No. 1345

Rump of Beef, Modern Style—Braised

Pointe de Boeuf Braise a la Moderne

Pare an aitchbone of beef, suppressing all the bones; roll lengthwise, tie and lay it in a long saucepan with melted fat pork; let it fry slowly for half an hour, turning it over frequently; season, then take the meat from the pan, spread on the bottom of this same saucepan a thick layer of minced vegetables and onions and replace the meat over, moisten with three or four gills of broth; let reduce very slowly and wet it again with as much white wine, then reduce to a glaze. Now moisten the meat to its height with broth, boil up the liquid, skimming well the fat from the surface and cover the saucepan; stand it in a slack oven and have the meat cook until well done which will take at least five hours. Put the meat on a baking dish to truss and pare; strain the stock, suppress its fat and add broth to it should there not be sufficient and reduce it it there be too much. Return the meat to a narrower saucepan, pour the stock over and add a glassful of Madeira or Marsala wine; finish to cook in a slack oven basting it at times so that it assumes a glaze; it should be tender and finely colored. When prepared to serve, drain the meat and cut it into well formed transversal slices of even thickness, dress these on a foundation of rice fastened on a long dish and surround with a garnishing prepared beforehand and having it symmetrically arranged. At the end of the dish where the narrow slices of the beef begin fasten a small fried bread support and in it stick a skewer garnished with cut vegetables and a round truffle. The garnishing around the meat consists of eight small chartreuses of vegetables, a dozen ball-shaped croquettes and a dozen thick slices of cucumbers hollowed out and stuffed, each one to be decorated with a slice of truffle cut out with a vegetable cutter. Serve at the same time as the remove a sauce-boatful of the strained, skimmed and reduced stock in which the beef was cooked. This dish is prepared to have served to the guests at a dinner party.

← No. 1344 Rump of Beef, Mirotons a la Menagere Beef No. 1346 Roast Beef-Middle Short Loin—English Style →

For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer's braise is a straightforward pot roast buried under a banquet garnish. Strip away the skewers and truffles and the method is sound; the two-stage reduction is what gives the sauce its body.

The hinge: reduce twice to a glazeThe hinge: reduce, then reduce to a glaze -- Before the meat is finally covered with broth, the pan liquid is taken down twice — first with broth, then with white wine, the second time to a sticky glaze. Skipping that step gives you a thin, gray braising liquid instead of a sauce that coats a spoon.
Gills and glassfulsA gill is half a cup, so three or four gills is 1.5 to 2 cups. A "glassful" of Madeira is usually taken as something like 4 fl oz, though it is nowhere defined here. The final broth quantity is unspecified because it depends on the pot: the recipe says to moisten the meat to its height, not over it.
Slack ovenA slack or cool oven is generally taken as somewhere around 275-300F. At that temperature a large rolled roast will need the full five hours the recipe allows; the meat is done when a skewer meets no resistance, around 200-205F internal, not at any fixed clock time.
AitchboneThe aitchbone is the cut over the pelvic bone at the rump end, next to the round; the recipe has you bone it out entirely and roll it. It is not commonly sold under that name today. A boneless bottom round or a rolled rump roast of 5-6 lb behaves the same; ask for it tied at 1-inch intervals rather than rolling it yourself.
Fat porkMelted fat pork is rendered salt pork or fatback. Lard, beef drippings or a neutral oil will brown the meat as well, but salt pork also seasons the vegetable bed underneath, which is part of the point.
The vegetable bed"Minced vegetables and onions" is the ordinary braising bed of carrot, onion and celery cut small — what later kitchens call a mirepoix. It is strained out of the stock; its job is to flavor the liquid, so do not skimp on quantity.
The garnish is optional theaterEight small chartreuses of vegetables, twelve croquettes, twelve stuffed cucumber slices, a fried bread support and a garnished skewer belong to a Delmonico's dinner service. The dish stands perfectly well on the rice foundation with the sauce alone.
TrufflesFresh black truffle at this scale is now a luxury purchase. Cooked truffle is used here for the dark disc it cuts, not for aroma; a slice of black olive or a cutout of cooked black trumpet mushroom does the same visual work.
YieldA 5-6 lb rolled roast, sliced across the grain, serves ten to twelve as a remove — the substantial course that followed the fish at a formal dinner.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer ran the kitchens at Delmonico's in New York for more than thirty years, and The Epicurean (1894) is essentially the working record of that restaurant's repertoire, written for cooks who already knew how to braise. "A la moderne" was a nineteenth-century French kitchen label for a braised joint dressed with a set garnish of turned and molded vegetables, and it says less about the beef than about the presentation: the fried bread support, the hâtelet skewer stuck with truffle, the vegetable chartreuses arranged symmetrically around a rice base. The instruction to serve the sauce "at the same time as the remove" marks it as a remove, the heavy course that replaced the fish.