Blood Sauce RE:Blood

Salut/Hi gerald,

le/on Sat, 31 Jan 2004 08:45:36 -0500, tu disais/you said:-

And wonderful it is too. Patrick Ceaux, a young chef who recently took over near us, had it on the menu on alternate weeks this autumn. After all the years I've known about it, I was able to try it. Phenomenal, as you say, though we had it with a youngish good Médoc (sorry, forgot which "chef's choice").

Err....

Nope. Sorry. No foie gras, and it's not strips.

Have a look at one of the earliest written recipes as found in Elizabeth David's "Mediterranean food"

LIEVRE A LA ROYALE This famous recipe for lièvre a la royale was invented by Senator Couteaux, who contributed regular articles to the Paris newspaper Le Temps. On November 29, 1898, instead of his usual political column, appeared this remarkable recipe. M. Couteaux related at length how he had spent a week in Poitou hunting the right kind of hare; how, the exactly suitable animal at last in his hands, he instantly took the train to Paris, sent out his invitations, and hurried off to consult his friend Spüller, who ran a well-known restaurant in the Rue Favart, to arrange the preparation and cook- ing of his hare for the following day. The dish takes from noon until 7 o'clock to prepare and cook, and Senator Couteaux tells how by 6 o'clock the exquisite aroma had penetrated the doors of Spüller's restaurant, floated down the street and out into the boule- vard, where the passers-by sniffed the scented air; an excitable crowd gathered, and the whole quartier was ‘mis en imoi'. If you ever feel like devoting the time (perhaps you need not afkr all spend a week catching your hare) and the ingredients to cooking this dish you will see that the senator was not exaggerating. I have translated the recipe as faithfully as possible. It is very lengthy and there are repetitions. But in those days there was plenty of space to fill up; and from the senator's precise instructions one can well imagine the delightful old gentleman bending over his ‘daubière', and the pride with which he presented this beautiful creation to his gourmet friends. Ingredients ‘You require a male hare, with red fur, killed if possible in mountainous country; of fine French descent (characterized by the light nervous elegance of head and limbs), weighing from s to 6 pounds, that is to say older than a leveret but still adolescent. The important thing is that the hare should have been cleanly killed and so not have lost a drop of blood. ‘The fat to cook it: 2 or 3 tablespoons of goose fat, 1 lb of fat bacon rashers; 1 lb of bacon in one piece. Liquid: 6 oz of good red wine vinegar. Two bottles of Macon or Médoc, whichever you please, but in any case not less than 2 years old. ‘Utensils: A daubière, or oblong stewing pan, of well-tinned copper, 8 inches high, 12 inches long, 8 inches wide and possessed of a hermetically closing cover; a small bowl in which to preserve the blood of the hare, and later to stir it when it comes to incorporating it in the sauce; a double-handled vegetable chopper; a large shallow serving dish; a sieve; a small wooden pestle.

‘The wine to serve: Preferably a St Julien or Moulin à Vent. ‘Preliminary Preparations ‘Skin and clean the hare. Keep aside the heart, the liver, and the lungs. Keep aside also and with great care the blood. (It is tradi- tional to add 2 or 3 small glasses of fine old cognac to the blood; but this is not indispensable; M. Couteaux finally decided against this addition.) 1n the usual way prepare a medium-sized carrot, cut into four; 4 medium onions each stuck with a clove; 20 cloves of garlic; 40 cloves of shallot; a bouquet garni, composed of a bay leaf, a sprig of thyme, and some pieces of parsley. ‘Get ready some charcoal, in large pieces, which you will presently be needing, burning fast. ‘First Operation (from half~past twelve until four 0' clock) * ‘At 12.30 coat the bottom and sides of the stewpan with the goose fat; then at the bottom of the pan arrange a bed of rashers of bacon. ‘Cut off the head and neck of the hare: leaving only the back and the legs. Then place the hare at full length on the bed of bacon, on its back. Cover it with another layer of bacon. Now all your bacon rashers are used up. 'Now add the carrot; the onions; the 20 cloves of garlic; the 40 cloves of shallot;* the bouquet garni. 'Pour over the hare: (i) the 6 oz of red wine vinegar, and (ii) a bottle and a halfof 2 year/old Macon (or Medoc).

'Season with pepper and salt in reasonable quantity.

'At one o'clock. The daubiere being thus arranged, put on the lid and set the fire going (either a gas stove or an ordinary range). On the top of the lid place 3 or 4. large pieces of charcoal in an incandescent state, well alight and glowing.

'Regulate your heat so that the hare may cook for 3 hours, over a gentle and regular fire, continuously.

'Second Operation (to be carried out during the first cooking of the hare)

'First chop exceedingly finely the four following ingredients, chopping each one separately: (i) 1 lb of bacon. (ii) the heart, liver, and lungs of the hare, (iii) 10 cloves of garlic, (iv) 20 cloves of shallot.

