No. 983

Rothschild Timeales

Timbales a la Rothschild

Decorate the bottom of each buttered timbale mold (No. 2, Fig. 137) with a thin round slice of truffle measuring three-quarters of an inch in diameter; around the sides range six lozenge shaped pieces of the truffle, each one divided by a round bit of truffle an eighth of an inch across, and more of the same sized and shaped pieces at both tips of the lozenges, making eighteen small rounds in all. Fill the bottom and sides with a chicken cream forcemeat (No. 75), and lay in the center a ball, half an inch in diameter, composed of foies-gras taken from a terrine and rubbed through a sieve; fill the mold with more forcemeat then poach and finish the same as for No. 959. Serve separately a puree of chestnuts (No. 712), diluted with veloute sauce (No. 415) and cream to the consistency of a sauce, incorporating into it at the last moment, a piece of melted fresh butter.

← No. 982 Ristori Timbales Hot Side Dishes No. 984 Sartiges Timbales →

For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer writes for a brigade with a numbered reference book at hand, so this reads as a set of instructions to other cooks rather than a standalone recipe. The cross-references are the main obstacle; once they are unpacked the dish is a straightforward chicken mousseline poached in decorated molds.

The cross-referencesNo. 75 is Ranhofer's chicken cream forcemeat, a mousseline of pounded and sieved raw breast worked with cream. No. 959 is the timbale recipe whose poaching and finishing this one borrows. No. 712 is a chestnut puree and No. 415 veloute, a white sauce thickened with roux. The exact working of Nos. 75 and 959 has to be read in the book itself.
The moldsTimbale mold No. 2 is the small metal mold Ranhofer illustrates at Fig. 137; he gives no capacity. Small metal dariole molds or small ramekins will serve; avoid ceramic if you want a clean unmolding.
Making the truffle decor stay putThis is the hinge. Butter the molds and chill them hard, then set the truffle cutouts into cold firm butter so they do not shift when the forcemeat goes in. Pipe the forcemeat down the sides with a bag rather than spooning it, or the pattern smears.
Poaching temperatureThe water bath should sit at 170-180F and never simmer. Boiling water makes a cream forcemeat curdle and weep. Small molds take about 15 to 20 minutes; the centre should read 160F and the tops should feel just set.
Foie gras from a terrineRanhofer means cooked terrine foie gras, not raw lobe. A commercial bloc or parfait sieved smooth and rolled into half-inch balls, then frozen briefly, holds its shape while the forcemeat is piped around it.
TrufflesThe recipe assumes black truffle in quantity. Preserved black truffle peelings and a small whole truffle will cut the eighteen rounds and six lozenges per mold; summer truffle is paler and gives a weaker pattern.
The sauceThin the chestnut puree with veloute and cream until it just coats a spoon, then add the butter off the heat; Ranhofer specifies melted fresh butter stirred in at the last moment. Once the butter is in, do not let it boil or it will separate.
YieldRanhofer gives none. Figure one timbale per person as a hot side dish or first course; the quantity of forcemeat depends on the size of the mold, which he does not state.

A Little History

The Epicurean (1894) is Charles Ranhofer's record of thirty years as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and this page shows the house at its most French: a garnish named for a family, coded by two ingredients. In nineteenth-century kitchens "a la Rothschild" signalled truffle and foie gras together, the shorthand for unlimited expense, and the name attaches to a scatter of dishes from garnished poultry to the candied-fruit souffle Rothschild generally credited to Careme's circle in the service of the banking family. The mosaic of truffle lozenges and dots set in butter at the bottom of a mold belongs to the older tradition of decorated cold entrees carried over into hot work, where the pattern is only revealed when the timbale is turned out. That such patience was spent on a side dish, one of hundreds numbered in sequence, is the clearest measure of how a Gilded Age restaurant kitchen was staffed.