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Sturgeon, Blanquette of, with Peas
If you have any sturgeon left that is still very fresh, make a blanquette with peas, which, not requiring to be highly seasoned, will admit only of fish which is extremely sweet. After having simmered the peas as they are always prepared for the second course, take three spoonfuls of sauce tournee, and reduce it with four spoonfuls of the peas, adding a very small bit of sugar. When your sauce is very thick, put to it a thickening of two yolks of eggs, then put the sturgeon to it, and serve either in a vol-au-vent, or in a border of potatoes. Observe that in this dish the seasoning must be very mild.
A leftover dish from the era when sturgeon was cheap enough to have a second life. Everything hinges on the egg liaison, which must never boil.
- The yolks are the whole dishOnce the two yolks go in, keep the sauce below a simmer — around 180F is safe — and stir constantly. A boil scrambles them and the blanquette turns grainy and thin. Off the heat is safest: whisk a little hot sauce into the yolks first, return the mixture to the pan, and warm it through only.
- Sauce tournéeAn old name for a thin velouté: blond roux slackened with a light stock (fish or veal here), simmered until it clears, then strained. A well-made fish velouté or a light fish stock thickened with beurre manié will stand in.
- "Spoonfuls" is ambiguousIn cookery of this period a spoonful usually means a tablespoon, though the measure is not standardised. The ratio matters more than the volume: three parts sauce to four parts peas, reduced until it coats a spoon heavily. Assume roughly 1/4 cup sauce and 1/3 cup peas for two portions and scale up.
- "Peas as prepared for the second course"A cross-reference to the book's own way with peas; most likely petits pois in the French manner — small peas stewed slowly in butter, often with shredded lettuce and a few tiny onions, and barely any liquid. Frozen petits pois are closer to the original than large fresh peas.
- The bit of sugarA pinch, not a spoonful. It is there to lift older peas, and with today's frozen peas you may not need it at all.
- The fish is already cookedThis assumes poached or roasted sturgeon left from a previous meal. Fold it in warm, in large flakes or neat cubes, and give it only a minute in the sauce. Sturgeon is dense and meaty, and reheating it hard makes it dry and stringy.
- Border of potatoesDuchesse potato — riced potato bound with yolk and butter — piped in a ring on an ovenproof dish and browned before the blanquette is spooned into the centre. The vol-au-vent alternative is a baked puff pastry case; frozen all-butter puff works.
- Sourcing sturgeonWild sturgeon is protected across most of its former range and its trade is restricted. Farmed sturgeon, sold as fillets or steaks, is what you will find and is the fish to use.
- YieldAs written, a small dish for two, or a first course for four. It does not keep — the yolk-bound sauce breaks on reheating.
Blanquette simply means a white stew, from blanc: no browning, a pale sauce, and a finish of egg yolk that belongs to the classical French repertoire. The instruction to use only fish that is "extremely sweet" reflects a real constraint rather than fussiness — a mild, unseasoned white sauce hides nothing, so this was the dish for yesterday's sturgeon while it was still impeccable. Sturgeon itself explains why the recipe exists at all: through the nineteenth century the great rivers of Europe and North America yielded it in quantity, and in the Hudson valley it was sold so cheaply that it was nicknamed "Albany beef." Overfishing for flesh and caviar collapsed those runs within a few decades of this book's period, which is why a recipe framed around leftovers now reads as a recipe for a luxury.