No. 2763

Okra or Gumbo, Garnished with Barley Bechamel Croustades

Gombo Garni de Croustades d'Orge, Bechamel

Procure young and tender okras; cut off both ends, keeping the gumbo two inches long; blanch them in a copper pan with boiling salted water, drain and lay them in a sautoir one beside the other; moisten to their height with mirepoix stock (No. 419), let simmer until cooked and the stock reduced to a glaze; dress, cover over with well-buttered bechamel sauce (No. 409), garnishing around with barley bechamel croustades, made according to the following directions.

Barley Bechamel Croustades.—Boil some pearl barley in salted water for three hours, drain, put into a sautoir, and dilute with a well-buttered and highly seasoned sauce. Fill some hollow croustade tartlets with this, forming a cover with a round piece of savarin (No. 148) an inch and a quarter in diameter and three-eighths of an inch thick, having it buttered and glazed in the oven.

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For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer assumes a brigade kitchen and a numbered cross-reference system, so the two sauces and the stock are elsewhere in the book. Translated into a home kitchen this is braised okra under béchamel, ringed with barley-filled tartlets.

Keep the pods whole and unbrokenKeep the pods in lengths rather than slicing them -- the recipe cuts off both ends and keeps each pod about two inches long, so it holds together in the pan. Sliced pods, plus long stewing, give the ropiness this preparation avoids.
BlanchingA brief plunge in well-salted boiling water, then drain thoroughly. Any wide pan will serve, though copper was called for in period kitchens in the belief that it kept green vegetables green.
SautoirA straight-sided shallow pan, wide enough to lay the pods in a single layer without crowding. A 10- or 12-inch skillet or sauteuse serves. "Moisten to their height" means barely covered, not submerged.
Mirepoix stock (No. 419)Ranhofer's is a stock cooked down with diced carrot, onion, celery, ham or bacon trimmings, thyme and bay, moistened with white wine and broth. A good vegetable or light chicken stock simmered twenty minutes with the same aromatics and strained gives the same effect. Reduce to a glaze means the liquid is nearly gone and coats the pods.
Béchamel (No. 409)His is a milk sauce built on a white roux with veal and aromatics, strained and finished with butter. "Well-buttered" means whisking cold butter into the finished sauce off the heat; it should nap the okra, not pool around it.
Three hours for pearl barleyLong by modern practice. Modern pearl barley is generally cooked through in 35 to 45 minutes and softens to paste well before three hours; taste at 35 minutes.
Croustades and the savarin lidsCroustade tartlets are small pastry shells, baked blind, or bread cases fried crisp. The lids are rounds about 1 1/4 inches across and 3/8 inch thick taken from savarin (No. 148, a rich yeast batter close to brioche), buttered and glazed in the oven; no temperature is given. A round cut from a buttered brioche or challah slice and toasted is a fair stand-in.
YieldNot stated. Figure about 1 1/2 lb okra and eight to ten croustades for six as a vegetable course alongside a roast.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer ran the kitchen at Delmonico's in New York, and The Epicurean (1894) is the record of that kitchen: French technique applied to whatever the American market supplied. Okra is the interesting part here. It reached the Americas through the transatlantic slave trade from West Africa, where several related words for the pod are generally cited as the source of "gumbo" (Bantu ki-ngombo is the derivation most often given), and by Ranhofer's day it was firmly established in Southern and Creole cooking as a thickener for stews. What he does with it is characteristically Delmonican: rather than treat it as a soup vegetable, he trims the pods and cuts them to two inches, then serves them under a b"chamel as a formal garnished entremets, with the barley croustades supplying the starch that ordinarily would have come from rice. The double title, French and English, runs through the whole book.