No. 2686

Artichoke Bottoms with Cream Bechamel, Baked

Fonds d'Artichauts Bechamel a la Creme, au Gratin

Drain some cooked artichoke bottoms (Fig. 546-548) on a cloth, selecting those of equal size; fill the hollow in the center with a layer of delicate chicken godiveau (No. 82); cover this with cream bechamel sauce (No. 411) and besprinkle the surface with grated parmesan, pouring some butter over. Range them at once in a sautoir, having its bottom covered with a little good gravy (No. 404); baste over with more melted butter and bake in a moderate oven for twenty minutes; they should be of a nice color. Dress in a circle on a dish and pour some cream bechamel in the center.

← No. 2685 Artichoke Bottoms with Baked Cauliflower Artichokes & Asparagus No. 2687 Artichoke Bottoms with Marrow →

For the Modern Kitchen

A composed garnish from Ranhofer's cross-referenced system: three separate preparations (cooked artichoke bottoms, a chicken forcemeat, a cream béchamel) assembled and browned. The hinge is that the godiveau goes in raw, so the bake has to cook it through, not just color the top.

Artichoke bottomsFonds d'artichauts are the trimmed, choke-free bases of large globe artichokes, cooked before this recipe begins. Cook them in a blanc (water with flour and lemon juice) so they stay pale; frozen or good-quality jarred bottoms are the practical substitute, and canned ones should be rinsed and drained hard on a cloth as directed.
GodiveauRanhofer's No. 82 is a fine forcemeat of pounded raw chicken; check the cross-reference for its exact binding (godiveau is variously bound with suet and eggs, or with a panade and cream). A food processor does the pounding; keep everything cold or the emulsion breaks. Season it assertively, as the béchamel and artichoke are both mild.
Cream béchamelCream béchamel -- His No. 411 is a béchamel enriched or finished with cream; aim for a sauce that coats a spoon heavily, since a thin one will run off the bottoms and thin the gravy in the pan.
"Good gravy"No. 404 is a meat gravy in the French sense (jus), not a flour-thickened American pan gravy. A few tablespoons of well-reduced veal or chicken stock in the pan is the point; it keeps the bottoms from scorching and becomes the basting liquid.
SautoirA shallow straight-sided pan that goes from stove to oven — a modern sauté pan or a metal roasting pan works. The bottoms are ranged in a single layer so they can be basted and so the cheese browns.
Oven and donenessThe book gives no temperature; a "moderate oven" is generally read as somewhere in the region of 325–350F. Twenty minutes should brown the parmesan and set the forcemeat, but check the center of the filling reaches 165F, since it goes in as raw chicken; thick fillings may need five minutes more.
BastingThe repeated butter is not decorative. Without it the exposed cheese and forcemeat dry out before the interior sets; brush again halfway through.
Serving and yieldRanhofer serves them in a ring with extra sauce pooled in the center. He gives no quantities and no number of servings; two bottoms a person is a reasonable working figure.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894) records the kitchen of Delmonico's in New York, and this entry shows how that kitchen worked: nothing is written out twice, and a single dish sends the cook to three other numbered recipes for its components. The artichoke bottom as an edible cup for forcemeat is a standard of nineteenth-century French garnishing — one of a run of them here, the neighbouring entries filling them with cauliflower and with marrow. Au gratin in this period means simply finished with cheese or crumbs and browned, not the potato dish the phrase now suggests; and godiveau, a term of uncertain origin, meant by Ranhofer's day a fine pounded forcemeat, the workhorse stuffing of the professional garde-manger.