Home › The World's Kitchen › Cream of Chicken, Francaise

Cream of Chicken, Francaise

Cut off head and feet and neatly draw and wipe a very small fowl. Place in saucepan with one each sliced carrot and onion, two each sliced leeks and branches celery, two branches parsley and a branch chervil. Pour in three and a half quarts water, add a half pound piece salt pork, season with a teaspoon salt, half teaspoon pepper and let come to a boil. Skim fat off surface, then let slowly simmer for two hours, being careful to skim fat off once in a while. Lift up fowl, plunge in cold water for ten minutes, remove skin and entirely bone it. Place meat in mortar and pound to a paste, remove and keep on a plate. Mix in a saucepan one ounce butter and two ounces flour, strain broth in this pan, mix until it comes to a boil, then add chicken paste little by little, with two tablespoons sherry, a saltspoon each cayenne and nutmeg, thoroughly mix, then let gently boil for thirty minutes. Dilute on a plate one egg yolk with a gill cream and juice of half a sound lemon, mix well while heating for three minutes, but do not allow to boil. Strain through sieve into a vessel, then through cheesecloth into a soup tureen and serve with a plate of bread croutons separately.