No. 2751

Lettuces Chopped with Croutons

Laitues Hachees aux Croutons

Pick and pare nicely some lettuce heads by removing the green leaves from the bottom of the stalk; detach all the leaves separately, and wash them in several changes of water, then blanch, refresh and drain; press down well to extract the liquid; pick over to remove all straws and other impurities that may be attached to the lettuce, then chop it up finely, and lay it in a saucepan with a piece of butter; dry over the fire, and season with salt and nutmeg, adding a pinch of flour; moisten with some clear gravy (No. 404), and then dress. Surround the lettuce with croutons fried in butter. The gravy may be replaced by cream and the flour by veloute sauce (No. 415) or espagnole sauce (No. 414). Cos lettuce can be prepared and served the same way.

← No. 2750 Lentils with Bacon Cabbages & Greens No. 2752 Lettuces Stuffed and Fried →

For the Modern Kitchen

A braised lettuce purée from Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894), written for a kitchen with stock and mother sauces already on hand. The whole dish hinges on getting the water out of the blanched leaves.

Squeeze it dryBlanched lettuce holds an enormous amount of water, and any left behind will thin the gravy into soup. After refreshing in cold water, press the leaves hard in a towel or against a sieve until no more liquid runs, then chop.
Blanch and refreshTwo to three minutes in well-salted boiling water is enough for leaf lettuce; drop it straight into ice water to stop the cooking and keep the colour. "Refresh" here means the cold plunge.
"Dry over the fire"This is a deliberate step, not a warming-through: cook the chopped lettuce in butter over medium heat, stirring, until the pan looks dry rather than weeping. Only then add the flour, and give it a minute before any liquid goes in.
Clear gravy (No. 404)Ranhofer's clear gravy is a strong, unthickened brown veal or beef stock. A well-reduced homemade brown stock is the nearest thing; commercial broth will need reducing, and low-sodium is better here since the dish is also salted.
Velouté and espagnoleVeléouté and espagnole -- The alternatives at No. 415 and No. 414 are the classic white and brown mother sauces. The recipe offers two separate swaps: cream in place of the clear gravy, and one of these sauces in place of the pinch of flour.
Cos lettuceCos is romaine. Its ribs are thicker than butterhead or leaf lettuce and want a minute or two longer in the blanching water.
NutmegGrate it fresh and use a restrained pinch; pre-ground jars are far blunter than freshly grated.
CroûtonsSmall triangles or fingers of crustless bread fried in butter until golden, arranged around the mound at the last moment. Fry them while the lettuce finishes; they soften quickly against a moist purée.
YieldLettuce collapses to a fraction of its bulk. Three or four large heads give roughly four small side servings.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer spent over thirty years as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and The Epicurean (1894) is the encyclopaedic record of that kitchen — some 3,500 numbered entries cross-referencing one another, as this one does to his gravy and sauce recipes. Braised lettuce belongs to a French tradition that treated the plant as a cooked vegetable rather than a salad green; laitue appears stewed, stuffed and glazed throughout eighteenth- and nineteenth-century French cookery, and the chopped version here is essentially the same treatment given to spinach or sorrel. The neighbouring entries — lettuces stuffed and fried at No. 2752 — show how far the idea was pushed. The croûtons are doing what croûtons always do in this book: supplying a crisp edge and a bit of architecture to a soft purée that would otherwise spread across the plate.