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Lamb Cutlets with Asparagus
Cut into one-half inch lengths the heads of a bundle of asparagus; also cut into lengths of the same size as much of the stalks as is eatable, and boil them separately in salt and water; when cooked drain, place them in separate fryingpans with a little butter, season to taste with pepper and salt, and toss them about over the fire. Trim the cutlets, dip them in beaten egg and breadcrumbs and fry in butter to a pale golden brown. When cooked drain the cutlets on a sheet of paper before a clear fire for a second, and then form them in a circle on a hot dish, pile the asparagus in the center, arranging the heads on top, and serve.
A straightforward late-Victorian hotel plate: breaded lamb chops crowned with buttered asparagus. The only real technique is keeping the asparagus tips and stalks apart, which the recipe insists on twice.
- Why two pansTips and stalk pieces cook at different rates and are meant to look different on the plate. Boil the stalk pieces about 3-4 minutes, the tips 2 minutes, and keep them separate through the butter toss so the tips stay intact for the top of the pile.
- "Cutlets"In period usage this ordinarily means rib chops from a rack, often with the bone scraped clean (Frenched). The book does not say how thick, nor what trimming involved; removing the chine and the heavier sinew, and flattening the meat slightly, would be the usual reading.
- Egg and crumbsDry the chops well, season before breading, and use fine dry crumbs rather than fresh. Let the breaded chops rest ten minutes so the coating sets and does not slide off in the pan.
- Butter will burn"fry in butter to a pale golden brown" is easier with clarified butter, or butter cut with a neutral oil. Whole butter pushed to the heat needed for a deep crust will blacken before the chops are done.
- DonenessThin breaded chops cook fast, a few minutes a side over medium-high heat, and are meant to stay pink at the bone. Taken to a deep brown crust they will be grey through.
- "Before a clear fire for a second"This is the coal-range way of blotting fat off without the coating going soft. A wire rack over a sheet pan in a 200F oven does the same job while the asparagus is finished.
- ServingA bundle of asparagus and eight to twelve chops feeds four as a main course; figure two to three chops a person. The chops stand overlapping in a ring, bones outward, asparagus heaped in the well.
- "As much of the stalks as is eatable"Snap each spear where it breaks cleanly and peel the lower inch of anything thicker than a pencil. The woody remainder is discarded, not cut up.
Oscar Tschirky ran the dining rooms of the Waldorf, and later the Waldorf-Astoria, from 1893 onward; the 1896 Cook Book by "Oscar" of the Waldorf is a vast compilation of the French-trained hotel repertoire as it was practiced in New York. A breaded lamb cutlet ringed around a vegetable garnish is a stock arrangement of that repertoire — the classical côtelettes d'agneau panées served en couronne, with the name of the dish taken from whatever filled the center. Asparagus placed it firmly in spring, when the recipe would have been printed on the card only as long as the local crop lasted; year-round asparagus is a much later development. The instruction to drain the cutlets on paper before a clear fire is a reminder that the book was written for coal and wood ranges, where a bright, smokeless fire was itself a piece of equipment.