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Lobster Sauce II
1 1/4 lb. lobster 1/4 cup butter 1/4 cup flour 1/2 teaspoon salt Few grains cayenne 1/2 tablespoon lemon juice 3 cups cold water Remove meat from lobster, and cut tender claw-meat in one-half inch dice. Chop remaining meat, add to body bones, and cover with water; cook until stock is reduced to two cups, strain, and add gradually to butter and flour cooked together, then add salt, cayenne, lemon juice, and lobster dice. If the lobster contains coral, prepare Lobster Butter, add flour, and thicken sauce therewith.
Horseradish Sauce I 3 tablespoons grated horse-radish root 1 tablespoon vinegar 1/4 teaspoon salt Few grains cayenne 4 tablespoons heavy cream Mix first four ingredients, and add cream beaten stiff.
A velouté built on lobster stock rather than milk, thickened with a butter-and-flour roux and finished with diced claw meat. The stock reduction is the whole point of the sauce, and it takes longer than the ingredient list suggests.
- The hinge: reduce properlyThree cups of water with the shells, body and chopped trimmings must go down to two cups before it meets the roux. Rushing this gives a pale, watery sauce that no amount of butter will rescue; allow a steady simmer of twenty minutes or more, judging by volume rather than the clock.
- Lobster sizeA 1 1/4 lb lobster is a small single one, yielding roughly 4-5 oz of picked meat. Buy it live and boil it yourself, or use a cooked one and beg the shells, since the sauce depends on them.
- Roux and consistencyA quarter cup each of butter and flour to two cups of stock is a thick, coating sauce in the older style. Cook the roux two or three minutes without colouring, then add the hot stock gradually and whisk smooth.
- Coral and lobster butterCoral is the dark green roe of a female lobster, which turns coral-red when cooked. Lobster Butter is made by pounding it with softened butter and forcing it through a sieve; used in place of the plain butter it gives colour and depth. Not every lobster will have coral, and the recipe itself treats it as conditional -- 'if the lobster contains coral' -- so treat this as optional.
- Cayenne and lemon"Few grains" means a pinch, enough to warm the sauce rather than register as heat. Add the lemon juice off the heat at the end so it stays bright.
- Adding the diceThe claw meat is already cooked. Fold it in at the last moment and heat through only; two or three minutes in a simmering sauce is plenty before it turns rubbery.
- YieldAbout two cups, enough to sauce four to six servings of poached or baked white fish, or to fill a vol-au-vent.