No. 2101

Partridges with Cabbage

Perdreaux aux Choux

Dress four partridges, truss them for an entree as in No. 178, and plunge the breasts in boiling water to stiffen the skin, then lard with medium lardons (No. 3, Fig. 52). Blanch for fifteen minutes four medium cabbages after removing the heart or core, and part of the green leaves; refresh, drain and press out every particle of water, then divide each quarter into two, remove the thick stalks, season lightly with salt and pepper, roll in thin slices of fat pork, tie with a string; put them into a braziere (Fig. 134) with the partridges and a pound of bacon cut in two equal-sized pieces and blanched for ten minutes; add also a one pound sausage, four medium carrots cut lengthwise in four, two onions, one having two cloves stuck in it, and a bunch of parsley garnished with thyme and bay leaf. Moisten with some stock (No. 194a) adding a little chicken fat; let cook, and after it comes to a boil finish in a slack oven for thirty to forty minutes. If the partridges be old ones they require one hour and a half to cook; remove them from the braziere, also the sausages and bacon which must be put under a light weight to cool off; it will take fully three hours to cook the cabbages. Have four dozen small carrots cut in pear-shapes and as many turnips of cylindrical form, two inches long by half an inch in diameter, round the ends neatly, then blanch, cook and let fall to a glaze separately. Half an hour before serving return the partridges to the cabbages and keep the whole warm. Cut the bacon into large three-fourths of an inch squares, the sausages into slices, and put both these into a sautoir with a few spoonfuls of the cabbage stock so that they keep hot until ready to serve; drain the cabbages through a colander, pressing it lightly to form into a socle on the bottom of the dish, laying the four untrussed partridges on top in a square, placing two clusters of carrots and two of turnips, alternated with the slices of sausages between the partridges, having the bacon in the center on top. Cover the partridges only with a half-glaze sauce (No. 413), and serve some of the same sauce separately.

← No. 2100 Partridges Truffled and Roasted Partridge, Pheasant & Grouse No. 2102 Partridges Larded and Roasted with Gravy and →

For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer writes for a brigade with a stock pot always on and a coal range that holds a low steady heat. The dish reduces to two operations that want different lengths of time: partridges braised briefly, cabbage braised for hours.

The hinge: cook the cabbage separatelyThe original admits the cabbage needs three hours while young birds need thirty to forty minutes, and it solves this by pulling the partridges out and returning them at the end. Do the same, or braise the cabbage bundles on their own with the bacon, sausage and aromatics, then add the birds for the last half hour. Partridge breast is dry meat and goes to string past an internal temperature of about 160F.
Slack ovenA slack or slow oven is usually reckoned at somewhere around 275-300F. That is right for a covered braise; the liquid should barely tremble.
BraziereA brazière is a wide, deep, tight-lidded braising pan. A heavy Dutch oven or a covered roasting pan does the job, provided the birds and cabbage sit in one layer with the stock coming partway up.
The birdsWild grey partridge is not sold in most markets. Farmed chukar or French red-legged partridge (about 1 lb each) is the closest substitute; two poussins or Cornish hens will stand in. Ranhofer's warning about old birds needing an hour and a half applies to wild shot game, not to farmed stock.
LardingLardons drawn through the breast with a larding needle are a lost habit; barding is easier and does the same work. Wrap each breast in a thin sheet of fatback or unsmoked streaky bacon and tie it on, removing it for the last few minutes if you want colour.
Bacon and sausageThe "pound of bacon" here is probably a piece of cured pork belly rather than breakfast strips — closer to Italian pancetta or French petit salé; blanching it ten minutes draws out salt. For the one-pound sausage, a plain fresh or lightly cured coarse pork sausage in one length — cotechino or a fresh kielbasa — suits better than anything sweetened or heavily smoked.
Half-glazeSauce No. 413 is demi-glace: brown stock reduced with espagnole. A good reduced veal or game stock, thickened only by reduction, serves the same purpose. Chicken fat added to the braising liquid is worth keeping; it carries the cabbage.
Turned vegetablesFour dozen carrots and four dozen turnips cut to shape and glazed separately is banquet garnish. Halve the count for a home table, or cut plain batons; the point is that they are glazed apart from the braise so they stay bright against the grey cabbage.
YieldFour birds, a pound of bacon and a pound of sausage over four cabbages will serve four as a main course and can be stretched further, with the cabbage pressed into a mound (Ranhofer's socle) and the birds, untrussed, laid on top as the recipe directs.

A Little History

Perdreaux aux choux is a farmhouse dish that Charles Ranhofer, chef at Delmonico's, dressed up for a New York dining room in The Epicurean (1894). In its plain form it is the standard French treatment of birds too old or too tough to roast: they go into the pot with cabbage, salt pork, sausage and root vegetables, and the long braise that ruins a young partridge makes an old one edible while the cabbage takes up the game fat. The version here keeps every element of the country dish but adds the restaurant grammar of the period — birds trussed and larded, cabbage quarters rolled in fat pork and tied, carrots turned to pear shapes, turnips to cylinders, everything glazed separately and reassembled as a symmetrical construction on a base of pressed cabbage, with demi-glace over the birds only. Partridge was a common market bird in America in the 1890s, when wild game was sold commercially and the term was applied loosely to several native species as well as imported European ones; the market hunting that supplied it was curtailed in the following decades, which is why the same recipe today means farmed chukar.