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Chicken Sauce for Sweetbread
Cut into dish 1 cupful of chicken. Season with 1/4 teaspoonful salt and a dash of cayenne, 1 teaspoonful parsley. Place in a saucepan 1 tablespoonful of butter and 1 of flour; stir together and cook thoroughly. Add the lightly beaten yolks of 2 eggs to 1 cupful of cream, and stir into the cooked flour a little at a time, stirring continuously. When smooth, add the first mixture of chicken, etc.
A yolk-thickened cream sauce studded with diced cooked chicken, meant to be spooned over braised sweetbreads. The whole thing hinges on heat control once the eggs go in.
- Do not let it boilOnce the yolk-and-cream mixture is stirred into the roux, keep the pan below a simmer. Hard boiling risks curdling the yolks and a grainy sauce, though the flour in the roux gives some protection.
- The chicken is already cooked"Cut into dish 1 cupful of chicken" is obscure; it may be a slip for "cut into dice," or simply mean cut the chicken into a dish. Either way the meat must be cooked beforehand — poached or roasted breast and thigh both work — as it is only warmed through in the sauce.
- Cook the roux pale"Cook thoroughly" is probably a direction to cook out the raw-flour taste, a couple of minutes over low heat. Keeping the butter and flour from taking colour suits a pale sauce for sweetbreads.
- Temper the liaisonAdd the cream-and-yolk mixture to the hot roux a spoonful at a time at first, whisking constantly, then in a thin stream. Adding it all at once sets the yolks in threads before the starch can protect them.
- CreamPeriod "cream" was not standardised and varied a good deal in richness. Something in the range of today's light cream or half-and-half will suit; heavy cream gives a heavier sauce than the recipe seems to intend.
- ParsleyA teaspoonful of parsley means finely chopped fresh flat-leaf or curly parsley. Stir it in at the end so it stays green.
- YieldAbout two cups, enough to sauce four servings of sweetbreads. It does not reheat well; make it while the sweetbreads finish.
- SaltA quarter teaspoon is light for this quantity of sauce. Taste at the end and correct.