Consomme
3 lbs. beef, poorer part of round 1 lb. marrow-bone 3 lbs. knuckle of veal 1 quart chicken stock Carrot Turnip 1/3 cup each, cut in dice Celery 1/3 cup sliced onion 2 tablespoons butter 1 tablespoon salt 1 teaspoon peppercorns 4 cloves 3 sprigs thyme 1 sprig marjoram 2 sprigs parsley 1/2 bay leaf 3 quarts cold water Cut beef in one and one-half inch cubes, and brown one-half in some of the marrow from marrow-bone; put remaining half in kettle with cold water, add veal cut in pieces, browned meat, and bones. Let stand one-half hour. Heat slowly to boiling-point, and let simmer three hours, removing scum as it forms on top of kettle. Add one quart liquor in which a fowl was cooked, and simmer two hours. Cook carrot, turnip, onion, and celery in butter five minutes; then add to soup, with remaining seasonings. Cook one and one-half hours, strain, cool quickly, remove fat, and clear.
A full-scale classical consommé: six and a half hours of simmering to build the stock, then clarification. The recipe assumes you know how to clear a stock, which is the one step it does not explain.
- "Clear" means an egg-white raftThe final instruction assumes the standard method: whisk egg whites and their crushed shells into the cold, degreased stock, heat slowly while stirring, then stop stirring as it approaches a simmer and let the coagulated raft rise. Ladle the clear liquid out through a cloth-lined sieve rather than pouring, and never let it boil or the raft breaks up and clouds everything.
- Never boil at any stageDo not let it boil hard -- Heat slowly to the boiling point, then hold at a bare shiver where a bubble breaks every second or two. A rolling boil works fat and albumin into the liquid, and clarifying afterwards will not fully undo it.
- Poorer part of the roundThis means bottom round or a similar lean, hard-worked cut. Lean is the point: fat clouds consommé. Ask a butcher for beef shin or leg meat if round is not available.
- Knuckle of vealThe veal knuckle is the joint end of the leg, prized for gelatin, and rarely on display now. Order it from a butcher, or substitute veal or beef knuckle bones split by the butcher. Marrow-bone means a cut section of beef leg bone with the marrow intact; you scoop some of that marrow out to brown the beef.
- Browning half the meatHalf raw, half browned is deliberate. The browned portion supplies colour and roasted flavour, the raw portion supplies clean beefiness and soluble protein for body. Do not brown it all.
- Chicken stock"One quart liquor in which a fowl was cooked" is the unsalted, unthickened broth from poaching a whole chicken. Unsalted homemade stock is closest; commercial broth is salty and often has added colour, so cut back the tablespoon of salt if you use it.
- The half-hour soakStanding in cold water before heating draws soluble proteins out of the meat. Those proteins rise as scum, which you skim, and that skimming removes much of the material that would otherwise cloud the soup before you ever come to clearing it.
- Cool quicklySix hours of stock in a deep pot cools dangerously slowly. Set the pot in a sink of iced water and stir, or divide into shallow pans, then refrigerate so the fat sets in a solid cap you can lift off whole.
- YieldThree quarts of water plus a quart of stock, reduced over six and a half hours and clarified, gives roughly 2 to 2 1/2 quarts of finished consommé: 8 to 10 cups as a first course.
The name is French for "completed" or "consummated" — a broth carried as far as it can go, drawn from beef, veal and fowl together, then stripped of every particle until it is clear. The heavy use of veal knuckle reflects a reliance on bones and long simmering for body rather than on a purchased powder. A recipe on this scale — six and a half hours of simmering before clarification — suited a kitchen with a range kept going all day.