No. 1157

Flounders a la Madeleine

Plies Carrelets ou Limandes a la Madeleine

Remove the fillets and skin from the fish; season and cover the side the skin was taken from, with a fish quenelle forcemeat (No. 90) with cooked fine herbs (No. 385) mixed in it; roll them up cork-shaped, and set them in buttered tin paupiette rings; place these on sheets of buttered paper, then in a sautoir, moisten with mirepoix stock (No. 419), and cook in the oven until properly done, then unmold and dip each one in beaten eggs, then in bread-crumbs; fry a fine color and dress on napkins with a bunch of fried parsley on top. The sauce to accompany these is made with one shallot, a medium sized onion, as much celery root and carrots, all cut up into three-sixteenth inch squares, blanch the carrots and celery in salted water, then set them into a little white broth to let fall to a glaze; fry lightly the shallots and onions, add to them the carrots and celery, and moisten with broth, throw in a little sugar, then cook in such a way that the vegetables are done when the liquid is entirely reduced. Moisten again with cream, reduce once more, thicken with egg-yolks and fresh butter, add a little powdered sweet pepper, and serve.

← No. 1156 Flounders a la Jules Janin Sole, Flounder & Turbot No. 1158 Flounders, Provencal Style →

For the Modern Kitchen

A two-stage dish: the stuffed fillets are first poached in the oven, then chilled, breaded and fried. Ranhofer assumes you have his forcemeat, herb and stock recipes to hand, so the cross-references need filling in before you start.

Chill before breadingCooling before breading -- Ranhofer says only to unmold and dip, but hot paupiettes are soft and wet and the crumb coating can slide off in the fat. Letting them cool before the egg and crumbs will help them fry clean.
Fish quenelle forcemeat (No. 90)Pounded raw white fish worked with a panada, butter and egg, all kept cold; check Ranhofer's No. 90 for the exact composition and proportions. A modern food processor does the pounding in a minute; keep everything refrigerator-cold or it will break.
Cooked fine herbs (No. 385)A chopped mushroom-and-herb mixture sweated in butter and cooked dry; see No. 385 for the exact composition. It must be cool and dry when folded into the forcemeat, or the stuffing will loosen.
Mirepoix stock (No. 419)A carrot, onion, celery and ham mirepoix cooked down with white wine and stock. A well-flavored fish stock with a splash of dry white wine is an honest substitute; you need only enough to come a third of the way up the rings.
Paupiette rings and the sautoirTin paupiette rings were straight-sided collars an inch or so deep. Rings from a set of crumpet or English muffin rings work, as do wide-mouthed metal cookie cutters, buttered inside. A sautoir is a straight-sided shallow pan; any oven-safe skillet or roasting pan serves.
Oven temperatureRanhofer gives none. Treat this as a gentle oven poach at 325-350F, covered loosely with buttered paper; 12 to 15 minutes for rolls of this size, until the forcemeat is just set and firm to the touch.
The egg-yolk liaisonAfter the cream is reduced, the yolks and butter must go in off the heat and the sauce must not come back to a boil, or it will curdle into scrambled egg. Hold it below 180F and serve promptly.
Powdered sweet pepperMost likely paprika; Ranhofer uses sweet Hungarian pepper elsewhere, though in period usage "sweet pepper" in powdered form could also mean a sweet Spanish pimento powder. It is not ground bell pepper or white pepper.
YieldA flatfish of this kind yields two to four fillets depending on how it is cut, so a pair of flounders will give somewhere between four and eight paupiettes; reckon two per person as a fish course. Scale the garnish vegetables by eye -- the brunoise should be a spoonful or two per serving.

A Little History

This comes from Charles Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894), the enormous record of his years as chef at Delmonico's in New York, where the fish chapter alone runs through dozens of preparations of sole, flounder and turbot under French names. "Plies, carrelets ou limandes" reflects a real problem for an American kitchen working from a French repertoire: true Dover sole was not reliably available on this side of the Atlantic, so the winter flounder, dab and plaice of the North Atlantic stood in for it, and Ranhofer lists the alternatives openly. Dish names of this kind are legion in the book, commonly honoring people or places, and the recipe immediately before this one is named for the critic Jules Janin. The technique itself is pure haute cuisine of the period: a fillet lined with quenelle forcemeat, rolled, poached, then crumbed and fried so that the diner gets a crisp shell around a pale mousse, with a glazed brunoise of root vegetables bound by an egg-and-butter liaison alongside.