No. 1847

Chicken Fillets or Breasts a la Marceau

Filets ou Ailes de Poulet a la Marceau

Remove the breasts from six chickens each one of them to weigh from a pound and a half to two pounds; suppress the skin and sinews and lift off the minion fillets to streak with truffles; pare the large fillets into half heart-shapes, and lay them in a buttered sautoir; place the minion fillets on the outer edges, pour over butter, cover with buttered paper and cook in a moderate oven. Fill with cream chicken forcemeat (No. 75) some flat quarter inch thick half heart-shaped molds, placed on a sheet of buttered paper and poach very lightly, then saute on both sides in butter and dress unmolded in a circle with the chicken fillets on top. Prepare a Marceau sauce (No. 495); when ready to serve add a little fresh butter; fill the middle of the circle with small mushroom heads fried in butter, cover over with a part of the sauce and send the remainder to accompany the dish poured into a separate sauce-boat.

← No. 1846 Chicken Fillets or Breasts a la Lucullus Chicken No. 1848 Chicken Fillets or Breasts a la Marechale →

For the Modern Kitchen

A Delmonico's plated composition rather than a weeknight dish: poached-then-sauteed chicken breasts ringed around molded forcemeat, with two cross-references to other numbered recipes in Ranhofer's book. Read those first, because the sauce and the forcemeat carry the dish.

The hinge: gentle heat, twiceBoth the fillets under buttered paper and the forcemeat molds are cooked slowly and barely through. Breast meat at a hard roast or a rolling poach turns dry and fibrous; the buttered paper (a cartouche) is there to keep the surface from browning while the interior comes up. Cook the fillets through to a safe internal temperature (165F) and rest them.
Sautoir and buttered paperA sautoir is a straight-sided saute pan; any wide, shallow, oven-safe pan does. Cut a round of parchment to sit directly on the meat rather than tenting it.
Moderate ovenAround 350F on a modern dial. The fillets are thin and will be done in roughly 12-15 minutes depending on thickness.
Minion filletsThe filet mignon of the bird, that is, the tenderloin strip on the underside of each breast. "Streak with truffles" means to cut thin truffle batons or slices and insert them into slits in the meat so they show as dark lines. Black truffle is the intent; a good tinned truffle or an omission is more honest than truffle oil.
The two cross-referencesNo. 75 is Ranhofer's cream chicken forcemeat, essentially a mousseline of raw breast, egg white and cream, which is why quarter-inch molds poach so lightly. No. 495 is the Marceau sauce. Neither is reproduced here; without the parent book, substitute a chicken mousseline and a supreme-style sauce and accept that the result is an approximation.
Poach, then sauteThe forcemeat disks are set in a bain-marie or a low oven until just firm, then browned in butter. Poach them too hard and they souffle and weep; they should still be quivering when they come out.
YieldTwelve large fillets and twelve minions from six birds. Most likely part of a long multi-course service rather than a standalone main; as a modern main course it serves six generously.
Scaling downNothing here depends on the count of six chickens. Two breasts per person, one mold each, and a proportional amount of sauce works exactly the same way.

A Little History

The Epicurean (1894) is Charles Ranhofer's record of his three decades in the kitchens of Delmonico's in New York, and this entry sits in a long run of nearly identical breast preparations distinguished only by their garnish and sauce: Lucullus before it, Marechale after. That was the logic of the grande cuisine Ranhofer had learned in France, where a named garnish was a fixed formula a trained cook could execute from the name alone. The names themselves came from anywhere that flattered a diner's sense of history, and "a la Marceau" is generally traced to Francois Severin Marceau, the young French Revolutionary general killed in 1796, one of a great many soldiers, statesmen and singers who ended up attached to a sauce.