No. 2242

Crepine of Lambs' Trotters, Perigueux Sauce

Crepine de Pied d'Agneau, Sauce Perigueux

Prepare and cook the lambs' trotters the same as for the poulette (No. 1768), drain and wipe; open them lengthways, and bone them entirely, using the utmost precaution not to tear the flesh; divide each one into two parts, season and fill the hollow place in each half foot with a salpicon composed of truffles, veal udder and cooked foies-gras, combined with raw quenelle forcemeat (No. 92), and a little baking forcemeat (No. 81); place on each four slices of truffle; wrap each half foot in a band of "crepine" or caul fat, previously well dried and beaten between two cloths to reduce its thickness; roll these crepines in melted butter, then in bread-crumbs, smooth and equalize the surfaces with the blade of a knife, and boil them for twenty to thirty minutes over a very slow fire, turning them during the operation. Dress them on a very hot dish, and serve with a sauce-boat of Perigueux sauce (No. 517).

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For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer's cross-referenced style hides most of the work in other numbered recipes; this is a two-day project built on long-simmered trotters, a truffled forcemeat stuffing, and a caul-fat wrapper. A few of his terms and one instruction need translating before you start.

"Boil them" is a mistranslation"Boil them" is almost certainly an error for "broil": breadcrumbed caul packets turned over a very slow fire are being grilled, not immersed in water. Twenty to thirty minutes over gentle heat suits a low grill, a moderate broiler at a distance, or a heavy pan with clarified butter. Immersing crumbed crepinettes in water would destroy them.
The trotters themselvesNo. 1768 has them blanched and then simmered gently, in the usual manner for trotters à la poulette, until the flesh loosens from the bones; check that recipe for its own liquid and timing. Cook them the day before, cool them under light weight, and bone them cold; warm trotters tear, which is the failure Ranhofer warns against.
Caul fatOrder it from a butcher, ideally lamb or pork caul. Soak it in tepid salted water to loosen, spread it flat, pat it dry between cloths and beat it thin as directed. It should be a single translucent sheet, not a wad, or the wrapper will stay greasy rather than melting away.
Veal udderTétine de veau, poached and pressed, was a standard binder for its bland gelatinous richness. It is essentially unobtainable now; blanched veal or pork fatback, or additional foie gras, fills the same role in the salpicon.
The two forcemeatsNo. 92 is Ranhofer's raw quenelle forcemeat, used here to bind the diced truffle and foie gras; No. 81, his "baking forcemeat", is a cooked liver-based forcemeat of the farce à gratin type that supplies flavour and colour. Check both numbers for their exact composition. A modern cook can pulse both in a food processor over ice.
SalpiconSimply a mixture cut into small even dice, roughly quarter-inch. Keep the truffle, udder and foie gras separate until the last moment so the foie gras does not smear.
Périgueux sauceNo. 517 is a demi-glace flavoured with truffle and Madeira; check the number for its exact composition. It is generally distinguished from Périgourdine, which uses sliced or whole truffle rather than chopped. A good reduced veal stock and real truffle trimmings will get you there; truffle oil will not.
YieldFour trotters give eight crepines. Ranhofer served these as a small entrée in a long menu; count two halves per person as a course, one alongside other dishes.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer published The Epicurean in 1894 after some thirty years as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and its Miscellaneous Entrées chapter is where the French repertoire he trained in sits most visibly on an American table. A crépine is the caul fat itself; a crépinette is the forcemeat parcel wrapped in it — traditionally a cheap butcher's device for using scraps, and here turned inside out: the humblest cut in the shop, lambs' trotters, is boned by hand and packed with truffles and foie gras. That inversion, taking peasant offal and dressing it in luxury, recurs often enough in the period to be worth noticing. The sauce takes its name from Périgueux in the Dordogne, the chief town of the department and at the centre of the French black truffle trade; by Ranhofer's day a "Périgueux" on a menu was shorthand for truffle, whether or not the truffle had ever seen Périgord.