No. 1290

Trout a la Beaufort

Truite a la Beaufort

A genus of fish of the salmon family, all their species being carnivorous; they live a greater part of the time in fresh water, generally that which is the purest and the most rapid. They are very highly esteemed.

Trout a la Beaufort.—Draw the fish through the gills without scaling or opening the belly; put it into a fish boiler with two gills of vinegar, cold water and half a bottleful of white wine, salt, sliced carrots and onions and a bunch of parsley, set it on the fire and bring the liquid to a boil while removing the scum, and the first boil set it on one side to keep the liquid at the same degree, but without boiling from twenty to thirty minutes; at the last moment drain off the fish and slide it on a dish covered with a folded napkin, dressing it on its side and not on the belly, so that the handsome shading of its skin may be entirely revealed; rub the surface over with a piece of butter to prevent the skin from drying; garnish around with small pike quenelles (No. 90) made with lobster butter (No. 580), decorated with truffles; lay a milt or roe fried in butter on the sides and garnish the ends with fillets of flounders scored with slices of truffles and stoned olives. Cover with a matelote sauce (No. 498) and send to the table a separate sauce-boat of the same sauce.

← No. 1289 Sturgeon or Sterlet with Quenelles and Olive Salmon & Trout No. 1291 Trout a la Cambaceres →

For the Modern Kitchen

This is a court-bouillon poach in the au bleu manner, dressed as a garnished centrepiece. The garnish is optional theatre; the poaching liquid and the temperature are what make or break the fish.

Never let it boilAfter the single initial boil the pot is moved to the side of the fire and held there without bubbling; Ranhofer gives no temperature, but this is gentle poaching rather than simmering. A hard boil would split the skin, and the recipe's insistence on leaving the fish unscaled and unopened at the belly is so the skin stays whole and its shading is revealed.
Two gills of vinegarA gill is half a cup, so one cup of vinegar. Half a bottle of white wine is about 12 fl oz. Cold water to cover — Ranhofer assumes a fish kettle, so a roasting pan with a rack, or any pot long enough to hold the fish straight, will do.
Fish boilerA long, narrow, lidded kettle with a perforated lift-out plate. The plate matters more than the shape: a whole poached trout cannot be lifted with a spatula without breaking, so improvise a sling of cheesecloth or a folded strip of foil under the fish before it goes in.
Twenty to thirty minutesThe recipe gives no weight; that timing would suit a large fish, of roughly three to five pounds, started in cold liquid. A pair of 12-ounce trout will be done in eight to ten minutes at the same heat; test at the thickest part behind the head, where the flesh should just leave the bone.
Drawn through the gillsThe viscera are hooked out through the gill opening so the belly stays whole and the fish holds its shape. A fishmonger will do this on request; it is fiddly and the gall bladder must not be torn.
Milt or roeMilt is the male fish's sperm sac, sold occasionally as soft roe. Either is hard to source outside a specialist counter and can be left out without harming the dish.
Quenelles and lobster butterNo. 90 is Ranhofer's pike quenelle forcemeat and No. 580 his lobster butter; see those entries for the method. Both can be replaced by a simple pike or whiting mousseline, or omitted entirely.
Matelote sauceNo. 498 is Ranhofer's matelote sauce; sauces of that name in this period are generally red-wine based, thickened and finished with butter, so expect something dark rather than pale — but check the entry. It is served over the fish and again in a boat.
YieldThe recipe gives no yield; a large trout dressed this way would serve several as a course. It is presented on a folded napkin and dressed on its side.

A Little History

Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894) records the kitchen of Delmonico's in New York, where whole poached fish were a standard grand centrepiece and the garnish list often ran longer than the cooking method. The handling here is close to the classic truite au bleu: an unscaled trout goes into an acidulated court bouillon, and the vinegar is traditionally said to react with the natural slime coating to throw a bluish sheen over the skin — which fits the recipe's insistence that the fish be neither scaled nor opened at the belly, and that it be dressed on its side so the shading shows. The a la Beaufort title, like most of the personal and place names attached to nineteenth-century garnishes, denotes the accompaniment rather than the fish, and its origin is not documented in the book; the compound of quenelles, truffles, olives and a matelote sauce is the signature. The introductory note on trout being carnivorous and preferring pure, rapid water reflects the period's belief that a fish's flavour recorded the water it swam in.