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Eggs, Bateliere
Have three quarts water with quarter gill vinegar and tablespoon salt, and as soon as it thoroughly boils carefully crack in six fresh eggs and poach four minutes. Lift up with a skimmer and gently drop them in cold water. Poach six more in same way, lift from the cold water, neatly trim and drain on a cloth. Finely chop twelve anchovies in oil, place on a plate with a teaspoon anchovy paste, mix well, and spread paste over eggs equally; turn lightly in Parmesan cheese, then drop in boiling fat and fry one minute. Lift up, dress on a dish with a folded napkin, decorate with six quarters of lemon and serve.
A twelve-egg dish of poached eggs coated in anchovy and Parmesan and deep-fried, meant as a hot hors d'oeuvre or luncheon course. The technique is sound; the measurements and a few unstated steps need translating.
- A quarter gillA gill is half a cup, so a quarter gill is 2 tablespoons of vinegar in three quarts of water. That is a light acidulation, enough to help the whites set without flavouring them.
- Poach in two batches, as writtenSix eggs at a time in three quarts keeps the water from dropping off the boil and stops the eggs welding together. The cold-water plunge halts cooking and firms the whites for trimming.
- Four minutes is deliberateThat is longer than a modern soft poach because the eggs must survive handling, coating and frying. Expect a set white and a yolk that is thick rather than runny. If you want any flow left in the yolk, take them out at three.
- Trimming mattersRagged skirts of white burn instantly in hot fat. Pare each egg to a neat oval with a small knife and dry it thoroughly on the cloth, or the coating will slide off.
- Anchovies in oilTwelve fillets, not twelve whole salt-packed fish. Drain them, chop to a paste with the teaspoon of anchovy paste, and spread thinly; the mixture is very salty and no further salt is wanted.
- Making the coating stickThe original goes straight from anchovy paste to Parmesan, which will hold only if the paste is tacky and the cheese is finely grated and pressed on. A beaten-egg wash between the two, or egg and fine crumbs mixed with the Parmesan, gives a far more reliable crust.
- "Boiling fat" means deep fat at 375F"Boiling fat" means deep fat, hot enough to colour the coating fast -- roughly 375F by modern practice, though the book gives no figure. One minute is all it needs: the eggs are already cooked and you are only colouring the cheese. Fry two or three at a time so the fat holds temperature, and lift them out the moment they are golden.
- The napkinDressing on a folded napkin is period service for anything fried, the linen absorbing fat at the table. A rack and paper does the same job before plating.
- YieldTwelve eggs serves six as a first course, two apiece, with a lemon quarter each. They must go to the table straight from the pan.
Batelière is French for boatwoman, and à la batelière is one of the old French garnish names associated with riverside cooking -- classically involving things such as crayfish, mushrooms, glazed onions or eggs, though usage varied considerably. Here the name signifies little more than the anchovy. Alexander Filippini, long of Delmonico's in New York, filled The International Cook Book (1906) with hundreds of such preparations arranged by category, and eggs occupy a large share of it: poached, fried, moulded and dressed in dozens of named styles. Deep-frying an already poached egg was a familiar trick of the period, giving a crisp shell over a soft interior -- a reminder that professional kitchens then thought nothing of cooking a single egg twice.