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Harlequin Slices
Select cold boiled carrots, turnips and string beans. Cut in dice and place in an earthernware pie plate. Over these vegetables pour Custard Royale (see above recipe) and bake in an outer dish of hot water. When cool, cut in slices just thick enough to prevent breaking when placed in the soup.
This is a soup garnish rather than a dish: diced vegetables suspended in a savory baked custard, then sliced. It depends on the Custard Royale recipe printed above it in the book, which is the usual royale of beaten eggs thinned with stock or cream and seasoned.
- The hinge: bake it low and slowA royale must set without ever simmering, or the eggs curdle and the custard weeps and will not slice. The recipe gives no temperature; in a modern oven 300-325F in the water bath, until the center is just firm to a light touch, works -- roughly 25-35 minutes for a shallow plate.
- "An outer dish of hot water"A bain-marie. Set the pie plate in a larger pan and pour in hot water to reach halfway up the sides; keep the water hot but never bubbling.
- Earthenware pie plateAny shallow ceramic or glass dish of about 8 inches works. The point is a thin layer, half an inch or so, so the custard sets evenly and slices cleanly.
- Custard proportionsIf you are not working from the book's own royale, a workable ratio is 2 eggs plus 1 egg yolk to 1 cup of stock or light cream, seasoned with salt and a little white pepper. Strain the mixture before pouring to remove any threads of albumen.
- Dice smallCut the carrot, turnip and beans small, about 1/8 inch. Larger pieces make the slices more likely to break at the cut, the same fragility the last line guards against by asking for slices thick enough not to break.
- Chill before cutting"When cool" means cold enough for the custard to firm; an hour in the refrigerator should let you cut slices about 1/4 inch thick. The recipe asks only for slices, though decorative shapes are the usual treatment for a royale.
- Add at the last momentFloat the slices in hot clear soup just before serving. Left in simmering broth they soften, cloud the liquid and break up.
- YieldThe recipe gives no yield; a shallow plateful will garnish several cups of consomme. Best made the same day, as a baked royale can weep on standing.
Royale is a French classical garnish for clear soups: a firm savory egg custard baked in a mold, chilled, and cut into small decorative shapes so that consomme arrives with something to look at. "Harlequin" is the name often attached to the version studded with several colors of vegetable, generally traced to the motley-patterned figure of the commedia dell'arte and the pantomime stage, and the same word is said to have attached to multicolored ice creams and jellies of the period. The recipe is also a thrifty one: the carrots, turnips and beans are specified as cold and already boiled, meaning yesterday's vegetables put to elegant use.