Lobster with Cream

Plunge two lobsters each weighing two pounds into boiling water, so as to kill them quickly; break off the large claws, and lay them in a narrow saucepan with the bodies; moisten them to their height with white wine and water, add branches of parsley, bay leaf, onions, finely shred carrots and salt; let boil for twenty minutes, drain and detach the tails from the bodies. Take out the creamy part from the bodies, press through a sieve, and keep this aside. Fry in some butter, four finely chopped, blanched shallots, moisten them with the lobster stock, and boil for fifteen minutes, strain, remove the fat, and reduce to a half-glaze, then thicken with two spoonfuls of veloute sauce (No. 415); continue to reduce while pouring in two gills of good raw cream, strain this sauce and add to it the creamy parts of the lobster, a dash of cayenne pepper and half a gill of burnt brandy; butter it without ceasing to stir so that the butter is thoroughly incorporated. Cut across in slices the tail meat and shells; cut the remaining bodies in two, and dress the two halves one beside the other in the center of a dish; range around the slices of tail, alternating each piece with a fine slice of cooked truffle, and on top of the body shells lay the claw meat; cover the lobsters with a part of the sauce, and serve the rest in a separate sauce-boat.

MUSSELS (Moules).

This bivalvular shell-fish is without any distinct head, or eyes, or organs of mastication; there are sea and river mussels. The shells from the sea kind are oval shaped, convex on the outside, and concave inside, black, bluish, smoothly polished, and varying from two to three inches in length. Mussels must be chosen very fresh. Be careful after having washed them to place them in a vessel with salted water and leave them for several hours.