No. 1185

Kingfish a la Sultana

Kingfish a la Sultane

Lift off the fillets and remove the skin, pare them to the shape of a half heart, season with salt and cover one side with fish quenelle forcemeat (No. 90); range them in a buttered sautoir, the pointed end toward the center of the pan. On the round end place a crescent made of the red meat found in the lobster claws having it an eighth of an inch in thickness; between the pointed end of the fillet and the crescent imitate a rosette with five halved pistachios. Moisten with a little court bouillon (No. 38), cover over with a buttered paper and place to cook in a slack oven. When done, dress them flat in a circle and fill the center with a garnishing composed of truffles, mushrooms and escalops of lobster mingled with some lean espagnole sauce (No. 416) made with Madeira, reduced properly and thickened; finish with fresh butter. At the tip of each fillet attach a fancy favor frill (No. 10) and serve with a separate sauce-boat of the same sauce.

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For the Modern Kitchen

A Ranhofer set piece: poached fillets built up with forcemeat, lobster and pistachio into a decorated crown. Most of the difficulty is in the cross-references, which point to preparations elsewhere in the book.

The hinge: gentle heatA "slack" oven is a cool one, usually reckoned somewhere around 250-300F, and gentle heat is the whole technique. The fillets are covered with buttered paper and barely poached in a shallow film of court bouillon so the quenelle coating sets without puffing, weeping or sliding off. Too hot an oven risks the forcemeat swelling and the decoration breaking up.
KingfishRanhofer means the northern kingfish or whiting (Menticirrhus saxatilis), an Atlantic drum once common in New York markets and rarely sold now. Any firm, lean, mild white fish that fillets cleanly works: hake, black sea bass, haddock or true whiting.
SautoirA straight-sided shallow pan, not a sloped saute pan. The point is that the fillets sit flat in a single layer with the liquid coming only part way up them; a wide skillet or a buttered roasting pan does the job.
Quenelle forcemeatNo. 90 is a fish farce, of the usual period type: raw white fish pounded with a panade and butter or cream, then bound and sieved. A food processor does in a minute what the original asked of a mortar; keep everything cold and stop before the mixture breaks. The recipe does not say how thickly to spread it -- a thin, even layer on one side only.
Court bouillonNo. 38 is a simple aromatic poaching liquid of the usual type: water with wine or vinegar, aromatic vegetables, herbs and salt, simmered and strained. The recipe calls only for "a little", enough to moisten; it is worth saving to reinforce the sauce.
The lobster crescent and rosetteThe "red meat found in the lobster claws" is the cooked claw meat, whose surface is scarlet. Press it into a slab and stamp crescents with a plain cutter. Pistachios should be blanched and skinned so they read green against the pale forcemeat; five halves fanned out make the rosette.
The sauceNo. 416 is a lean (fish-based, meatless) espagnole. Modern equivalent: a well-reduced fish velouty or demi-glace finished with Madeira, reduced until it coats, then mounted with cold butter off the heat. Do not let it boil after the butter goes in.
Favor frillsNo. 10 is a paper cuff, the same thing put on lamb chop bones. Purely decorative and easily omitted; nothing about the dish depends on it.
Yield and timingThe recipe gives neither. Allow one or two fillets per person for a fish course, and expect roughly 12-18 minutes in a slack oven depending on thickness; the forcemeat should be firm to the touch and the fish opaque throughout.

A Little History

The Epicurean (1894) is Charles Ranhofer's record of thirty-odd years as chef of Delmonico's in New York, and this entry shows the house style at full stretch: a cheap local market fish raised to a dinner-party centrepiece by forcemeat, lobster, truffle and a Madeira sauce. "A la sultane" was one of the stock French garnish names of the period — here it carries a pistachio element — part of the same nineteenth-century fashion for orientalising labels that gave the repertoire turque, orientale and mogol. The kingfish itself tells you something about the era's markets: an abundant Atlantic drum landed off Long Island, it appears repeatedly in Ranhofer's fish chapter and has since largely dropped out of American commerce. The construction, with fillets pared to a half-heart, ranged points inward and dressed in a circle around a filled centre, gathers the whole dish onto a single platter.