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Tenderloin of Beef, Athenienne
Neatly trim a little of the fat from a two-and-a-half-pound piece tenderloin of beef. Place a mirepoix in a roasting pan, lay filet over, season with a teaspoon salt and half teaspoon pepper, lightly baste with a tablespoon melted butter, pour two gills water into pan, then set in brisk oven for thirty-five minutes, turning and basting it once in a while. Remove, dress filet on a hot dish and keep hot.
Remove fat from surface of gravy, then transfer contents of pan into a small saucepan, pour in a gill demi-glace, two tablespoons sherry and one saltspoon cayenne pepper, mix well and let reduce for ten minutes. Skim fat off surface, then strain sauce over tenderloin, dress egg plant julienne at both ends of dish and serve.
A plain roast fillet with a pan sauce, written for a cook who already keeps demi-glace on hand. The only real difficulty is that 1906 roasting times assume a much larger, cooler oven than yours.
- Watch the thermometer, not the clockThirty-five minutes in a hot oven will take a 2.5 lb centre-cut tenderloin well past pink. Pull it at 125-130F internal for medium-rare and rest it 10 minutes; that is likely to be 20-25 minutes at 450F in a modern oven.
- Brisk ovenRead this as 425-450F. The high heat is there to colour the outside of a lean cut quickly, which is also why the water in the pan matters -- it keeps the mirepoix and drippings from scorching into bitterness.
- Gills and saltspoonsA gill is half a cup, so two gills of water is one cup and a gill of demi-glace is half a cup. A saltspoon is about a quarter teaspoon, which is a good deal of cayenne for the cup and a half or so of liquid that goes into the saucepan -- less again once it has reduced; start with an eighth.
- MirepoixNo quantity is given. A cup or so of roughly diced onion, carrot and celery, with a bay leaf if you like, will serve. It is a flavour base and a roasting rack, not a vegetable side; it gets strained out.
- Demi-glaceThe book assumes a kitchen with brown sauce simmering somewhere. Substitute a good reduced veal or beef stock, glace de viande loosened with stock, or a decent commercial demi-glace concentrate. Bouillon cubes will make the reduced sauce salty and thin.
- Reduce, then strainTen minutes of reduction is a guide, not a rule -- go by body. You want a sauce that coats a spoon lightly, since there is no flour or butter finish to carry it. Skim carefully; tenderloin fat that has been through the pan tastes greasy.
- Eggplant julienneMatchsticks of peeled eggplant, salted briefly, dried, floured or not, and fried crisp in deep fat. Fry them last and dress them at the ends of the platter at the moment of serving, or they slump.
- YieldFour to six, depending on whether it opens a longer menu or stands as the main course.
Nineteenth-century French kitchens named garnishes rather than dishes, and a cook reading "Athénienne" on a menu card was reading a shorthand: something in the Greek manner, which is often said to have involved eggplant, and sometimes onion and tomato besides. Whether such garnishes bore any relation to actual Athenian cooking is doubtful -- they belong to the same fashion for geographic labels that produced ussanaise...