No. 2438

Tenderloin of Beef a la Violetta

Filet de Boeuf a la Violetta

Have the tenderloin prepared and cooked the same as for a la Bayonnaise (No. 1443), and when completely cold pare it to the needed size to fit in an oblong mold, previously decorated with a variety of vegetables blanched and cooked in broth (No. 194a). Cover this decoration with a heavy coating of jelly; cut the tenderloin nine inches long by three and a half wide; trim it nicely and lay it in the center of the mold and imbed it in ice, laying it in very straight. Fill up the mold with cold melted jelly, and when it becomes quite cold and the jelly thoroughly firm, unmold it on an oval dish, and garnish around with some finely chopped jelly. Select eight equal-sized, large, ripe and very firm tomatoes; plunge them into boiling water to peel off the skins, and empty the insides through an inch and a quarter opening on the stalk end. Shred some lettuce leaves and cooked beet-root, season them with salt, pepper, oil and vinegar, and thicken the whole with a little jellied mayonnaise (No. 613), mixing in with it some whipped cream; fill the tomatoes with this, and put the covers on again; coat them over with partly cold jelly; also have eight cooked artichoke bottoms, garnish each one with asparagus tops seasoned and thickened with jellied mayonnaise (No. 613), adding to it some whipped cream. Place on top of the asparagus a small black truffle glazed with jelly; garnish around the inside of the dish with chopped jelly. Lay the prepared garnishings over, and intercalate around these a row of jelly croutons.

← No. 2437 Tenderloin of Beef a la Noailles The Cold Service No. 2439 Tenderloin of Beef, Grenadins Rochambeau →

For the Modern Kitchen Do not make this as written.

This is a cold buffet centerpiece from Ranhofer's Delmonico's kitchen, and almost all of the work is aspic work rather than cooking. The beef is done before the recipe begins; what follows is molding, coating and garnishing, and every step depends on temperature control.

The hinge: jelly at the right temperature"Cold melted jelly" means aspic that is liquid but only just — cool to the touch, syrupy, on the point of setting. Poured warm it melts the decoration and clouds the mold; poured too cold it sets in ropes and traps air. Keep a bowl of it over cool water and stir it down as you work.
Aspic strengthFor a mold that must unmold and hold a sharp edge, work with a firm jelly — roughly one envelope of powdered gelatin (about 2¼ teaspoons) per cup of well-flavored, clarified beef stock. For coating tomatoes and truffles a softer set, about half that, gives a thinner shining film.
The cross-referencesThe recipe is unusable on its own. No. 1443 (à la Bayonnaise) supplies the cooked tenderloin, served cold and pared to shape; No. 194 a is Ranhofer's set of vegetables blanched and cooked in broth for decorating molds; No. 613 is a mayonnaise stiffened with aspic. Any modern equivalent of each will serve.
Decorating the moldLine the chilled mold with a thin layer of jelly first, let it set, then lay the vegetable cut-outs face down into a second thin layer. Doing it in stages is what keeps the pattern from floating. The mold sitting in ice, as the text directs, is doing the work of a refrigerator.
"Imbed it in ice"The phrase is ambiguous, but it almost certainly means the mold rather than the meat: the filled mold is packed in crushed ice so the jelly sets from the outside in while the beef is held straight and centered. A sheet pan of ice in the refrigerator does the same thing.
Jelly croutonsNot bread. A tray of firm aspic poured about half an inch deep, chilled hard, then cut into neat triangles or diamonds with a wet knife. The chopped jelly for the border is the same aspic hacked coarsely with a cold blade so it glitters.
Artichoke bottoms and trufflesFresh artichoke bottoms trimmed and cooked in acidulated water are best; good-quality jarred bottoms are the practical substitute. The "small black truffle" was a far more plentiful and comparatively inexpensive garnish in Ranhofer's day than it is now — a slice of a preserved truffle, or a black olive, keeps the visual note.
Yield and holdingEight tomatoes and eight artichoke bottoms indicate a service for eight. Assemble the same day, keep everything refrigerated until the moment it goes out, and do not leave a mayonnaise-and-cream-filled tomato standing at room temperature for more than about two hours.

A Little History

The Epicurean (1894) was Charles Ranhofer's summary of thirty-odd years as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and its long "Cold Service" section is among the fullest records in English of nineteenth-century cuisine froide thar, mirror-surfaced platters that stood on buffets and cold sideboards and were expected to be looked at as much as eaten. Escoffier, very nearly Ranhofer's contemporary, would prune this style hard; Ranhofer was working at its height, when a garnish existed to be counted and matched, eight tomatoes against eight artichoke bottoms. Names like \honhonored a patron, a performer or an occasion rather than describing the dish, and Ranhofer, who cooked for a clientele of New York society and visiting singers, produced many of them; no documented origin for this particular name survives. What holds the plate together is calf's-foot and knuckle jelly, the labor-intensive clarified stock that a professional kitchen of the period always had going and that home cooks now approximate with powdered gelatin.