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Spinach, French Style
Only the leaves are used. After washing them in several waters, they are placed on the fire in a saucepan and a small quantity of boiling water is added with a little salt. The dish is not covered, as this would darken the spinach. After boiling for twenty minutes the vegetable is turned into the colander and all the water is pressed out, the spinach being chopped during the process. Salt and pepper are then added, the spinach is returned to the saucepan, tightly covered and allowed to stand in a moderate heat for five minutes. Just before serving plenty of butter and two tablespoons white sauce for every pint of the vegetable are added although the sauce is as often omitted as used.
SPINACH SOUFFLÉ-This is a satisfactory way to dispose of left-over cooked spinach. To every cup, mix in the beaten yolk of one egg; place in a granite stewpan, heat and stir over the fire until the egg sets; then remove from the heat and when cold add the beaten whites of the eggs. Fill individual baking shells onehalf full of this mixture, arrange the shells on a roasting-pan and bake in a hot oven for ten minutes, serving at once to prevent falling.
Two linked preparations: boiled spinach dressed with butter, and a light soufflé made from the leftovers. The boiling time is the one instruction worth overruling.
- Twenty minutes is far too longSpinach leaves are tender in two to three minutes in boiling salted water. Boil briefly, drain, and the colour looks after itself.
- Why the lid stays offThe volatile acids released by the leaves fall back into the water under a lid and turn the chlorophyll dull. Leaving the pan open is sound practice, but it matters much less over three minutes than over twenty.
- QuantitiesA pint of cooked, pressed spinach is about two cups, which takes roughly a pound and a half to two pounds of raw leaves. That is a side dish for three or four.
- White saucePlain béchamel: equal butter and flour cooked together, milk whisked in, simmered until it coats a spoon. Two tablespoons per pint is a gloss rather than a binder, and the original is right that it can be left out.
- "Moderate heat" for the standingHere it means the lowest burner setting or the back of the stove, not an oven temperature — the covered pan is only holding the seasoned spinach warm for five minutes.
- Granite stewpanEnamelled steel or cast iron, the speckled grey ware of the period. Any non-reactive pan does; the point is that spinach and egg both take on a metallic taste in bare aluminium or unlined copper.
- Setting the yolksStirring the yolk into hot spinach until it thickens is a custard base, and it will scramble over direct high heat. Keep it gentle and take it off while it is still glossy, then cool it before the whites go in or they will deflate.
- A hot oven425 to 450F. Ten minutes suits small individual shells filled halfway; larger ramekins need longer, and the instruction to serve at once is not decoration — these fall within a minute or two of leaving the oven.
"French style" here signals little more than that the spinach is chopped, buttered, and finished with a spoonful of sauce rather than served in wet leaves. The long boil reflects an older preference, common in nineteenth-century cookery, for green vegetables thoroughly softened; shorter cooking became standard later. The souffle appended to the entry is characteristic of household economy: a leftover cup of spinach, an egg, and a hot oven turn Tuesday's vegetable into Wednesday's first course.