'The chopping of the garlic and the shallots must ie so fine that each of them attain as nearly as possible a molecular state.

'This is one of the first conditions of success of this marvellous dish, in which the multiple and diverse perfumes and aromas melt into a whole so harmonious that neither one dominates, nor discloses its particular origin, and so arouse some preconceived prejudice, however regrettable.

'The bacon, the insides of the hare, the garlic, and shallots being chopped very fine, and separately, blend them all together thoroughly, so as to obtain an absolutely perfect mixture. Keep this mixture aside.

• In spite of the enormous quantity of garlic and shallots which enter into the composition of lièvre a la royale, the remarkable fact is that to a certain extent the two ingredients cancel each other out, so that the uninitiated would hardly suspect their presence.

' Third Operation (from four o'clock until a quarter to seven)

'At four o'clock. Remove the stewpan from the fire. Take the hare out very delicately; put it on a dish. Then remove all the debris of the bacon, carrot, onions, garlic, shallot, which may be clinging to it; return these debris to the pan.

'The Sauce. Now take a large deep dish and a sieve. Empty the contents of the pan into the sieve, which you have placed over the dish; with a small wooden pestle pound the contents of the sieve, extracting all the juice, which forms a coulis in the dish.

'Mixing the coulis and the hachis (the chopped mixture). Now comes the moment to make use of the mixture which was the subject of the second operation. Incorporate this into the coulis.

'Heat the half bottle of wine left over from the first operation. Pour this hot wine into the mixture of coulis and bachis and stir the whole well together.

'At balf-past four. Return to the stewpan: (i) the mixture of coulis and hachis, (ii) the hare, together with any of the bones which may have become detached during the cooking.

'Return the pan to the stove, with the same gentle and regular fire underneath and on the top, for another 1 1/2 hours' cooking.

'At six o'clock. As the excess of fat, issuing from the necessary quantity of bacon, will prevent you from judging the state of the sauce, you must now proceed to operate a first removal of the fat. Your work will not actually be completed until the sauce has become sufficiently amalgamated to attain a consistence approximating to that of a puree of potatoes; not quite, however, for if you tried to make it too thick, you would end by so reducing it that there would not be sufficient to moisten the flesh (by nature dry) of the hare.

'Your hare having therefore had the fat removed, can continue to cook, still on a very slow fin, until the moment comes for you to add the blood which you have reserved with the utmost care as has already been instructed.

‘Fourth Operation (quarter of an hour before serving) ‘At quarter to seven. The amalgamation of the sauce proceeding successfully, a fourth and last operation will finally and rapidly bring it to completion. ‘Addition of the blood to the hare. With the addition of the blood, not only will you hasten the amalgamation of the sauce but also give it a fine brown colour; the darker it is the more appetizing. This addition of the blood should not be made more than 30 minutes before serving; it must also be preceded by a second removal of the fat. ‘Therefore, effectively remove the fat; after which, without losing a minute, turn to the operation of adding the blood. ‘(i) Whip the blood with a fork, until, if any of it has become curdled, it is smooth again. (Note: the optional addition of the brandy mentioned at the beginning helps to prevent the curdling of the blood.) ‘(ii) Pour the blood into the sauce, taking care to stir the contents of the pan from top to bottom and from right to left, so that the blood will penetrate into every corner of the pan. ‘Now taste; add pepper and salt if necessary. A little later (10 minutes at a maximum) get ready to serve. ‘Arrangements for serving ‘At seven o'clock. Remove from the pan your hare, whose volume by this time has naturally somewhat shrunk. ‘At any rate, in the centre of the serving dish, place all that still has the consistency of meat, the bones, entirely denuded, and now useless, being thrown away, and now finally around this hare en compote pour the admirable sauce which has been so carefully created.'

Needless to say (concludes the senator) that to use a knife to serve the hare would be a sacrilege. A spoon alone is amply sufficient.

• These times are given for a dinner to be served at seven o'clock.

The most famous recipe with blood in the sauce is coq-au-vin.

It has been illegal (there we go again) to make it with blood for years in France. Mainly because you can get pretty ill unless you can guarantee that the chicken is of impeccable origin, and even than it is russian roulette as to whether it is salmonella or something much worse that you will get.

Mike

Was all Beaujolais planted in Gamay for red in the 19c?

Salut/Hi gerald,

le/on Mon, 02 Feb 2004 08:29:32 -0500, tu disais/you said:-

I think so, though of course at the time, people were much LESS obsessed with technical details like provenance and cepage, and more concerned with whether the wine tasted good! I'm not defending that view, particularly, though I think one can become TOO hypnotised. For exampe, in a light year, is it a good thing or a bad thing to add a little beefy, high alcohol wine from elsewhere? Is it better to chaptalise, or should one stick to 100% of the stated wine from the stated year, EVEN if the wine is less palatable? And given that a blended table wine sells for about 1/10th the price of a top burgundy, is it reasonable to expect the grower to say what he's done?