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Fried Sweetbreads
Soak the sweetbreads for an hour, plunge them into boiling water for five minutes, and throw them into cold water till cool. Cut them in slices, egg and bread-crumb them, dip them in clarified butter, bread them again, and fry in plenty of hot fat till they are brightly browned on both sides. Drain them, and then dish on toast, pouring cucumber sauce or maitre d'hotel sauce upon them. Time to fry the slices, about ten minutes.
A straightforward treatment of veal sweetbreads: soak, blanch, slice, double-bread and fry. The only steps that need translating are the ones the original assumes you already know.
- What you are buyingSweetbreads are glands, usually the thymus and pancreas, of a calf or lamb; they are not a sausage product (pork sweetbreads are also sold, but veal and lamb are what a book like this means). The heart sweetbread (the round, compact lobe) slices best; the ragged throat sweetbread is better in a braise. Order ahead from a butcher and use within a day.
- The soak mattersThe hour in cold water draws out blood and is what keeps the finished slices pale rather than grey. Change the water once or twice, and keep it refrigerated rather than at room temperature.
- Blanch, chill, then peelFive minutes in boiling water firms the flesh so it can be handled. The step the text leaves out is peeling: once cool, strip off the outer membrane and any hard connective tissue, or the slices will curl in the pan.
- Press before slicingPressing appears in period treatments of sweetbreads and is still the best route to even slices, though this recipe does not call for it. Lay the blanched sweetbreads between two plates with a weight on top and refrigerate an hour; they slice cleanly at about half an inch.
- The double coatingEgg and crumb, a dip in clarified butter, then crumb again. The butter layer between the two crumb coats is what gives the crisp shell; ordinary melted butter will work but its milk solids scorch, so clarified is genuinely better here.
- Fat and timing"Plenty of hot fat" means a generous depth; in books of this kind it can mean anything from shallow fat to deep frying. Aim for fat hot enough to brown the crumb briskly, around 350-360F. The recipe allows about ten minutes; half-inch slices in properly hot fat may brown sooner, and longer only dries them out.
- The saucesMaitre d'hotel is butter worked with lemon juice, chopped parsley, salt and pepper, melted over the hot slices. Cucumber sauce in a book of this date is peeled, seeded cucumber stewed soft and finished in a white sauce or with cream.
- YieldA pair of veal sweetbreads runs about a pound trimmed and serves three to four as a first course, two as a main with the toast.