Egg Timbales
1 tablespoon butter 1 tablespoon chopped parsley 1 tablespoon flour ⅔ cup milk 1/2 teaspoon salt 1/8 teaspoon pepper Few grains celery salt 3 eggs Few grains cayenne Make a sauce of the butter, flour, and milk; add yolks beaten until thick and lemon-colored, then add seasonings. Beat whites of eggs until stiff and dry, and cut and fold into first mixture. Turn into buttered moulds, set in pan of hot water, and bake in a slow oven until firm. Serve with Tomato Cream Sauce (see page 271). 6 eggs 2 tablespoons butter 1 slice onion 1/3 cup flour 1 cup white stock
A savory baked custard lightened with beaten whites — essentially a small, firm souffle that holds its shape when unmoulded. Two things decide whether it works: the oven temperature and the water bath.
- The hinge: low heat, wet heat"Slow oven" in this period covered a range, roughly 250-325F; around 300F is a reasonable modern reading. The pan of hot water is not optional: custard driven too hot curdles and weeps, and a timbale that weeps will not unmould cleanly.
- Timing and donenessThe original gives none. In individual moulds expect 20 to 30 minutes; the centre should be just firm to a light touch, or 170-175F on an instant-read thermometer. Let them stand five minutes before running a knife around and inverting.
- The mouldsTimbale moulds were small straight-sided metal cups of about 4 to 6 ounces. Ramekins, custard cups, or a buttered muffin tin all work. Butter them thoroughly and set them on a folded towel in the water pan so the bottoms do not scorch.
- How much waterPour hot water into the outer pan to come halfway up the moulds, and use a lid or a loose foil tent if the tops are browning before the centres set.
- "Beaten until stiff and dry"Period language for whites taken to a full stiff peak. Modern practice stops slightly short of dry — genuinely dry whites break into clumps and fold in unevenly, leaving white streaks in the custard.
- YieldThree eggs and half a cup of milk fill three or four small moulds; serve as a light lunch or supper dish for two to three, or as a first course for four.
- The trailing linesThe list beginning "6 eggs, 2 tablespoons butter, 1 slice onion, 1/3 cup flour, 1 cup white stock" belongs to the next recipe, not to this one. "White stock" in books of this kind is a light veal or poultry stock.
- The sauceTomato Cream Sauce of this period is generally a white sauce with strained, seasoned tomato added. If you substitute, keep it loose and sharp — the timbale itself is rich and mild.
Timbale comes from the French for a kettledrum, borrowed in turn from Arabic al-tabl, a drum, and it describes the shape of the mould rather than anything about the filling. By the 1890s American cooking schools had adopted the form enthusiastically: chicken, fish, rice and vegetable timbales all appear alongside this egg one, because a moulded, unmoulded, sauced portion was exactly the kind of neat individual service that the era's instructors were teaching middle-class households to imitate from professional kitchens. The technique also solved a practical problem — it turned three eggs and half a cup of milk into a course that looked composed and deliberate, which is much of what the Boston Cooking School was about.