No. 2594

Sturgeon or Sterlet, Livonienne-Small

Petit Esturgeon ou Sterlet Livonienne

Clean the fish and put it in a fish-kettle to moisten with white wine court-bouillon (No. 39); boil and leave to cool off in its stock, then dress it on a dish, having carefully preserved the fish perfectly whole; let get thoroughly cold in the ice-box. Cover over with half-set jelly or else with fish-glaze (No. 399) and crawfish butter (No. 573); decorate it around with trussed crawfish, herring paupiettes (No. 789), cucumbers stuffed with vegetables, gherkins, olives, chopped jelly and croutons. Serve a mayonnaise ravigote sauce (No. 612) at the same time.

← No. 2593 Soles a la Mazagran-Fillets Garnishings for Cold Dishes No. 2595 Sweetbreads a la Mirabeau →

For the Modern Kitchen

A cold buffet centerpiece from Ranhofer's Delmonico kitchen, built on a whole poached fish and a series of cross-referenced component recipes. The cooking itself is simple; the work is in sourcing, handling and presentation.

Sourcing the fishSterlet is a small sturgeon of the Caspian, Black Sea and Danube basins, rarely if ever seen in American markets; all sturgeon species are CITES-listed and wild harvest is heavily restricted. Buy farmed white sturgeon or farmed Siberian sturgeon, which is what a legitimate fishmonger is likely to have; a 4-6 lb fish fits a domestic kettle.
The hinge: never let it boilDespite the word "boil" in the original, bring the court-bouillon to a bare shiver at around 170-180F and hold it there. Sturgeon flesh is dense and firm but seizes and dries at a rolling boil, and a whole fish that has tightened will crack when you try to skin and glaze it.
Cool in the stockLeaving the fish in its liquid off the heat both finishes the cooking and keeps it moist. Once it is at room temperature, move fish and stock together to the refrigerator; do not let a whole fish sit out for hours cooling on the counter.
Fish-kettle substitutesA long oval poacher with a lifting rack is the traditional vessel and makes it possible to move the fish without breaking it. Failing that, a roasting pan on the stovetop across two burners, with the fish wrapped in cheesecloth with the ends left long as handles, does the same job.
Court-bouillonRanhofer's No. 39 is a white wine court-bouillon: broadly water and dry white wine with aromatic vegetables and herbs — carrot, onion, thyme, bay, parsley, peppercorns — and salt, simmered before the fish goes in. It should taste distinctly seasoned, since it is also the cooling bath.
Half-set jelly and fish glaze"Half-set" means the aspic has been cooled to the point where it coats a spoon and just begins to thicken but still flows, roughly syrup consistency. Fish-glaze (No. 399) is fish stock reduced to a sticky, near-solid essence; crawfish butter (No. 573) is butter pounded with cooked crawfish shells and heads, then strained, and gives the coral color the presentation depends on.
Crawfish and garnish"Trussed" crawfish are cooked whole with the tail curled and pinned or tucked back under the body so they sit upright around the dish. Herring paupiettes are fillets rolled around a stuffing; the chopped jelly is set aspic cut into dice and scattered as a border.
Holding and servingOnce glazed, this must stay refrigerated and should not sit on a buffet more than about two hours. A fish of this size, presented whole with its garnishes, serves 8-12 as a cold course, with the mayonnaise ravigote passed separately.

A Little History

"Livonienne" points to Livonia, the old Baltic province spanning present-day Latvia and Estonia, and in nineteenth-century French menu language it is often said to have signaled a Russian-Baltic register: sterlet, crawfish, cucumbers, gherkins, soured and pickled garnishes. The sterlet itself was the prestige fish of the Russian imperial table, small enough to serve whole and expensive. Charles Ranhofer, who ran the Delmonico's kitchen in New York for more than thirty years and published The Epicurean in 1894, filed this among his garnishings for cold dishes, the chapter that supplied the elaborate glazed and aspic-coated centerpieces expected at a long buffet. The system of cross-references, sending the cook to numbered entries for court-bouillon, glaze, crawfish butter and sauce, is typical of the book: it was written for a brigade with all those preparations already standing in the larder, not for a household cooking one dish from scratch.