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Julienne Soup
Take three carrots, three turnips, the white part of a head of celery, three onions, and three leeks. Wash and dry the vegetables, and cut them into thin shreds, which should be not more than one inch in length. Place the shreds in a stewpan with two ounces of butter and a small pinch of pounded sugar, and stir them over a slow fire until slightly browned. Pour over them three quarts of clear stock (see STOCK), and simmer gently for an hour, or until the vegetables are tender. Carefully remove the scum and grease, and half an hour before the soup is done enough, add two lumps of sugar, with two pinches of salt, and two pinches of pepper if required, two cabbage lettuces, twelve leaves of sorrel, and twelve leaves of chervil, cut in the same way as the other vegetables, after being immersed in boiling water for a minute. Boil half an hour longer, skim carefully, and serve. Send bread fried in dice to table, and serve as hot as possible. It must be remembered that quick boiling would thicken and spoil this soup, which ought to be a clear brown. Julienne is seasonable for nine months of the year only. In January, February, and March the carrots, turnips, and leeks required for it are hard and stringy. There are, however, vegetables to be bought ready cut, preserved, and dried, but these are much inferior in flavour to fresh vegetables. In summer time French beans, green peas, and asparagus tops may be put in, but they must be boiled separately and added a few minutes before serving. Probable cost, exclusive of the stock, about 1s. 6d. Sufficient for eight or ten persons. (See VEGETABLES, DRIED.)
A clear vegetable soup that stands or falls on two things: the knife work and the fact that it must never reach a rolling boil. Everything else is straightforward.
- Never let it boilDon't let it boil fast -- The instruction that "quick boiling would thicken and spoil this soup" is the hinge of the recipe, though the text itself says to "boil" gently for the last half hour. Hard agitation works fat and vegetable fibre into the liquid and clouds what should be a clear brown. Hold it at a bare shiver, with the surface barely trembling.
- The cutThe recipe asks for thin shreds no more than an inch in length; it does not specify a thickness. Uniformity matters more than fineness, since ragged pieces cook unevenly.
- The sugar and butterThe pinch of pounded sugar with the butter is there to help the carrots and onions colour, giving the soup its brown tint. Keep the heat genuinely low; scorched sugar will make the whole pot bitter.
- Quantities and yieldThree quarts is about 3.4 litres of stock, and the recipe states it serves eight to ten.
- Total cooking timeAn hour of simmering plus a further half hour after the greens go in is long by current practice, and the root vegetables will be very soft. Modern versions simmer the julienne 20 to 30 minutes and add the lettuce, sorrel and chervil in the last five, which keeps colour and definition.
- Sorrel and chervilBoth are still grown but rarely stocked in supermarkets. Sorrel brings a sharp lemon note that nothing quite replaces; a squeeze of lemon at the end is the usual stand-in. Flat-leaf parsley with a little tarragon approximates chervil.
- Cabbage lettuceThis means a firm heading lettuce, not a loose-leaf one. Little Gem or the heart of a romaine shreds well and holds together in the broth.
- The stockWith no thickening, no cream and very little fat, the soup tastes of whatever stock you use. The recipe asks only for "clear stock" and refers the reader to its own STOCK entry; a weak cube will produce a thin, salty result.
- The fried breadSmall dice of bread fried in butter or clarified fat, sent to the table separately so they stay crisp. Serve the soup as hot as the bowls allow, since a lean clear soup cools fast.
Julienne is one of the classic French clear vegetable soups, and its name is shared with the knife technique, though the relationship between the two is not settled. The entry teaches two fundamentals at once: an even julienne, and the discipline of a simmer that never breaks into a boil. The note on seasonality is worth reading closely. Before cold storage and air freight, January to March were the hungry months for root vegetables in Britain, when last year's carrots and turnips had gone woody in the clamp, and the alternative was the dried and pressed vegetable preparations the entry sends readers off to look up, which the author clearly regards as a poor substitute. The costing of about 1s. 6d. for eight to ten people, stock excluded, marks this as an economical dish for a household that already had a stockpot going as a matter of course.