Timbale of Pheasants with Truffles

Remove the meat from the breast of two raw pheasants. Chop up the fleshy part of the legs with one fillet and the carcass parings, and with it mix an equal quantity of fat pork, a few raw truffles and fragments of foies-gras; pound well and pass through a sieve. Cut into large squares the remaining breast meats and lay them in a vessel with as much cut-up raw foies-gras; season highly and pour over a few spoonfuls of Madeira wine; keep this in a cool place for two hours. Butter a large dome-shaped mold, broader than it is high; line it with cold pie paste (No. 144) and cover with a layer of the forcemeat, filling the empty space with the contents of the vessel; cover the top with a thick, well-rounded layer of the same, and then lay several slices of fat pork on all; close up the aperture of the mold with a flat of the same paste, fastening it to the edges, and in the center bore a small opening. Now lay the timbale on a small-sized baking sheet and let it cook for about an hour and a half in a slack oven; after it has been removed for a quarter of an hour pour into the hole two or three gills of brown chaudfroid (No. 594), reduced with pheasant fumet (No. 397) and Madeira wine, and let it cool for twenty-four hours before unmolding. When ready to serve invert it on the table, lift off the mold and cut from the bottom a slice about an inch thick, then begin cutting the dome into even slices, not too thick, from the top to the bottom; restore these to their original shape on the piece cut from the bottom. Dress the timbale on a wooden foundation attached to a dish and covered with white paper; have small holes perforated at equal distances around the edges of this foundation and into these stick a dozen small hatelets, each one being garnished with two peeled truffles, one larger than the other. On the summit of the dome insert another hatelet garnished with large truffles; surround the foundation either with handsome jelly croutons (No. 2442), or else with slices of pie cooked in a cradle mold.