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Chestnut Roulettes
1 cup chestnut purée 2 eggs Few drops onion juice 2 tablespoons butter 2 tablespoons heavy cream 1/4 teaspoon salt Few grains paprika Mix ingredients in order given, cook two minutes, and cool. Shape a little larger than French chestnuts, dip in crumbs, egg, and crumbs again. Fry in deep fat, and drain on brown paper.
A croquette in all but name, from the era when chestnuts were a standard kitchen staple rather than a seasonal novelty. The recipe assumes you already have stiff, dry chestnut purée on hand and that you know how to manage a kettle of deep fat.
- The hinge: a stiff, cold mixtureEverything depends on the paste being dry enough to hold a shape. The recipe says only to cook two minutes and cool; in practice, keep the heat low, stir constantly, then spread the mixture on a plate and chill until firm before shaping. A soft mixture will burst in the fat.
- Chestnut puréeAbout 1 lb of chestnuts in the shell yields roughly a cup of purée. Roast or boil, peel while hot, then cook soft in a little milk or stock and press through a sieve. Vacuum-packed cooked chestnuts work; sweetened canned chestnut spread does not, as this is a savory dish.
- "Cook two minutes"This is the point at which the raw eggs set and bind the purée, not a boil. Keep the heat low and stir without stopping, or the eggs will scramble and the paste will go grainy.
- Onion juiceGrate a peeled onion on a fine grater and press the pulp through a sieve or squeeze it in cheesecloth. A few drops is genuinely all that is wanted; the flavor is meant to sit behind the chestnut.
- "French chestnuts"Probably a reference to marrons, the large single-kernel European chestnut, so shape the roulettes into rounded ovals a little over an inch across. The quantity given should make roughly a dozen small pieces.
- Crumbs, egg, crumbsDry fine breadcrumbs, not fresh. Beat the coating egg with a tablespoon of water so it flows evenly, and let the breaded roulettes rest in the refrigerator fifteen minutes before frying so the crust sets.
- Deep fatThe recipe gives no temperature. Around 375F, in enough oil to float them, frying a few at a time so the temperature holds, suits them; they need only a few minutes to color, since the mixture has already been cooked.
- Brown paperGrocery-bag paper was the period's draining surface. Paper towels or, better, a wire rack over a sheet pan will keep the crust from steaming soft underneath.
Chestnuts were a workaday ingredient in American kitchens when this book was compiled, cheap in autumn and sold roasted on city streets — the native American chestnut still stood in the eastern woods, and the blight that would destroy it was not identified in New York until the early 1900s. Nearly all chestnuts sold in the United States today are European or Asian. The name "roulette" — a little wheel — has often been taken to place the dish in the large family of croquettes that filled the entrée pages of turn-of-the-century cookbooks: a bound purée, shaped, breaded, and fried. Shaping them to imitate the whole chestnut is a bit of period wit.