No. 1971

Pullet a la Arco Valley

Poularde a la Arco Valley

Prepare, cook, and dress the pullet the same as for a la Seymour(No. 1981); serve at the same time but separately a veloute sauce (No. 415) reduced with mushroom broth and thickened when ready to serve with egg-yolks, cream and fresh butter, adding chopped parsley, small mushroom buttons and small chicken quenelles. Garnish around with cassolettes (No. 860) of oysters poached, drained and mingled with allemande sauce (No. 407).

← No. 1970 Pigeons with Olives-Breasts Capon & Pullet No. 1972 Pullet a la Dame Blanche →

For the Modern Kitchen

This is one of Ranhofer's short entries that assumes you have the rest of the book open beside you: the bird itself is cooked by cross-reference, and what is written here is really the sauce and garnish. The hinge is the sauce — once the egg yolks go in it must never come back to a boil, or it will curdle and the whole plate is lost.

Cross-references firstNothing here can be executed without No. 1981 (the pullet), No. 415 (velouté), No. 407 (allemande) and No. 860 (cassolettes). Read all four before starting; the entry is a variation, not a standalone method.
What a poularde isA poularde is a fattened young hen, unmated and heavier than a spring chicken. A good 4–5 lb roasting chicken is the practical substitute; an air-chilled bird will brown and hold its shape better than a wet-packed one.
The egg-yolk liaisonReduce the velouté with mushroom broth, take it off direct heat, temper the yolk-and-cream mixture with a ladle of hot sauce, then return it and hold below about 180F. Butter goes in last, off the heat, in pieces.
Allemande sauceAllemande is simply velouté already finished with a yolk-and-cream liaison and a little lemon. It is the same discipline as above — it is a holding sauce, not a simmering one, and it will not survive reheating over a flame.
OystersPoach them only until the edges ruffle, roughly a minute in their own barely-trembling liquor, then drain. Longer cooking produces rubber. Save the strained liquor to loosen the allemande.
CassolettesIn Ranhofer these are small edible cases, not the modern lidded baking dish. Bake or fry them ahead and fill at the last moment, or the sauce will soften the walls before the plate reaches the table.
Quenelles and mushroom buttonsThe quenelles should be piped no larger than a hazelnut and poached in salted water or light stock until they float and firm, a few minutes. Use the smallest whole button mushrooms you can find, briefly cooked in butter with a squeeze of lemon so they stay pale.
Mushroom brothNo commercial equivalent is intended. Simmer mushroom trimmings and stems in light chicken stock or water for twenty minutes and strain; the point is a pale, savoury liquid that reduces the velouté without darkening it.
Yield and serviceA bird this size serves four to six. The recipe directs that the sauce go to the table at the same time but separately, with the cassolettes ringing the platter.

A Little History

The Epicurean (1894) is Charles Ranhofer's record of thirty-odd years as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and its chicken chapters read like a guest book: dishes are named for patrons, visiting dignitaries and society figures, then filed as numbered variations on a handful of base preparations. Arco-Valley was a Bavarian noble family, and a dish carrying the name is often taken to commemorate a particular diner or dinner at the restaurant, though Ranhofer, characteristically, explains nothing. The construction is pure haute-cuisine grammar of the period: a poached or braised fattened hen, a velouté finished with an egg-yolk liaison, and a ring of small filled cases — a New York touch, since oysters were still cheap and abundant in the harbour trade. The reliance on cross-numbers rather than full instructions tells you who the book was for: professional cooks in a brigade who already knew the mother sauces by heart and needed only to be told which one, reduced with what, and garnished how.