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Eggs in Shells
Put into a basin a teacupful of breadcrumbs; add a teacupful of finely-minced tongue or ham, a little salt, pepper, ground mustard, melted butter and chopped parsley; then work the mixture to a smooth paste with a little hot milk, and spread it on table shells; break some eggs carefully, put one on each shell; sprinkle over the top biscuit or cracker crumbs, and add a little salt and pepper; pour a dessertspoonful of liquefied butter on each and bake for five minutes, or until the eggs are firm Arrange the shells on a dish, garnish with fried parsley, and serve.
Eggs, Italian Style Boil some eggs hard, cut them in halves, take out the yolks, weigh them, and put them in a mortar with an equal weight of butter, and pound together with a little breadcrumbs soaked in milk or cream, chopped parsley, one anchovy, a little chopped onion, grated nutmeg, pepper and salt. Put the mixture into a saucepan, and cook to a thick paste, adding a little cream or gravy. Fill the cavities of the whites with this, and serve cold with a salad, or hot in sauce, or on a puree of vegetables.
Eggs, Leo XIII Make a Duchess potato preparation and form it into the shapes of chicken fillets; just when ready to serve, brown them in butter. Place them as a border on a round dish and over them lay a soft egg on each, between each egg put a very white, cooked cockscomb. Fill the center of the dish with a garnishing composed of cocks' kidneys, mushrooms and olives mixed with supreme sauce. Glaze the surface with a salamander and serve. Egg-loaf, Princess Style Butter thickly a small charlotte mould, decorate the bottom and sides with cooked asparagus tops, thoroughly dried on a cloth. Take two glassfuls of supreme sauce, to it add four finely-chopped hard-boiled eggs and six raw yolks of eggs, season it well. Fill the mould with this preparation and steam it for thirty minutes. Turn the loaf out onto a round dish, decorate around with fried bread croutons, laying a poached egg on each one, cover with half glaze sauce, and serve.
Eggs, Lyonese Style Put into a saucepan of water half a dozen of eggs and boil until hard. Peel and chop fine two medium-sized onions, put them into a stewpan with butter, and fry until brown; pour half a pint of broth over the onions; season with salt and a small quantity of grated nutmeg, boil gently and stir now and then until reduced to a rather creamy thickness. Peel the hard-boiled eggs and chop the whites. Put the latter into the sauce, boil up once, and then turn the whole out onto a hot dish. Garnish with the yolks of the eggs and small, baked puff paste cakes, and serve very hot Eggs, Maitre d'Hotel Boil until hard, six eggs; peel and cut into quarters, arranging them on a dish that will stand the heat of the oven; put in some pieces of butter, sprinkle a little chopped parsley, tarragon, chervil, pepper and salt over, and set the dish in a moderate oven until the butter is melted. Turn the eggs and cook a few minutes longer, then take them out, and serve.
A run of egg dishes from the Waldorf's kitchen, written for cooks who already had stock, supreme sauce and a coal range at hand. Most translate directly; a few of the garnishes no longer exist in any market.
- Table shellsThese are natural scallop shells (or the china imitations sold as "coquilles"), used as individual gratin dishes. Any shallow 4-inch ramekin holds the same amount and behaves the same in the oven.
- Teacupful and dessertspoonfulA teacupful in this period is roughly 6 fl oz, so about three-quarters of a cup of crumbs and the same of minced tongue. A dessertspoonful is two teaspoons, which is a generous but not absurd amount of melted butter per shell.
- Five minutes is too shortAn egg broken onto a cold paste in a cold shell will not set in five minutes. Expect 10 to 14 minutes at 400F, judging by the white rather than the clock: the book's real instruction is "until the eggs are firm."
- Moderate ovenFor the Maitre d'Hotel eggs, read moderate as 350F. The dish is only warming butter and herbs through, so it needs a couple of minutes, not a bake.
- Cockscombs and cocks' kidneysThe garnishes for Eggs Leo XIII are the combs and testicles of the rooster, blanched white and simmered. Neither is sold in ordinary markets now. Mushrooms, olives and the supreme sauce carry the dish perfectly well on their own.
- SalamanderAn iron plate heated red and passed over the surface to glaze it. A broiler set high, or a kitchen torch, does the same work in the same few seconds.
- GlassfulThe two glassfuls of supreme sauce in the Princess-style loaf are genuinely imprecise; period usage for a glass runs somewhere between a half cup and a full cup. Judge by consistency instead.
- Steamed egg loafThirty minutes of steaming in a small charlotte mould sets the six raw yolks into a savoury custard. Keep the water at a bare simmer; a hard boil will curdle it and the loaf will weep when turned out.
- YieldsThe Lyonese and Maitre d'Hotel dishes each specify six eggs, so figure three to six servings depending on whether the dish is a course or a garnish; the others leave the number open. Eggs in Shells is one shell per person as a first course.
Oscar Tschirky, the maitre d'hotel remembered as "Oscar of the Waldorf," published his cook book in 1896, and the egg chapter is a fair sample of how a great American hotel kitchen worked at the end of the century: French grand cuisine adapted to whatever New York's markets could supply. The naming convention is the giveaway. Dishes were routinely titled for royalty, prelates and patrons, and Eggs Leo XIII appears to honour the reigning pope, whose pontificate ran from 1878 to 1903, with a garnish of cockscombs, cocks' kidneys and supreme sauce that would have read as luxurious rather than eccentric. Those variety-meat garnishes were common restaurant currency then, wasting nothing from the poultry supplier and signalling expense at the same time; they had largely fallen out of American use by the middle of the next century. The plainer dishes here, hard eggs in onion sauce or warmed with herb butter, are the domestic backbone the fancy ones were built on.