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Salmi Sauce
Mix together in a small saucepan one tablespoonful each of flour and butter and stir it well over the fire until lightly browned; then pour in three-fourths of a pint of white wine and an equal quantity of broth, add one tablespoonful each of chopped shallots and carrots, a bunch of sweet herbs, a blade of mace, a lump of sugar, and salt and pepper to taste. Boil the above ingredients until reduced to about half their original quantity, pass it through a sieve, then mix in the meats, etc., prepared for the hash.
A brown-roux reduction sauce meant to finish a salmi — a hash of already-cooked game or poultry. The whole point is the reduction, so resist the urge to shortcut it.
- Quantities in cupsThree-fourths of a pint is 1 1/2 cups by American measure, so you are starting with 1 1/2 cups wine and 1 1/2 cups broth. That is a lot of liquid for a single tablespoon each of flour and butter; the body comes from reduction, not from the roux.
- Brown the roux properly"Lightly browned" means blond to light hazelnut, roughly 4-6 minutes over medium heat with constant stirring. Stop while it still smells nutty rather than toasty, since it will darken further as the sauce cooks down.
- Sweet herbsA "bunch of sweet herbs" is essentially what we would tie as a bouquet garni; the usual reading is parsley stems, thyme and a bay leaf, though period composition varied. Tie it so it can be pulled out, though here everything goes through a sieve anyway.
- MaceA blade of mace is the lacy covering of the nutmeg, sold whole in some spice shops. If you only have ground, use a pinch — under 1/8 teaspoon — as it is more assertive than the blade.
- A lump of sugarLumps cut from loaf sugar varied in size; roughly a teaspoon is a fair working assumption. It is there to round the acidity of the wine, not to sweeten; taste before adding more.
- The reductionReducing three cups by half at a bare simmer takes 25-35 minutes in a wide pan. You want about 1 1/2 cups of finished sauce, thick enough to coat a spoon.
- StrainingPass it through a fine sieve and press the shallot and carrot firmly against the mesh — that pulp is much of the flavor. Discard the herb bundle and mace first.
- Finishing the hashThe cooked meat goes in only at the end and is warmed through, not simmered. Game and poultry already roasted will turn stringy if boiled in the sauce.
- YieldThe recipe gives no yield; it finishes at roughly 1 1/2 cups of sauce, enough to moisten a modest hash of cooked meat.
Salmi (French salmis) is a classic use for game that has already been roasted: the flesh is carved off and reheated in a sauce built from wine, aromatics and often the pounded carcass and trimmings. The name is generally traced to the same root as salmigondis, the old French word for a mixed ragout that also gave English "salmagundi." A dish of this kind suited a large hotel kitchen of the 1890s, where birds roasted to order left joints and carcasses over at the end of service, and salmis were both economical and fashionable restaurant fare.