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Fricassee of Eggs
Boil twelve fresh eggs for eight minutes, remove and plunge in cold water for one minute, take up and shell, then cut into quarters and keep on a hot plate till required. Heat one tablespoon melted butter in a saucepan, add a finely chopped onion and gently brown for five minutes, stirring once in a while. Add one good tablespoon flour, stir briskly, pour in a gill milk, half gill cream, and mix on fire until it comes to a boil. Add the eggs with six sliced canned mushrooms, a half teaspoon each freshly chopped parsley, anchovy essence and salt, and two saltspoons pepper. Mix well, cook for five minutes, dress eggs on a hot, deep dish, arrange six heart-shaped bread croutons around and serve. SHIRRED EGGS, DEERFOOT (PARK) Cut six "Deerfoot" sausages in half-inch pieces, place in a sautoire with a teaspoon melted butter and briskly fry them for six minutes, tossing once in a while. Pour in one and a half gills tomato sauce, adding a half teaspoon chopped parsley, lightly mix and cook for five minutes. Evenly divide sausages in six shirred-egg dishes, carefully crack two fresh eggs into each dish, evenly season with a half teaspoon salt and two saltspoons pepper, set in the oven for five minutes, remove and serve.
A white-sauce fricassee built on hard-boiled eggs rather than chicken. The measurements are small and archaic, and the sauce is the only thing that can go wrong.
- Gills and saltspoonsA gill is 1/2 cup, so the sauce takes 1/2 cup milk and 1/4 cup cream. A saltspoon is 1/4 teaspoon, making two saltspoons 1/2 teaspoon pepper.
- Sauce ratioOne tablespoon each of butter and flour to 3/4 cup liquid gives a thin sauce by modern standards. Cook the roux a moment before the milk goes in, and add the liquid gradually or it will lump.
- The eight-minute eggEight minutes gives a yolk just set through, which is what you want for quarters that hold their shape. The one-minute cold plunge is only to stop the cooking; leave them in longer if you want them to peel cleanly.
- Anchovy essenceA bottled anchovy extract of the period, still made but less common on shelves. Anchovy paste, thinned slightly, is the closest match; Worcestershire will do in the same quantity but brings vinegar and spice with it.
- Don't boil the eggs twiceThe five minutes in the sauce is to heat the quarters through, not to cook them. Keep it at a bare simmer and fold gently or the whites shred and the yolks crumble into the sauce.
- Canned mushroomsCommon in recipes of this period. Fresh button mushrooms, sliced and sweated with the onion, are better; drain canned ones well so the packing liquid does not slacken the sauce.
- CroutonsCut white bread into hearts with a cutter and fry in butter until golden. The recipe gives no oven method; if you prefer to bake them, brush with butter and use a moderate oven. Add them at the last moment so they stay crisp against the sauce.
- YieldTwelve eggs and six croutons point to six servings as a luncheon or supper dish. It is worth doubling the sauce if you plan to serve it over rice or toast.
The International Cook Book came out of the Delmonico's tradition, and this is a French restaurant technique scaled down for a household: fricassée normally refers to meat, usually chicken or veal, cooked gently in a pale sauce rather than browned. Applying the name to hard-boiled eggs was not unusual in nineteenth-century kitchens, where eggs could stand in for meat and where a good velouté or béchamel could carry almost any filling. The anchovy essence and the heart-shaped croutons are marks of the era — bottled savory extracts for depth without meat stock, and cut fried bread as a common garnish for dishes served in a sauce.