du lard rapé, l’assaisonnez de sel, de poivre & un peu de fines herbes, rangez les foies dessus & garnissez de crêtes, de champignons, morilles, mousserons & truffes assasisonnés comme le dessous, & couvrez le tout de tranches de veau bien minces & bardes de lard, couvrez la tourte de l’autre abaisse, dorez-la d’œufs & la mettez cuire au four; étant cuite, tirez-la & la découvrez, ôtez-en les tranches de veau & les bardes de lard, dégraissez-la & y mettez un peu d’essence de jambon, recouvrez-la & la servez chaudement.

Middle-class Soups - Potages Bourgeois

Cover a good piece of beef [a haunch or a slice], with water in a cooking pot, & when the pot boils half an hour, after skimming the foam, add mutton, a knuckle of veal, & poultry as much as you want; also add salt & three cloves, & let it boil [again until meats are tender]. One hour or half an hour before serving, add herbs with a few cucumbers or root vegetables according to the season, & [some] verjuice: *[ladle] soup onto croutons or [slices or pieces] of dried bread in a serving bowl, simmer on embers [slowly re-warm], & add bouillon as it is consumed [the bread absorbs it].

*Before adding soup to bread, one can add to [hot] soup two egg yolks [beaten] with half-glass of verjuice & a little bouillon, stirring them in well to set the egg.

The title of this soup, middle-class or Bourgeois, infers that there is a difference in the soup of the lower class. This is, indeed, true. This soup has meat, in fact, more than one type of meat. Although this soup would be usual at the table of the gentry living in the country (as the title of the book implies [The New Country House]), the servants or the lower class would most likely not have meat(s) in their soups, but simple fare of vegetables and grains. Notice though that the gentry also sop up the last drop of broth with bread, using bread as an integral part of the soup. Waste not, want not.

La nouvelle maison rustique, ou, Économie generale de tous les biens de campagne: la manière de les entretenir & de les multiplier : donée ci-devant au public / par le Sieur Louis Liger. Paris : Saugrain, 1755, Tome II, IV. Part. LIV. IV. Chap. I. La Cuisine. B., p. 840.

Potages Bourgeois
Mettez de l’eau dans une marmite avec un bon morceau de bœuf de cimier ou de tranche, faites-la écumer, & quand le pot aura bouilli une demi-heure, mettez-y du mouton, un jarret de veau, & une volaille se vous en voulez; ajoutez-y du sel & trios clous de girofle, & le laissez bouillir. Une heure ou demi-heure avant que de dresser, vous mettrez des herbes avec un peu de concombres ou de raciness suivant la saison, & du verjus en grain: ayant dressé le potage sur des croutons ou du pain séché, faites-le mitonner sur de la braise, & mettez du bouillon à mesure qu’il sera consommé. On peut ajouter au potage deux jaunes d’œufs délayés avec demi-verre du verjus & un peu de bouillon, les ayant fait un peu blanchir auparavant sur le feu, & les verser sur le potage.