Consomme
3 lbs. beef, lower part or round 1 lb. of marrow bone 3 lbs. knuckle of veal 3 qts. water Carrot, Turnip, Celery, Onion} 1/4 cup each, cut in dice 1 tablespoon salt 6 peppercorns 3 cloves 2 sprigs thyme 2 sprigs parsley 1/2 bay leaf Cut the beef in 1 inch cubes and brown 1/2 of this in fat from the marrow bone. Put remaining 1/2 in kettle with cold water and salt, add veal cut in pieces, browned meat and bones. Let stand one hour. Heat slowly to the boiling point, let simmer six hours, removing scum as it forms on surface. Scald the vegetables and add with the seasonings the last hour of cooking. Strain, cool quickly, remove fat, and clear.
A classic long-simmered brown stock intended to be clarified. Everything here works in a modern kitchen; the two things the original leaves unsaid are how to clear it and how to cool it safely.
- Never let it boilAfter the initial heat-up, hold the pot at a bare shiver — a bubble or two breaking the surface, around 180-190F. A rolling boil emulsifies fat and pulverises particles into the liquid, and no amount of clarifying afterward will give you a bright consomme.
- "Clear" means an egg-white raftThe recipe assumes you know the technique. Once the strained stock is cold and degreased, whisk in lightly beaten egg whites (two or three for three quarts, crushed shells optional), bring it slowly to a simmer without stirring after it begins to set, let the raft hold for 30-45 minutes, then ladle the liquid out through a cloth-lined sieve rather than pouring.
- Knuckle of vealA veal knuckle is the joint end of the leg, split; it is what supplies the gelatin that gives consomme its body on the lip. Ask a butcher — supermarkets rarely stock it. A split calf's foot serves the same purpose.
- Fat from the marrow boneScoop the marrow out and render it in the pan before browning the beef. If your bones are lean, a spoonful of beef dripping or neutral oil does the job; the point of the browning is the fond, not the fat.
- The one-hour standCold water and an hour's rest before heating is the traditional practice — soluble proteins are drawn out while cold and coagulate slowly as the pot warms, rising as scum you can skim. The reasoning is that skipping it starts you off with a cloudier pot.
- Scald the vegetablesHere scald means a brief dip in boiling water, not a full cooking. Added only in the last hour, the diced carrot, turnip, celery and onion give fresh aroma rather than the stewed sweetness of vegetables boiled six hours.
- Cool quicklyThree quarts of warm stock in a deep pot sits in the bacterial danger zone for hours. Strain into a wide shallow pan, or set the pot in a sink of ice water and stir. Refrigerate once below about 70F; the fat lifts off as a solid disc the next day.
- Yield and servingExpect noticeably less than the three quarts of water you started with, after six hours' simmering, straining and clarifying — enough for eight to ten small cups as a first course. Serve it hot in cups, seasoned at the end, since long simmering concentrates the tablespoon of salt added at the start.
Consomme is French for something like "completed" or "brought to perfection," and that is the claim the dish makes: a stock cooked down and then clarified until it is perfectly transparent, judged as much by eye as by tongue. Its presence in a promotional cookbook says a good deal about American home cooking in the early twentieth century, when milling companies gave away recipe books to sell flour and, in doing so, carried restaurant-French technique into ordinary kitchens. A household following this page committed six hours of fuel and six pounds of meat to produce a clear broth with nothing floating in it — the meat itself being spent and discarded, or at best relegated to hash. That deliberate extravagance was the point; a bright consomme signalled a cook who had time, ingredients and training, and it opened formal dinners for decades on both sides of the Atlantic.