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Savoury Entremets: Macaroni
Macaroni au gratin-macaroni with grated cheese and white sauce, sprinkled with breadcrumbs, Parmesan and melted butter, and baked. à l'Italienne-macaroni with grated Parmesan, gravy and melted butter. à la Napolitaine, or à la crème with grated Parmesan, butter, cream, etc. à la Milanaise-with a purée of tomatoes and grated cheese; garnished with croûtons.
Macaroni à la sauce tomates is dressed with cream, grated cheese, etc., and covered with tomato sauce. en timbale-a mould of macaroni dressed with butter and grated cheese.
Timbale de macaroni à la Florentine is dressed with cream and anchovy sauce.
Croquettes à la Milanaise are croquettes of macaroni with grated Parmesan, Béchamel sauce, etc.; breadcrumbed and fried. Macaroni thus dressed may be served in little cases as Petites caisses à la Milanaise. It can also be made into small rissoles or rissolettes.
Spaghetti à la Russe is Spaghetti macaroni dressed with chopped tomatoes and cheese sauce; garnished with shrimps or prawns.
Vermicelle au Parmesan-vermicelli dressed with cheese, white sauce, etc. à la Venise-a savoury cream of vermicelli with chopped ham; served with gravy.
Riz à l'Indienne is curried rice. à la Diable is devilled rice. à la Turque is rice with melted butter. à la Milanaise-a mould of rice boiled in broth, with grated Parmesan, etc. à l'Espagnole is served with tomato sauce, grated cheese, etc.; garnished with slices of ham. à la Florentine-curried rice with grated Parmesan and shrimps or prawns. à la Piémontaise-dry rice with potato pulp, grated Parmesan, etc.; garnished with fillets of anchovies.
Riz à la Polonaise-served with slices of fried onion, grated ham and cheese. à la Mustapha-with melted butter and chopped truffles. à la Victoria-cooked with broth, etc., and served with poached eggs and rolls of fried bacon.
Ballotines de riz à l'Indienne are little balls of curried rice, breadcrumbed and fried. Dipped in batter and fried, they are called Fritot de riz à l'Indienne.
Rice is also dressed au Parmesan-with white sauce and grated cheese, and in any of the ways given for macaroni.
The preparations of macaroni and rice are specially suitable for second course dishes at luncheon. If required for a savoury, they may be dressed in little cases.
Macaroni, spaghetti, vermicelli and rice. The book’s own closing line tells you where all of it went: second course at luncheon, or dressed in little cases as a savoury. Never a dish of its own at dinner.
- Macaroni meant pastaIn this book macaroni is the general word. The page says Spaghetti macaroni and files vermicelli alongside without comment. The shapes had their own names but the category was single, and all of it came dry, by the pound, in long lengths.
- A savoury was its own courseThe savoury came at the very end of dinner, after the sweet: one hot, salty, strongly flavoured mouthful. That is why the page suggests little cases. A savoury was served individually and small, and a shared dish of macaroni would have been wrong in that slot.
- Timbale means a mouldMacaroni en timbale is pasta packed into a mould with butter and cheese and turned out whole, so that it arrives as an object that can be cut. The modern habit of serving pasta loose in a bowl makes most of this page look peculiar; every dish on it was built to hold a shape.
- Grated cheese, unnamedParmesan is specified where Parmesan is meant. Everywhere else the page says grated cheese and stops, which means the cook chose. A modern reader should read those entries as an instruction to use a hard dry cheese and not look for a lost ingredient.
- Curry runs through the riceCurried rice appears four times here and carries French names throughout: à l’Indienne, à la Florentine, and twice as fried balls. Curry powder had been absorbed into the repertoire so completely that it needed no more introduction than butter did.
- À la Turque is rice and butterThe page glosses it as rice with melted butter, and nothing else. Where a grand-sounding name turns out to mean two ingredients, the name was the dish, and that is as true of this chapter as of any in the book.
The last two sentences on the page are the real content, and they are a piece of social instruction rather than cookery: these preparations are specially suitable for second course dishes at luncheon, and if wanted for a savoury they may be dressed in little cases. Luncheon in this household was the informal meal — family, women, callers who had come in — and dinner was the formal one. Pasta and rice were welcome at the first and admitted to the second only in miniature, in a paper case, at the end, when the serious business of the evening was over. The hierarchy has nothing to do with how anything tasted. It is about what a dish could be made to look like, and whose eyes were on the table when it came in.