No. 819

Shrimps in Side Dishes

Crevettes en Raviers ou en Bateaux

Throw some fine shrimps into boiling and unsalted water remove at the first boil and place in a bowl, sprinkle with salt; leave them an hour or two to become marinated with the salt, drain, then dress them in a pyramid or crown-shaped on side dishes, garnishing with sprigs of parsley and throw over very small pieces of clear ice.

← No. 818 Sausages Smoked; with or Without Garlic, d'A Cold Side Dishes No. 820 Sliced and Buttered White or Rye Bread, Slic →

For the Modern Kitchen

A two-line recipe that is really a lesson in restraint: shrimp barely cooked, salted after the fact, and served cold in their shells. The only things needing translation are the vessels and the salting method.

Raviers and bateauxA ravier is the small shallow oblong dish used for hors d'oeuvre service; bateaux are boat-shaped versions of the same. Any small shallow dish works — the recipe calls for the shrimp to be dressed on small side dishes rather than one large platter.
"Remove at the first boil"This is the hinge. The shrimp come out as soon as the water returns to a boil around them — a matter of a minute or two, when they turn opaque and curl loosely. Anything longer and they go cottony.
Why unsalted waterThe salt goes on afterwards, dry, and draws out a little moisture as the shrimp cool — a brief dry cure rather than a brine. A teaspoon or so of fine salt per pound is a reasonable modern starting point; taste one after an hour before adding more.
The hour or two of marinatingCover and refrigerate during this rest. A period cold larder was cold; a modern kitchen counter for two hours is not, and shellfish is unforgiving about it.
Drain before dressingSalted shrimp will weep. Tip off the accumulated liquid and pat them dry, or the pyramid will slump and sit in a puddle.
The ice"Very small pieces of clear ice" means shards chipped from a clear block, scattered over the shrimp as they go to table. Crushed ice from a machine does the same job, though it melts faster and waters the dish; add it at the last moment.
YieldThe recipe gives no quantities. As one of several cold side dishes, something like 4 to 6 shrimp per person is a reasonable guess.

A Little History

This comes from Charles Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894), the enormous compendium of his years as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and it sits in a run of numbered cold side dishes — smoked sausage on one side, sliced buttered bread on the other. These were hors d'oeuvre in the older French sense: small salty things set out in raviers at the start of a long meal. Serving shrimp banked in a pyramid and dusted with ice chips may have shown off the house's ice supply as much as its cooking; commercial ice was widely available in New York by the 1890s, whether cut from northern lakes or made by machine.