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Fried Mutton Chops
Prepare the same as for broiled mutton chops, put them in a stewpan and cook; when done the hot fat must be poured away and a few tablespoonfuls of good stock, or water slightly warmed, and one tablespoonful of catsup or other flavoring added. Boil this stock up after removing the chops, and either pour it over them or serve separately.
Fried Mutton Chops, Soubise Sauce Peel two large Spanish onions, two carrots and two small turnips, and cut the carrots and turnips into small balls with a vegetable cutter. Boil them separately in salted water until tender. Trim off the fat from eight mutton chops, dip them in well-beaten egg and then in breadcrumbs that have been seasoned with salt and pepper; put a lump of clarified fat in a fryingpan, place it over the fire till blue smoke arises, put in the chops and fry them brown on both sides. Drain the boiled vegetables, chop the onions, put them in a saucepan, dredge them with flour and a little salt and pepper, pour in gradually one breakfast cupful of milk, stir it over the fire until it boils and thickens, then add two ounces of butter. Drain the cutlets and arrange in a circle on a hot dish, put the carrots and turnips in the center, pour the onion sauce round, and serve while very hot.
Mutton Chops, Maintenon Style Cut off some mutton chops of equal thickness, and butter them well. Chop some parsley, sweet herbs, and shallots very fine, mix well together and cover the chops with this. Put the chops in a pan and fry until three parts done, take them out, brush over with egg, sprinkle over breadcrumbs, and some more herbs if there is not sufficient adhering to them. Wrap each chop in buttered or oiled paper, put them in a pan and broil until quite done. Whole capers, with a little of their vinegar seasoned with cayenne, may be served with them, or some of the liquor from the chops, skimmed, and an equal quantity of veal gravy added and made hot, and then seasoned with a little lemon juice or vinegar, may be served in a sauceboat.
Three related treatments of mutton chops from the Waldorf kitchen: a plain pan-fry with a quick pan sauce, a breaded version with onion (soubise) sauce, and chops wrapped in paper and finished under heat. A few of the terms and materials need translating.
- Mutton itselfMutton is sheep older than a year, and usually over two, which is what Oscar means. In most of the country it is a special order from a halal butcher or a farm. Loin or rib lamb chops behave similarly but cook faster and taste milder, so check them early.
- "Catsup" in the first recipeIn an 1896 hotel kitchen catsup could mean mushroom or walnut ketchup as readily as tomato, both thin, dark and sharply savoury. Tomato ketchup will work but is much sweeter; mushroom ketchup, or a smaller quantity of Worcestershire, is closer to the intent.
- "Put them in a stewpan and cook"A stewpan here is a straight-sided saucepan, and the chops are fried in their own rendered fat, not stewed. Trim a little fat into the cold pan, let it render, then raise the heat and brown the chops.
- Breakfast cupfulA breakfast cup is larger than a teacup, generally taken as 8 to 10 fl oz. Start with 8 oz of milk for the soubise and let it down further only if the sauce tightens too much.
- Clarified fat and "blue smoke"Clarified fat means butter with the milk solids removed, or clean rendered beef or mutton fat. The faint blue haze is the period cue that the fat is hot enough to set the crumb coat at once; no precise temperature can be read from it, and fat that is not hot enough will soak into the crust.
- Soubise sauceSoubise is a béchamel enriched with a heavy weight of cooked onion. Boil the Spanish onions until genuinely soft, not just translucent, and chop them fine or the sauce will be stringy; pass it through a sieve or blend it briefly if you want the smooth version served in dining rooms of the period.
- The paper wrappingMaintenon style is cooking en papillote. Use parchment, not the oiled kitchen paper of 1896, and finish the parcels in a 400F oven rather than directly under a broiler flame, where paper scorches and can catch.
- DonenessThe book gives no internal temperature. Chops are at their best pulled at 130-135F for medium-rare in lamb; older mutton is usually taken further, to about 145F, and benefits from a five-minute rest before serving.
- YieldEight chops in the soubise recipe serve four as a main course, two per person, with the carrot and turnip balls filling the ring.
Oscar Tschirky's book records the repertoire of a New York hotel at the moment when French service was the standard for anything grand, and the two named variations here are French to the bone. Soubise, an onion-heavy béchamel, is traditionally linked to the Princes de Soubise of the eighteenth century, and Maintenon style, meat wrapped in paper with a herb and shallot mixture, carries the name of Louis XIV's second wife; both attributions are culinary tradition rather than documented invention. What is more telling is the mutton. In 1896 mutton was ordinary American eating, sold everywhere and, if the received account is right, often thought manlier and more flavourful than lamb, with chophouses said to have built their reputations on it. American taste shifted decisively toward young lamb over the following half-century, which is why a recipe that needed no explanation to Oscar's readers now requires a phone call to a butcher.