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Timbale of Lambs' Sweetbreads
Take a timbale mould, line it with short paste, having previously buttered it, and put a layer of forcemeat mixed with chives, and a little finely-chopped lean raw ham inside. Blanch a score of lambs' sweetbreads, and fry them over a brisk fire in bacon fat until well browned; sprinkle over salt and pepper, take them off the fire, and let them cool. Put them in layers in the timbale mould, alternating each layer with the forcemeat. Put a layer of forcemeat on the top, cover the mould with a round of paste, fixing it carefully to the sides, place it in a moderate oven, and bake for about one hour. When cooked turn the timbale out of the mould, make a hole in the top, pour in a little thickened gravy, put back the round that has been removed, garnish with mushrooms and parsley, and serve at once.
Lambs' Sweetbreads with Villeroy Sauce Select the desired quantity of sweetbreads, blanch and place them in a stewpan, adding broth to half their height, boil till tender and the gravy is reduced. Put the sweetbreads between two plates, and leave till cold. Cut each sweetbread in two, dip them in Villeroy sauce, and place them on a baking sheet. When the sauce has cooled on them, take them from the baking sheet with the aid of a knife, roll them in breadcrumbs again, and fry in boiling fat; when nicely browned all over, drain, arrange them on a hot dish, and serve.
Two related dishes from the Waldorf's kitchen, both built on the assumption that a cook has lambs' sweetbreads by the score and a pastry-lined mould at hand. The hinge is the blanching: sweetbreads must be soaked, parboiled, pressed and cooled before anything else happens, or they will be spongy and grey inside the crust.
- A score of sweetbreadsTwenty lambs' sweetbreads. Lamb thymus is small, roughly an ounce or two each, so the whole quantity is about 1.5-2 lb of trimmed meat. Veal sweetbreads are far easier to buy and are considerably larger, so proportionally fewer will fill the same mould.
- Blanch means more than dippingSoak the sweetbreads in cold water for several hours, changing it until it runs clear, then bring them slowly to a simmer for a few minutes, plunge into ice water, and peel away the outer membrane and any gristle. Press them flat between two plates with a weight until cold. Unblanched sweetbreads will not hold their shape through an hour in the oven.
- ForcemeatAn uncooked ground-meat farce, here doing the work of a binder. Veal or chicken breast ground with an equal weight of pork fatback, seasoned, is one common period combination; a modern food processor gives a smoother result than pounding in a mortar. Season it firmly, since it is the only element carrying salt through the interior.
- Short paste and the mouldA timbale mould is a plain, deep, slightly tapered cylinder, drum-shaped rather than fluted. A 6-inch charlotte mould or a straight-sided cake tin works. The recipe calls for short paste: a sturdy short crust meant to stand as a container, not a flaky tart shell, and it needs to be rolled thicker than you would think.
- Moderate oven350F. An hour at that heat is right for a filled mould of this size; the pastry should be firm and coloured and the centre at 165F.
- Thickened gravyA reduced brown stock bound with a little roux or arrowroot, poured hot into the finished timbale through the cut hole so it soaks the forcemeat. Half a cup is enough; more will soften the pastry base.
- Villeroy sauceA thick, reduced allemande or velouté enriched with egg yolk and often mushroom essence, boiled down until it sets solid when cold. It is a coating sauce, not a pouring one.
- Frying in boiling fatDeep fat at 350-360F. The interiors are already cooked, so the point is only to colour the crumb crust; two or three minutes is plenty, and longer will crack the sauce coating and let it leak.
- YieldThe timbale serves six to eight as a first course, cut in wedges like a raised pie. The Villeroy sweetbreads are a fritter course, two or three halves per person.
Oscar Tschirky, the Swiss-born maître d'hôtel known to New York simply as Oscar of the Waldorf, published his Cook Book in 1896, and its offal chapters show how much high hotel cooking of the period leaned on cuts an American home cook rarely touched. Sweetbreads, the thymus and often the pancreas of a young animal, commanded high prices precisely because they are small, perishable and demand exact handling. The word timbale comes from the French for a kettledrum, describing the shape of the mould rather than the contents; a timbale could be lined with pastry, as here, or with forcemeat alone. Villeroy sauce is generally traced to the ducs de Villeroy of the French court, and its purpose is entirely practical: a sauce reduced until it sets like jelly can be used to jacket a delicate piece of meat so it survives the fryer intact. Both dishes belong to a service style that assumed a brigade of cooks, cold marble to work on, and a dining room willing to pay for the labour.