No. 1677

Lamb Cutlets, Leverrier

Cotelettes d'Agneau a la Leverrier

Broil some well pared, first cut cutlets; have as many one and three-quarter inch diameter tin rounds with slightly raised edges; butter and decorate the bottoms with a star each point of which should be formed one half of tongue and the other half of truffle. Cover the cutlets with a layer of forcemeat and place them in buttered bottomless cutlet shaped molds, so that the cutlet is enveloped in forcemeat and fills them up entirely; smooth well the surface and then turn over on the widest part, the star decorated tin round, so that the decoration is exactly on the kernel. Put them for a few moments into a moderate oven and after the forcemeat is poached, lift off both the tin round and the mold molding the chop. Pare some artichoke bottoms two inches in diameter, season and fry them in butter, then dress them flat in a circle and lay a cutlet on top of each; trim the handles with frills (No. 10), pour a little half-glaze (No. 400) in the bottom of the dish and serve separately a half-glaze sauce (No. 413) with orange juice and butter added at the last moment.

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For the Modern Kitchen

An 1894 chaud-froid-adjacent presentation piece: each broiled cutlet is jacketed in forcemeat, poached in a mold, and stamped with a star of tongue and truffle. The work is all in the assembly, and the hinge is the forcemeat.

The forcemeat is the whole dishThe recipe specifies nothing beyond "forcemeat", but a fine, well-bound quenelle-type forcemeat, kept thoroughly cold, is what will hold its shape when poached. If it is warm or loosely bound it will slump the moment the mold comes off, and no amount of decoration will save it.
"Moderate oven"350F. The cutlets are already broiled; the oven work is only to set the forcemeat, so use a covered pan with a little stock or a bain-marie so the surface stays moist. The forcemeat is raw meat and should reach 160F throughout.
Broil the cutlets under-doneThey get a second cooking in the oven. Take them off the grill at about 120-125F internal so they finish at medium-rare rather than grey.
Molds and tin roundsThe "bottomless cutlet shaped molds" are cutters used as rings; plain metal ring molds no wider than the 1 3/4-inch tin round work, set on a buttered baking sheet. The "tin rounds with slightly raised edges" are shallow 1 3/4-inch tartlet tins used as lids to carry the decoration, which transfers onto the forcemeat as the mold is lifted.
Tongue and trufflePickled or cooked beef tongue, sliced thin and cut with a small aspic cutter, and black truffle for the alternating star points. Both were pantry staples in a professional kitchen of the 1890s; a firm black olive or a slice of well-blackened mushroom stands in for truffle visually but not in flavour.
Artichoke bottomsFresh globe artichokes trimmed to the base, or the tinned artichoke bottoms sold for exactly this purpose. Frozen hearts are too small and too soft to hold a cutlet flat; they will not read as a platform.
Half-glazeDemi-glace, from Ranhofer's own numbered sauces. The finish is the point: orange juice and cold butter whisked in off the heat, right before service, so the sauce keeps its gloss and does not break or turn bitter.
FrillsHis No. 10 is a paper cutlet frill slipped over the exposed rib bone. Purely decorative, and only possible if the cutlets were French-trimmed before broiling.
YieldReckon two cutlets per person as a course; the recipe sets one cutlet on each artichoke bottom, so count a bottom per cutlet. The molding is fiddly enough that it is worth assembling everything a few hours ahead and holding the raw assemblies chilled.

A Little History

The Epicurean was Charles Ranhofer's summary of thirty-odd years as chef at Delmonico's in New York, published in 1894, and its lamb chapter is a catalogue of garnishes bearing the names of patrons, singers and public figures. The star decoration here strongly suggests the French astronomer Urbain Le Verrier, whose calculations located Neptune in 1846 and who was a considerable celebrity in the mid-century press — though Ranhofer, characteristically, explains none of his dedications, so the connection is an inference rather than a documented one. What the recipe shows plainly is the logic of high nineteenth-century restaurant cooking: a plain broiled chop is treated as raw material for architecture, sheathed in forcemeat, mounted on a fried artichoke bottom, inlaid with truffle, and sauced separately so the decoration is never obscured. Dishes of this kind were the reason a kitchen employed a dozen cooks and kept a drawer of tin cutters in graduated sizes.