No. 973

Marly Timbales

Timbales a la Marly

Garnish the bottom of a buttered timbale mold (No. 2, Fig. 137) with a round piece of truffle, and the entire sides with thin truffle crescents intercalated to resemble fish scales; in the center of each scale, lay a small one-eighth of an inch round bit of tongue. Fill them with a partridge and cream forcemeat (No. 75), and set in the center a ball of salpicon made as follows: Mingle some partridge fumet (No. 397) with a reduced espagnole (No. 414), and add to it some foies-gras and mushrooms, both cut into one-eighth inch squares, and left till cold before using. Poach the timbales in a moderate oven, when done, dress and serve separately a sauce composed of one-third of espagnole sauce (No. 414), one-third of tomato sauce (No. 549), and one-third of veal blond (No. 423) reduced together.

← No. 972 Lombardy Timbales Hot Side Dishes No. 974 Mentana Timbales →

For the Modern Kitchen

This is a Ranhofer entry in the fullest sense: almost every component is a cross-reference to another number in The Epicurean, and the written instruction covers only the assembly. Read it as the final step of a day's work rather than a standalone recipe.

What you are actually makingA timbale here is a small buttered mold (the book specifies its own No. 2, Fig. 137) lined decoratively, filled with a mousseline-style forcemeat around a core of diced garnish, then poached and turned out. It is not a pastry case and not a baked casserole.
"Poach in a moderate oven"This is normally read as a bain-marie: the molds stand in a pan of hot water, covered with buttered paper. Ranhofer gives no temperature, timing or mold size here; a modern moderate oven is around 325-350F, and the water must never boil or the forcemeat curdles and weeps. Small molds will take roughly 20-30 minutes, until the center is firmly set and a skewer comes out clean.
The lining is the hingeButter the molds heavily and chill them before laying in the truffle, or the pattern slides when you pack the forcemeat. Press each crescent flat against the metal and add the filling in small spoonfuls with a piping bag rather than dropping it in, so no air pocket lifts the decoration.
The cross-referenced componentsNo. 75 is a pounded game forcemeat lightened with cream, essentially a mousseline; No. 397 is a concentrated partridge stock; No. 414 is espagnole, the flour-thickened brown sauce; No. 423 is blond de veau, a pale veal reduction. A modern kitchen can substitute a well-reduced brown game jus for the espagnole without much loss.
PartridgeGray or red-legged partridge, boned raw; game of this sort was obtainable by a kitchen like Delmonico's, though in American usage the name "partridge" was often applied to ruffed grouse. Farmed partridge and quail are the closest current equivalents; a boneless guinea fowl breast gives the right texture if not the same flavor, and pheasant is stronger than intended.
Foies-grasRanhofer means whole foie gras cut into 1/8-inch dice, not the modern smooth mousse in a tin; in his kitchen that would most likely have come from a cooked or lightly cooked lobe or terrine. It is folded into the cold salpicon, so cut it and return it to the refrigerator until the moment of filling.
The salpicon must be coldThe instruction "left till cold before using" is not incidental. A warm, loose salpicon melts into the surrounding forcemeat and the timbale turns out as an undifferentiated block instead of showing a distinct center.
TruffleBlack winter truffle, and the recipe uses a great deal of it purely for looks. Preserved truffle peelings pressed and cut with a small round cutter give the same effect at a fraction of the cost; the flavor here comes from the game and the sauce, not the decoration.
Yield and serviceThe original gives no quantities at all. Figure one timbale per person as a hot entree between courses, unmolded onto a warm plate with the three-part sauce passed separately rather than poured over, which would hide the truffle work.

A Little History

The Epicurean (1894) is Charles Ranhofer's record of thirty-odd years as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and this run of numbered timbales shows the book at its most Parisian: each is distinguished less by its filling than by the pattern of truffle and tongue lining the mold. Names like Marly, Lombardy and Mentana were applied to garnishes and preparations in the nineteenth-century French repertoire more or less as labels of fashion, and Marly is generally traced to the royal chateau of Marly-le-Roi near Versailles rather than to any documented cook or event. The fish-scale lining, the ball of salpicon hidden at the center, the sauce sent to table apart, all belong to service a la russe, where dishes arrived plated in sequence and a small hot entree was expected to be looked at before it was eaten. The elaborate cross-referencing is equally of its moment: Ranhofer wrote for a brigade with stockpots already on the fire, and assumed that espagnole, veal blond and game fumet were standing preparations in the kitchen, not things anyone would begin from scratch for a dozen timbales.