No. 2256

Cutlets of Tenderloin of Beef a la Bienville

Cotelettes de Filet de Boeuf a la Bienville

Cold roast or braised tenderloin of beef is used to make these cutlets; trim one pound of beef free from fat or sinews; cut it into three-sixteenths of an inch squares, and the same quantity of cooked mushrooms cut the same size. Reduce some brown Madeira sauce (No. 492) in a saucepan, add to it some raw egg-yolks, and a little good butter, then mix in the beef fillet, also the mushrooms. Heat the preparation well, and when boiling pour it in a dish to let it become perfectly cold, then divide it into twelve equal parts. Roll them out on a table dredged with grated bread-crumbs; shape them in form of cutlets, dip them in beaten egg and then roll them in bread-crumbs; flatten the tops with the blade of a knife, so as to make them smooth and equal-sized, then fry them in very hot fat until they have assumed a good color, and serve them with well-buttered gourmets sauce (No. 472).

← No. 2255 Cutlets of Tenderloin of Beef a la Babanine Miscellaneous Entrées No. 2257 Chicken Cutlets a la Adolphe Hardy →

For the Modern Kitchen

This is a croquette dressed up as a cutlet: cold cooked beef bound in a reduced sauce, chilled solid, breaded and fried. Everything depends on the binding stage.

The hinge: chill it hardThe mixture must be reduced until stiff and then cooled completely — several hours in the refrigerator, or overnight. If it is merely cool it will not hold a cutlet shape and will burst in the fat.
Egg yolks off the heatAdd the raw yolks to the reduced Madeira sauce off the burner and stir them in, then return it to gentle heat. Ranhofer does say to heat the preparation until boiling; a flour-thickened brown sauce gives the yolks some protection, but without constant stirring they can still curdle.
Three-sixteenths of an inchA scant quarter-inch dice. The point is a mixture that reads as diced meat rather than paste, so keep the cuts even and resist the food processor.
The two saucesNo. 492 is a brown sauce reduced with Madeira; any good demi-glace finished with Madeira will serve as the binder. No. 472, sauce gourmets, is a separate brown sauce which the recipe directs be well buttered; its composition is not given here, so consult the numbered entry before substituting.
Cooked mushroomsThe same quantity of mushrooms as beef, already cooked — sautéed dry until they stop giving off liquid, or the moisture will loosen the binding.
Frying fat"Very hot fat" for a breaded item of this kind is usually taken as somewhere around 360–375°F. Deep enough to float the cutlets; they are cooked through already and need only two to three minutes to color.
ShapingA cutlet mold gives the classic teardrop, but hand-shaping on a crumbed board works, which is all this recipe asks for. Some period recipes call for a short length of macaroni pushed into the narrow end to mimic a bone; it is not called for here.
YieldTwelve cutlets, as the recipe directs, from a pound of beef with an equal quantity of mushrooms. How many people that serves depends entirely on the rest of the menu; the recipe does not say.

A Little History

The Epicurean (1894) is Charles Ranhofer's record of some three decades as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and this dish shows the house method for turning yesterday's roast fillet into today's paying course: dice it, bind it in a fortified brown sauce, chill, crumb and fry. Whom or what "Bienville" refers to here is not stated — Ranhofer attached personal and place names to his variations by the hundred, often for a patron, a visiting dignitary or simply to distinguish one garnish from the next, and the connection to the person named is usually no deeper than that. The technique itself is older than the label: shaping a bound mince into a cutlet form, sometimes with a stub of macaroni standing in for the bone, appears widely in French practice for making a small quantity of cooked meat look like a served portion.