No. 2873

Eggs Molded a la Bedford—in Cocottes and Eggs Cocottes

Œufs Moules en Cocottes a la Bedford et Œufs Cocottes

Cover the bottoms and sides of a few cocottes, a small earthen saucepan standing on three feet, able to go in the oven (Fig. 563), with a layer of liver baking forcemeat (No. 64), thickened with a little raw forcemeat thinned with duxelle sauce (No. 461) and Madeira wine; break a fresh egg over, season the white with salt and pour a little hot butter over the top. Place these cocottes in a sautoir containing a little hot water; poach the eggs for eight to ten minutes in a slack oven, and after removing bestrew with truffles and cooked beef tongue, cut either in small dice or chopped up; dress the cocottes on a dish or on a folded napkin.

Eggs Cocottes.—Have small cocottes (Fig. 563); butter the interiors and cover the bottoms with a preparation made with a few finely chopped shallots, slightly fried in butter, to which add a few finely chopped fresh mushrooms; after these have evaporated all their moisture, add some chopped parsley, salt, pepper, nutmeg and chopped truffles. Break an egg in each cocotte, pour boiling hot melted butter over and stand the cocottes on a baking sheet; push into a medium hot oven for ten minutes, then serve.

← No. 2872 Fried Eggs with Ham or Bacon Eggs & Omelets No. 2874 Eggs Molded a la Colbert—in Cases (œufs Moul →

For the Modern Kitchen Do not make this as written.

Two related dishes: a rich version lined with liver forcemeat and finished with truffle and tongue, and a plain one on a mushroom-shallot base. Both are eggs baked in individual dishes, and both hinge on stopping while the yolk is still liquid.

CocottesRanhofer's footed earthenware pots are today's ramekins or small cocottes of about 4 to 5 oz. Anything ovenproof, straight-sided and roughly egg-plus-filling sized works; shallow dishes cook too fast at the edges.
Oven temperaturesA "slack" oven is a low one, in the region of 275-300F; "medium hot" is somewhere around 350-375F. Ranhofer gives no numbers, so these are approximations. The first recipe uses the lower heat because the water bath and the low temperature together keep the whites tender.
The sautoir of hot waterA sautoir with a little hot water is a bain-marie. Use a roasting pan with hot water in it -- the recipe calls for only a little, not a deep bath -- and start with the water already hot so the timing holds.
When to pull themEight to ten minutes gives set whites and a fluid yolk, but ovens and ramekin thickness vary; judge by the white being just opaque and barely wobbling. The residual heat of the pot continues cooking after it leaves the oven, so err early.
Liver baking forcemeatNo. 64 is a pounded liver and fat forcemeat, bound and baked. A smooth chicken-liver pâté or mousse thinned with a spoonful of Madeira gives the same effect; spread it thin, about an eighth of an inch, or it overwhelms the egg.
Duxelle sauceNo. 461 is a brown sauce worked with duxelles, mushroom and shallot cooked down dry. A few spoonfuls of a good demi-glace with finely chopped sautéed mushrooms stirred in stands in for it.
Second recipe: dry the duxellesThe mushrooms and shallots must give up all their moisture before the egg goes in, as the text says. Any water left in the pan steams the white and thins whatever sauce you serve alongside.
Season the white, not the yolkSalt sitting directly on a yolk is often said to mottle its surface during baking. Whatever the reason, Ranhofer's instruction is specifically to season the white.
Truffles and tongueBoth garnishes are optional in a domestic kitchen. Cooked beef tongue is still sold at good butchers; a black truffle can be replaced with a little truffle paste, though preserved truffle in oil contributes almost nothing but scent.
YieldOne cocotte per person as a first course or light supper dish, two for a main. The forcemeat version is very rich; a single egg is enough.

A Little History

Œufs en cocotte take their name from the small footed earthenware pot, the cocotte, rather than from any place or person, and the technique of baking an egg in its own vessel over a garnish was a fixture of nineteenth-century French service because the dish arrived at the table in the pot it cooked in, still hot. Charles Ranhofer, chef at Delmonico's in New York, filled The Epicurean (1894) with dozens of numbered egg preparations of exactly this kind, each distinguished only by what lines the bottom of the mold — a system that let a kitchen build a long carte out of a handful of base preparations. The "à la Bedford" label follows the era's habit of naming garnishes after patrons and notables; Ranhofer's own attributions were often local and commemorative, and the connection here is not documented. The reliance on a cross-referenced forcemeat, a compound sauce and truffle-and-tongne garnish is characteristic of the book: it assumes a brigade with those components already standing ready, which is why the plain Eggs Cocottes that follows it reads like the version meant for a smaller household.