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Potage Belle Fontaine
(Paris.) Cook 1 quart good veal stock with 1 tablespoonful of chopped ham and the meat of a chicken, about 2 cupfuls, minced very finely. Simmer for 40 minutes, add salt, pepper, a tablespoonful of chopped parsley, a teaspoonful of onion juice, then press through a sieve. Finally, add 1 cup of cooked and shredded cabbage.
A clear veal-based purée soup finished with shredded cabbage. The method is simple; the points worth watching are the sieving and the cabbage, which should stay distinct rather than dissolve into the purée.
- The sieve is the dishPressing the simmered chicken and ham through a sieve is what gives the soup its body — there is no flour or cream here. A food mill or fine chinois with a ladle to force the solids through does the same work; a blender followed by a strainer is quicker but gives a slightly cloudier result.
- Onion juiceA period ingredient made by grating a halved onion and using the liquid, or by squeezing grated onion in a cloth. Grated onion pressed straight into the pot is an acceptable substitute since the soup is sieved anyway.
- Veal stockGood veal stock was a kitchen staple in 1900 and is not now. A light homemade chicken stock is the nearest thing; avoid dark brown veal demi-glace, which will overwhelm the delicate flavour the recipe is after.
- The chickenTwo cupfuls of minced chicken — the recipe does not say whether raw or already cooked — roughly 10 oz. Mince it finely before it goes in, as the recipe says; large pieces will not pass the sieve without a fight.
- Cabbage added lastCook the cabbage separately, shred it fine, and add it only after sieving. Simmered in the soup from the start it turns sulphurous and grey, and the whole point of the garnish is a fresh green note against the smooth base.
- SeasoningSalt goes in near the end because a quart of stock reduces over 40 minutes of simmering. Taste after sieving, when the ham has given up its salt.
- YieldSomewhat more than a quart once the sieved meat and the cup of cabbage are counted — four small first-course servings, or two as a light supper.
With a Saucepan Over the Sea belongs to a genre of turn-of-the-century American cookbooks built on European travel: dishes collected, or claimed to be collected, from restaurants and private kitchens abroad, then set down for a home cook in Boston or Philadelphia. The bracketed "(Paris.)" is the whole apparatus of authority. "Belle Fontaine" appears to be one of the decorative names French kitchens attached to soups in the nineteenth century, alongside Cr cy...