No. 900

Croustades Perretti

Croustades a la Perretti

Have ready two pounds of noodles (No. 142), cook this for four minutes in boiling, salted water, drain well and return it to the saucepan; season, and finish with six ounces of butter and four ounces of parmesan in such a way as to obtain a compact preparation. With this fill some buttered six sided molds, cool them on ice, unmold, dip them in beaten eggs, roll them in white bread-crumbs, and smooth the surfaces with the blade of a knife, mark them on one side with a pastry cutter, three-quarters of an inch in diameter, and ten minutes before serving plunge them into hot fat to attain a golden color, drain, and empty them, then fill the insides with a salpicou of chicken and mushrooms, mingled with some supreme sauce (No. 547), and chicken glaze (No. 398); put back the cover previously removed, and dress them to serve.

For Talliarines proceed the same as for the noodles, only use a salpicon of olives cut in small three-sixteenth inch squares, some mushrooms, foies-gras, brown sauce (No. 414) and tomato sauce (No. 549).

← No. 899 Croustades of Gnocquis a la Rivoli Hot Side Dishes No. 901 Croustades a la Piedmontese →

For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer's method is essentially a fried noodle timbale: buttered, cheesed pasta pressed into molds, chilled solid, breaded, deep-fried, then hollowed and filled. Everything depends on the chilling step, and the recipe assumes you own the rest of the book.

The hinge: chill until truly hardThe molded noodle is only cuttable and breadable because it has set cold with butter and cheese binding it. Refrigerate the filled molds at least three or four hours, or freeze briefly; a soft croustade will slump in the fryer and burst its crumb coat.
The noodlesNo. 142 is the book's own noodle recipe, an egg-based fresh noodle. Two pounds means two pounds of the raw noodles, not dried pasta, since the recipe has you cook them after weighing. Fresh noodles need the stated four minutes; dried commercial noodles would need to be cooked to just under al dente and drained very dry, since surface water keeps the mass from compacting.
"A compact preparation"Six ounces butter and four ounces parmesan to two pounds of noodles should be worked in off the heat until the strands cohere into a paste stiff enough to hold a mold's shape. If it looks loose and glossy it is too warm; let it cool slightly and stir again.
The moldsSix-sided molds of roughly dariole or small timbale size; the recipe gives no dimension, but the three-quarter-inch lid cutter implies something appreciably wider than that. Any straight-sided small mold, metal ramekin or muffin cup will work. Butter them well and line the base with a disc of parchment if you are unsure of the release.
Salpicon"Salpicou" here is a printer's variant of salpicon: cooked ingredients diced small and bound in sauce. The second version specifies olives cut in three-sixteenth-inch squares, which sets the scale for everything else in the dice.
The cross-referenced saucesNo. 547, supreme sauce, is a chicken veloute finished with cream and butter. No. 398, chicken glaze, is stock reduced to a syrupy glace de volaille, used by the spoonful for depth and gloss. No. 414 is a brown sauce, No. 549 a tomato sauce. Any competent modern equivalents serve.
FryingFry at 350-360F. Hotter and the crumb browns before the chilled interior warms through; the ten minutes before serving in the original is a service instruction, not a frying time, which is more like two to three minutes to a good gold.
Cutting the lidMarking the top with a three-quarter-inch cutter before frying gives you a clean plug to lift out afterward. Do it while the croustade is cold and firm, and go only partway down.
YieldTwo pounds of noodles will fill roughly ten to twelve small molds. As written this is a hot side dish or entree course in a long dinner; two per person is generous as a first course.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer published The Epicurean in 1894 after decades as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and the book is organized as a working kitchen's reference, which is why nearly every recipe points elsewhere by number rather than repeating itself. The croustade in this period meant any edible case to be hollowed and filled, most often bread or pastry, and making one out of pressed noodles is a French kitchen's trick for turning a cheap starch into a formal service piece. The "Talliarines" variant is most likely tagliarini or taglierini, spelled by ear (compare the Spanish tallarines), and its filling of foie gras, olives and tomato points to the Italian-inflected side of the Delmonico repertoire, which also gives the neighboring entries their gnocchi and their Piedmontese label. Naming dishes for patrons, performers and visiting dignitaries is often said to have been standard practice in restaurants of the era; who Perretti was is not recorded in the book itself.