No. 1663

Breasts of Lamb, Chopped Sauce

Poitrine d'Agneau a la Sauce Hachee

Have two fine breasts of yearling lamb or young mutton; suppress the bone part covering the gristle; lay the meats in a low saucepan lined with bardes of fat pork, cut up carrots and onions, and a garnished bouquet; moisten with stock (No. 194a) cover over with buttered paper and set it into a moderate oven to cook for two to two hours and a half, until the bones can be easily removed. Drain and place the meats under the pressure of a weight to reduce to five-eighths of an inch, and when quite cold, pare and remove the skin carefully without touching the fat, and cut the meat up into half hearts, trim them, nicely rounding the angles, and dip them in melted butter, roll in bread-crumbs, and broil over a slow fire till they attain a fine color and are very hot, then dress them either in a straight row or in a circle. Garnish around with olive-shaped pieces of potato cooked in fresh butter, and when done, and the butter is drained off, add some salt and the juice of a lemon, dredging over with chopped parsley. Serve a chopped sauce (No. 539) separately.

← No. 1662 Breasts of Lamb, Baked Lamb No. 1664 Breast of Lamb with Turnips →

For the Modern Kitchen

A two-stage dish: the breasts are braised until the bones pull free, pressed flat and chilled overnight, then crumbed and broiled. Plan for two days.

The hinge is the pressingThe breast must be weighted while still warm and left until quite cold, ideally overnight in the refrigerator. A sheet pan with another pan and a few cans on top gives the even 5/8-inch slab that lets you cut clean shapes; skip it and the meat shreds under the knife.
Moderate ovenA "moderate" oven of this period is usually read as somewhere around 325-350F, with the pan covered by buttered paper rather than a tight lid. Two to two and a half hours is right for lamb breast; test by tugging a rib bone, which should slip out with no resistance.
"Suppress the bone part covering the gristle"Trim away the flap of brisket bone and cartilage at the thick end before cooking. The rib bones stay in during the braise and are pulled out afterward while the meat is warm.
Bardes of fat porkThin sheets of pork fatback (fresh or only lightly salted) used to line the pan. Plain fatback is closest; thinly sliced unsmoked pancetta or blanched thick bacon works, but reduce the added salt accordingly.
Garnished bouquet and stockA bouquet garni of parsley stems, thyme and bay. Ranhofer's No. 194a is one of his numbered stocks; a light unsalted stock is safer here, since it reduces around the fatty meat.
Half hearts and olive-shaped potatoesCut the chilled slab into half-heart shapes, cornering off the angles as the text says. The potatoes are turned to small olive shapes, cooked gently in butter until tender and golden, then finished off the heat with salt, lemon and parsley.
Broiling the crumbed pieces"a slow fire" means the crumbs color as the interior reheats. Moderate heat under a broiler or over cooler coals, turning once, until browned and heated right through; high heat scorches the crumbs before the center is hot.
FatLamb breast is among the fattiest cuts. Chill the braising liquid, lift the cake of fat, and reduce what remains if you want it in the sauce; the meat itself should be pared of skin but keeps its fat layer, as the text insists.
Chopped sauceRanhofer's No. 539, a sauce hachee: a vinegar-sharpened brown sauce with chopped aromatics such as shallot, gherkin, caper and parsley. Any sharp piquante-style sauce fills the same role against the rich meat.
YieldTwo lamb breasts, pressed and cut, give roughly 6 to 8 portions as a course.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer, chef at Delmonico's in New York, published The Epicurean in 1894 as a full working record of the restaurant's kitchen, and this recipe shows the house method for making a cheap cut behave like a formal entrée. Breast of lamb was, and largely still is, one of the least expensive pieces on the carcass; braising, pressing and crumbing it — the same treatment classical French kitchens gave to pig's ears, tripe and calf's feet — turned it into neat uniform pieces that could be plated in a ring with turned potatoes. The technique of pressing braised meat cold and then reheating it in breadcrumbs is essentially a way of buying time in a restaurant: the long work happens the day before, and service is a few minutes on the grill. The "chopped sauce" of gherkin, caper and shallot belongs to the same nineteenth-century logic, acid and salt set against fat, that produced sauce piquante, rémoulade and ravigote.