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RABBIT, QUENELLES OF (another way) (These says M Ude are made like)
"These," says M. Ude, "are made like the generality of quenelles; the only difference is that you take the flesh of rabbits instead of any other meat. The legs in general are used for making the quenelles; the fillets will supply another dish, so will the legs occasionally. The bones and the parings are used to make the consomm and sauces. As the legs are tougher than the tender fillets, they should be pounded for a longer time and rubbed through a tamis, on account of the nerves and sinews."
Ude assumes you already know how to make a quenelle and tells you only what changes when the meat is rabbit. The useful information here is the butchery logic: legs for forcemeat, fillets (the loins) for a separate dish, bones and trim for stock.
- What a quenelle actually isA poached forcemeat dumpling: pounded raw meat bound with a panada (bread or flour paste) or with egg white, enriched with butter or cream, seasoned, then shaped in two spoons and poached. Reckon on roughly equal weights of meat and total binder-plus-fat as a starting ratio.
- TamisA tamis is a drum sieve, a fine mesh stretched on a wooden hoop, and the flesh is forced through it with a wooden mushroom or a plastic scraper. A food processor does the pounding in a fraction of the time, but it will not remove sinew — the sieving step is the whole point of Ude's instruction and should not be skipped.
- Why the legs need longer workRabbit hind legs carry far more connective tissue than the saddle fillets. Under-worked, they give a quenelle that is gritty and stringy rather than smooth; that is the hinge of this entry.
- Farmed versus wild rabbitUde's rabbits may well have been wild, though tame rabbits were also sold in London markets in his day. Farmed rabbit is milder, moister and more tender, so the legs need less work; wild rabbit, especially an older animal, needs the full treatment and benefits from extra cream or butter.
- Keep everything coldThe mixture is an emulsion of protein, fat and liquid. Work over ice and chill between stages, or the butter or cream will separate during poaching and the quenelles will be greasy and coarse.
- Poaching temperaturePoach in barely trembling stock or salted water at about 170–180F, never at a boil, for roughly 8–12 minutes depending on size. A rolling boil breaks the surface and the quenelles shred.
- Test one firstPoach a teaspoonful before shaping the batch. If it falls apart add a little more egg white; if it is rubbery, work in more cream.
- The bones and paringsUde's whole-animal economy still holds. Brown the bones and trim, simmer for a light rabbit stock, and use it both as the poaching liquid and as the base of the sauce served over the quenelles.
- YieldThe recipe gives no quantities. As a rough guide, the legs of one rabbit will make enough quenelles for a first course for three or four, depending on how large you shape them.
The "M. Ude" quoted here is Louis Eustache Ude, a French chef who worked in England in the early nineteenth century, cooked for the Earl of Sefton and later ran the kitchens at Crockford's club in St James's; his book The French Cook (1813) went through many editions and was still being mined for authority when Cassell's compiled its dictionary decades later. Quoting him by name was a way of signalling that a plainly written British household encyclopaedia had the French professional tradition behind it. The quenelle itself belongs to that tradition — a pounded, sieved forcemeat poached in stock, the ancestor of the mousseline — and it was exactly the sort of dish that justified a large staff, since the pounding and sieving of tough leg meat by hand was tedious work. Rabbit appears because it was cheap and plentiful in Britain, and Ude's note about splitting the animal between forcemeat, roast fillets and stock reflects a kitchen where nothing was thrown away.