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Salt, Cayenne, and Nutmeg
Pound the chicken and pass it through a hair sieve. Then mix with it the eggs, milk, salt, cayenne, nutmeg, and almond essence. When thoroughly blended, turn the mixture into three or four small dariole moulds well greased, and steam slowly for twenty minutes, or until set.
Turn out very carefully, cut into fancy shapes, and serve in the consommé. A few asparagus points and chervil leaves may also be served in this soup.
This is not a soup but a garnish for one: a savoury chicken custard, set in small moulds, cut into shapes and dropped into clear consommé at the moment of serving. The printed page carries the tail of an ingredient list in its title, so the quantities have been lost.
- The missing quantitiesThe recipe as printed gives no amounts. A classical chicken royale of this type runs roughly 4 oz cooked chicken breast, 1 whole egg plus 2 yolks, and about 4 fl oz milk or cream, with salt, cayenne and nutmeg to taste and almond essence in drops rather than spoonfuls. Treat those figures as a reconstruction, not as the author's own.
- Hair sieveA horsehair sieve was the fine sieve of the period; it is often said to have been preferred because, unlike tinned wire, it would not discolour acid foods. A fine drum sieve or a nylon tamis does the same work; a food processor followed by a push through a fine strainer is quicker and gives the same smooth, fibre-free paste, which is the whole point of the pounding.
- Dariole mouldsSmall cylindrical tinned moulds, usually slightly tapered, of roughly 2 to 4 fl oz. Timbale moulds, dariole tins, or small ramekins all work, though a shallower vessel sets faster and gives a slab that is easier to cut into shapes.
- Steam slowly means below the boilThe water should stay at a bare tremble rather than a rolling boil; covering the moulds with greased paper is the usual precaution, though the recipe does not specify it. Boiled hard, the custard tends to turn granular and honeycombed rather than cutting cleanly.
- Almond essenceVictorian almond essence was generally based on bitter almonds. Use it in drops rather than spoonfuls; too much and the garnish tastes of marzipan against the chicken.
- Cutting the shapesLet the turned-out custard cool and firm before cutting, or the edges tear. Aspic or small canapé cutters will give the 'fancy shapes' the recipe calls for; a knife and a steady hand will produce neat dice.
- Assembly and yieldThree or four darioles should yield garnish for several servings of consommé. Add the shapes, the asparagus tips and the chervil to hot soup in the plate at the last moment; held in simmering liquid they are likely to soften and cloud the consommé.
What is described here is a royale, one of the standard garnishes of French classical cookery for clear soups, and a consommé finished with it appears on old menus as consommé à la royale. The logic is entirely visual: a consommé had already been clarified to absolute transparency, so the cook's remaining art lay in what floated in it, and pale set custards cut into diamonds, crescents and stars showed that labour off to a dining room. The almond essence is the period's own touch, a faint sweetness in a savoury garnish that reads as odd now but is occasionally documented in nineteenth-century forcemeats and quenelle mixtures.