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Sole, Small Patties Of
Make small vol-au-vent cases in the usual way. Bake them, take off the covers, and fill them with a savoury preparation made by cutting the flesh of a cold fried sole into dice, and warming them in thick Allemand sauce. Put the covers on the top, and serve on a dish covered with a napkin.
A way of using up cold fried fish, dressed up as a first course. The whole thing hangs on the sauce, which is a thickened velouté finished with egg yolk and cream.
- Allemande sauceA velouté (blond roux with veal or fish stock) thickened further with egg yolks and cream, sharpened with lemon. Once the yolks go in it must not boil or it will curdle and break; hold it just below a simmer while the fish warms through.
- "Thick" means thickFor a filling the sauce should coat the back of a spoon heavily and hold its shape when spooned, otherwise it will soak the pastry and run out on the plate. Reduce the velouté well before the liaison goes in.
- Vol-au-vent cases"In the usual way" means rounds of puff pastry with an inner circle scored to lift out as a lid. Frozen all-butter puff works; the original names no oven heat, but a hot oven of around 425F for 15-20 minutes should see them risen and dry inside, then lift off the caps and scoop out any soft pastry.
- The fishCold cooked sole is firm enough to dice neatly, which is the point of using leftovers rather than fresh. Cut into roughly half-inch dice, pick out every bone, and fold it gently into the sauce, holding it just below a simmer while it warms through as the recipe directs, so the fish does not shred.
- Assemble at the last minuteFilled cases go soft within minutes. Have the pastry warm and dry, the filling hot, and fill only as the dish goes to the table.
- SeasoningCold fried fish has already been salted, so taste the finished mixture before adding more. A little cayenne, nutmeg or chopped parsley is in keeping with the period.
- YieldOne cold sole of about 12 oz filleted weight fills roughly eight two-inch cases, which serves four as a first course.
- The napkinA folded linen napkin on the serving dish keeps the cases from sliding and absorbs any butter that leaks from the pastry. It is presentation, not preservation.
Vol-au-vent cases filled with a bound ragout were a staple of nineteenth-century service, and small versions were the kind of thing a well-run kitchen could make from yesterday's fish rather than throwing it out. Sauce allemande — velouté finished with an egg-and-cream liaison — was one of the standard sauces of the French repertoire that English cookery books absorbed; the name is generally said to have been abandoned in France around the time of the First World War, and Escoffier had already treated it as a derivative of velouté rather than a leading sauce. The appeal of the dish is that the reader who can raise puff pastry and bind a sauce with yolks combines the two skills and turns cold fried sole into something worth carrying in on a napkin.