Sweetbreads
Parboil the sweetbreads, then cook them with one tablespoon of butter and one tablespoon of stock. When cooked cut them into smallish pieces, season with pepper, chopped-up parsley, and one tablespoon of lemon, then roll them in flour; dip into egg and fry.
A terse set of instructions that assumes you already know how to clean sweetbreads — which is where most of the work actually lies. Everything after the soaking and pressing is quick.
- Soak and peel firstThe recipe begins at the parboil, but sweetbreads need 2-3 hours in several changes of cold water first to draw out blood. After parboiling (10-15 minutes in barely simmering salted water with a splash of vinegar or lemon), plunge into ice water and pull away the outer membrane and any gristle.
- Press themStandard practice then and now: after parboiling, lay the sweetbreads flat between two plates with a weight on top and chill for an hour. Pressed sweetbreads slice cleanly instead of crumbling when you cut them into "smallish pieces".
- Which sweetbreadButchers sold both throat and heart sweetbreads; the older terminology is inconsistent about which is thymus and which pancreas. Heart sweetbreads are rounder and more tender and are what you will usually be offered today. Veal is the likely intention here. Figure about 1 1/2 lb for four people.
- The butter-and-stock stageOne tablespoon of each is a glaze, not a braise — a small pan, lid on, 5-8 minutes over low heat until the liquid is nearly gone. Use a pan just large enough to hold the sweetbreads in one layer or the liquid vanishes at once.
- "One tablespoon of lemon"Juice, not zest or a wedge. It goes on the cut pieces before flouring, so it seasons the meat rather than the crust.
- Flour, then egg, then fryThere are no crumbs here, so the coating is thin and sets rather than crisps. Beat the egg with a pinch of salt, let excess drain, and fry in about 1/2 inch of oil or clarified butter at 350-360F, a minute or two a side until golden. Crowding the pan will steam the coating off.
- DonenessSweetbreads are fully cooked by the end of the parboil and glaze; the frying is for colour only. Overcooking makes them dry and grainy rather than creamy.
- ServingThe book gives no accompaniment. Lemon wedges and a green vegetable suit the dish; they are best eaten straight from the pan, as the coating softens quickly.
Sweetbreads — the thymus and pancreas of a young animal, animelle in Italian — appear regularly in cookbooks of this period. Simple Italian Cookery was published in 1912 under the pen name Antonia Isola, part of a small wave of books introducing American cooks to Italian home food, and its style is characteristic: no yields, no temperatures, and the assumption that a reader already knows how to blanch and press offal. The treatment here, glazed in butter and stock and then floured and egged before frying, is close to the Italian animelle dorate approach — "gilded" sweetbreads.