No. 2196

Venison Noisettes a la Thierry—Tenderloin

Noisettes de Filet de Chevreuil a la Thierry

Cut the tenderloin into slices, each to weigh four ounces when pared and rounded; lay them in a sautoir with melted butter, season with salt, mignonette, a whole clove of garlic and a bay leaf. Just before serving place the saucepan on a hot fire and saute them quickly; lay each noisette on a bread crouton fried in butter of the same diameter and a quarter of an inch thick; dress them in a circle and in the center have a garnishing of game quenelles made with a coffeespoon (No. 155), truffles cut in the shape of crescent olives mixed with espagnole sauce (No. 414), reduced with game essence (No. 389) and Madeira wine.

← No. 2195 Venison Grenadins a la Royale—Tenderloin Venison & Large Game No. 2197 Venison Tournedos St. Hubert—Tenderloin →

For the Modern Kitchen

A straightforward sear of venison medallions, but the recipe assumes a fully stocked professional larder — three of its components are cross-references to other pages of The Epicurean. Decide what you will do about the sauce before you cut the meat.

Noisette and mignonetteA noisette is a trimmed round medallion; here each is cut to weigh 4 oz after paring, which depending on the diameter of the loin means a thick slice, an inch or more. Mignonette is coarsely cracked pepper, not fine ground.
SautoirA shallow straight-sided sauté pan, wide enough that the medallions sit in one layer without touching. The meat rests in melted butter with the garlic clove and bay as a short marinade, then the same pan goes over high heat.
ChevreuilThe French names roe deer, a small animal with a loin only a couple of inches across. Farmed red deer or axis venison loin is what is available; cut medallions from the thick end and expect them wider than Ranhofer's.
The hinge: cook them rareVenison loin is very lean and turns dry and livery past medium rare. Two to three minutes a side over real heat, to an internal 125–130F, then rest five minutes off the pan.
CroutonsCut rounds of firm white bread to the exact diameter of each medallion, a quarter inch thick, and fry in butter until crisp through. Cut them before you sear so they are ready; soft croutons collapse under the meat and its juices.
Quenelles by coffeespoonGame quenelles (No. 155) are a poached game forcemeat, typically bound with panada and egg, shaped in small ovals between two coffeespoons — a small spoonful each, less than a teaspoon — and poached gently in stock until just set. They must not boil hard or they break up.
The sauce, in practiceEspagnole (No. 414) reduced with game essence (No. 389) and Madeira is a two-day project in the original. A strong reduced venison or beef stock, thickened lightly and finished with a good half cup of dry Madeira, gives the same effect; season it sharply, as it is carrying the whole dish.
Truffle garnish"Crescent olives" means the truffle is pared into small crescent or olive shapes. Sliced preserved truffle, or a spoonful of truffle paste stirred into the finished sauce, is the honest modern substitution.
Yield and serviceTwo 4 oz medallions per person; allowing for paring and rounding, a 2 lb loin will stretch to three or four. The circle of noisettes with the quenelle and truffle garnish heaped in the centre is meant to go to table on one hot platter, sauce passed separately or spooned around the base.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer ran the kitchen at Delmonico's in New York, and The Epicurean (1894) is essentially that restaurant's working repertoire written down, which is why so many entries are less recipes than assembly instructions pointing at numbered preparations elsewhere in the book. The venison chapter is large because American game was still commercially abundant in the 1880s and 90s: venison, canvasback duck and terrapin were the luxury proteins of the period, and a plate built on croutons, quenelles and truffles in a Madeira-laced espagnole is the standard grand-cuisine treatment applied to native meat. The origin of the name "a la Thierry" is not documented; it may honour a patron or a colleague rather than describe a fixed garnish. The construction itself — meat on a fried crouton to keep it clear of the sauce, garnish massed in the centre of a ring — belongs to the composed-platter service of the period.