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Roulade of Beef, Nivernaise
Procure a three-pound-piece flank of beef twice as long as wide, trim off the fat and split it crosswise without separating. Season all around with a teaspoon salt and half teaspoon white pepper and keep in a cool place till the following stuffing is prepared:
Finely chop up two ounces lean, raw pork, one ounce lean, raw veal, and one ounce cooked lean ham and place these articles in a mortar; pound to a paste, add three tablespoons fresh bread crumbs, half teaspoon freshly chopped parsley, a bean chopped garlic, half teaspoon salt, two saltspoons cayenne pepper, a saltspoon each grated nutmeg and thyme, half a gill cream and one raw egg; pound the whole well together for five minutes, remove from the mortar and evenly spread all over the cut part of the beef. Roll up tightly, firmly tie with string all around, place a mirepoix at the bottom of a braizing pan, lay the roulade on top, spread two tablespoons of melted lard over the beef and set in the oven for twenty-five minutes or until a golden colour. Then add two tablespoons flour at the bottom of the pan, stir well with a wooden spoon, pour in half gill claret, one and a half gills demi-glace, one gill of tomato sauce and one gill water. Reset the pan in the oven for fifty-five minutes longer, turning the beef occasionally; remove, untie, place the beef on a dish and keep warm. Skim the fat from the gravy in the pan and boil the sauce on the range for fifteen minutes, strain the sauce over the beef, pour a Nivernaise garnishing around the beef and serve.
A classic braised beef roll with a pork-and-veal forcemeat, written for a professional kitchen that had stock, demi-glace and a mortar on hand. Nothing here is out of reach, but several quantities and one omission need translating.
- No oven temperature is givenThe book leaves it to the cook. A workable modern reading of the two stages is to brown the tied roulade uncovered fairly hot (around 425F) for the first 25 minutes, then drop to about 325-350F once the liquid goes in.
- Gills and saltspoonsA gill is half a cup (4 fl oz), so half a gill of claret is 1/4 cup and one and a half gills of demi-glace is 3/4 cup. A saltspoon is 1/4 teaspoon; two saltspoons of cayenne is a genuinely hot 1/2 teaspoon, so scale to taste.
- "A bean chopped garlic"An old kitchen measure meaning a bean-sized piece, roughly one small clove. Not a whole head.
- Butterflying the flank"Split it crosswise without separating" means butterfly the flank open like a book so you have a thin, wide sheet to spread and roll. A meat mallet between plastic sheets afterwards gives an even thickness and a tighter roll.
- The forcemeatA food processor replaces the mortar: pulse the pork, veal and ham cold, then add the crumbs, egg and cream and run until smooth. Keep everything refrigerator-cold or the cream and fat will split.
- Mirepoix and demi-glaceThe mirepoix is a rough dice of onion, carrot and celery laid under the meat as a rack and flavour base. Demi-glace can be bought, or use reduced brown beef stock; plain canned broth will leave the sauce thin, since the recipe relies on it for body.
- ClaretPeriod shorthand for dry red Bordeaux. Any dry, unoaked red works.
- Timing and tendernessFlank is lean and full of connective tissue. The stated 55 minutes will cook it through but may leave it chewy; a covered braise of 2 to 2.5 hours at 325F gives a roll that slices cleanly without shredding. Let it rest before untying and cutting into thick rounds.
- The Nivernaise garnishNot explained in the text: in classical usage it means carrots turned into small olive shapes and glazed in butter and stock, often with glazed button onions alongside.
- YieldA three-pound flank plus stuffing serves six generously, with sauce.
Nivernaise takes its name from the Nivernais, the old province around Nevers in central France, long associated with carrots; in classical French kitchen language the word signals a garnish of glazed turned carrots, sometimes with onions, and it attaches to everything from tournedos to braised beef. The dish belongs to the international hotel repertoire that circulated in American professional kitchens around the turn of the twentieth century, when a chef could assume a standing pot of demi-glace and staff to pound forcemeat in a mortar. Stuffing and rolling a cheap, flat cut is far older and thoroughly domestic in origin, but the layers here are professional: a lean flank made luxurious by a veal-and-pork farce, browned, braised in wine and tomato, then dressed with a garnish whose name alone told a diner what to expect on the plate.