No. 2862

Hard-Boiled Eggs a la Washburn

Œufs Durs a la Washburn

Take the whites of eight hard-boiled eggs; cut them in thin slices or in quarter-inch dice, also some cooked truffles and mushrooms; with these fill eight medium-sized shells (Fig. 438), alternating the three different ingredients; cover with some reduced soubise (No. 543). Smooth to a dome and mask this with a thin layer of chicken cream forcemeat (No. 75); dredge white bread-crumbs over all, pour on a little melted butter and bake for two minutes in the oven; serve at once.

← No. 2861 Hard-Boiled Eggs a la Gibson Eggs & Omelets No. 2863 Hard-Boiled Egg Croquettes →

For the Modern Kitchen Do not make this as written.

A composed shell dish from Ranhofer's Delmonico kitchen, written for cooks who already had soubise and forcemeat standing by. The work is entirely in the two component recipes it points to; the assembly itself is ten minutes.

The two cross-referencesSoubise (No. 543) is an onion purée bound with rice or béchamel and reduced until it is thick enough to hold a dome — reduce it further than you think, or it will slump off the egg. Chicken cream forcemeat (No. 75) is raw breast pounded or processed with egg white and cream, a mousseline; it must be cold at every stage or it breaks.
"Shells"Coquilles — natural scallop shells or the silver-plated and porcelain imitations used for this kind of service in the 1890s. Small gratin dishes or ramekins of about 1/2 cup capacity stand in well.
The two-minute bake is wrong for a home ovenThe two-minute bake will not do in a home oven -- the forcemeat layer is meant to be paper-thin, and raw chicken forcemeat under crumbs will not cook through in two minutes. Expect 10-12 minutes at 400F, then a moment under the broiler for colour, and check that the forcemeat is cooked through before serving.
Whites onlyEight yolks are left over; the recipe does not say what became of them. Sieve them into the soubise, or keep them for mayonnaise the same day.
TrufflesFresh black truffle in this quantity is now a luxury out of proportion to the dish. Cooked, well-drained mushroom duxelles carries the same dark note, or use a small amount of preserved truffle and its juice.
Butter and crumbsUse dry, fine white crumbs, not panko, and drizzle the butter rather than pouring — too much and it pools in the shell and separates the crumb layer from the forcemeat.
YieldEight shells, served as a hot hors d'oeuvre or a light entrée course. Two per person makes a lunch dish.

A Little History

The Epicurean (1894) is Charles Ranhofer's record of some thirty years as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and its dedication recipes — à la Washburn, à la Gibson, and hundreds more — read as a roll of the restaurant's patrons and the occasions they marked. Who this particular Washburn was is not recorded in the volume, and several prominent American families of the name were plausible Delmonico's customers, so any attribution would be guesswork. What the recipe does show is the logic of a large brigade kitchen: nothing here is made from scratch at the moment of ordering. Soubise, forcemeat and cooked truffles were all components prepared in advance, so the cook on eggs had only to assemble, crumb and fire them.