No. 2702

Beetroot Fritters a la Dickens; Beetroots with Butter and Fine Herbs and Beetroots with Cream

Beignets de Betteraves a la Dickens; Betteraves au Beurre et fines Herbes et Betteraves a la Creme

Cut some beetroots cooked as below in slices, each one an eighth of an inch thick; wipe dry and place on half of them a quarter of an inch thick layer of the following preparation: Fry two well-chopped onions colorless in butter; add four ounces of chopped mushrooms and a pinch of minced chervil, salt and pepper; on this layer place another round of beetroot, and from the whole remove rounds an inch and a half in diameter; dip these in frying batter (No. 137) and plunge into very hot frying fat, drain, wipe and dress as a garnishing around a meat remove.

With Butter and Fine Herbs.—These beets can be cooked in boiling water or by steam without suppressing the stalk or root end; select them always of a fine red; peel after they are done and cut them up into quarter-inch thick slices and from these remove rounds two to two and a half inches in diameter; lay them in saucepan with salt, pepper and a little vinegar; saute for a few moments and serve; chopped parsley and chives can be scattered over the top.

With Cream.—After the beetroots are cooked and cut into slices, as above, simmer them in fresh cream, seasoning with salt, cayenne pepper and nutmeg; thicken just when ready to serve with egg-yolks and fresh butter.

← No. 2701 White Beans, Thickened Maitre d'Hotel and Br Carrots, Beets & Root Vegetables No. 2703 Brussels Sprouts a la Baroness →

For the Modern Kitchen

Three beet preparations under one number: a fried sandwich of beet rounds with duxelles between them, a quick sauté with vinegar and herbs, and a cream version finished with yolks. The first is the ambitious one; the other two take minutes once the beets are boiled.

Cook the beets whole and unbrokenRanhofer's instruction not to cut the stalk or root end is the hinge for all three versions. Trim the leaves to an inch above the crown, leave the tail intact and do not peel; a cut beet bleeds into the water and comes out pale and washed out. Boil or steam 40-60 minutes depending on size, then slip the skins off under cold water.
Frying batter, No. 137The cross-reference is to Ranhofer's frying batter (pâte à frire), a light batter of the usual period type. Any light beer batter works. Mix it just before frying and use it immediately.
The filling is a duxellesOnion sweated colorless in butter with chopped mushrooms and chervil, cooked until the mushroom liquid has gone. If it is at all wet the sandwich will steam apart in the fryer. Cool it completely before spreading.
Assembly orderBuild the sandwich on square-cut or whole slices first, then stamp out the inch-and-a-half rounds through both layers with a cutter. Cutting first and filling after gives you ragged edges that leak. Chill the assembled rounds firm before battering.
Frying fat"Very hot" is not quantified in the book; around 375°F is the usual modern equivalent. The beets are already cooked, so you are only setting the batter, about two minutes. Much cooler than that and the batter absorbs fat and the beet weeps pink through it.
"A meat remove"The remove (releve) was the substantial dish that came in and displaced the soup or fish, in practice often the roast joint. Read it as a garnish ringing a platter of roast beef, veal or lamb, not a dish served on its own.
The vinegar in the butter versionA teaspoon or two per pound is enough. It is there to fix the color and cut the sweetness, and the sauté is genuinely brief, a minute or two just to heat through and glaze.
The cream version will curdle if you rush itSimmer the slices in cream to reduce it slightly, then pull the pan off the heat before stirring in yolks beaten with a little of the hot cream, and finish with cold butter. It must not return to a boil after the yolks go in.
YieldA pound of beets, roughly three medium, yields about eighteen to twenty of the inch-and-a-half rounds, or four servings of either the butter or the cream preparation.

A Little History

Ranhofer ran the kitchen at Delmonico's in New York for over thirty years, and The Epicurean (1894) is essentially that restaurant's working repertoire set down in print, which is why so many dishes carry the name of a patron or a celebrity guest. Charles Dickens was feted at a famous Delmonico's banquet in April 1868 during his second American reading tour, and the house attached his name to several preparations; whether this particular fritter dates from that dinner is not documented, and the dedication may be no more than a compliment paid later. The dish itself is a French kitchen idea applied to a homely root: two slices of beet sandwiching a duxelles, battered and fried, is the same construction as a beignet of ham or cheese. Beets appear throughout nineteenth-century American cookery mainly boiled and pickled, so treating them as a hot garnish for the roast course was the sort of elevation Delmonico's was selling.