James Peterson

The next time someone makes a comment about the questionability of eating sweetbreads, ask them if they ever eat hotdogs. Why something so delicious and delicate should be eschewed by Americans, I have no idea, but sweetbreads may be the most delicious and satisfying of all the organ meats. They are certainly the most expensive.
If you buy a whole sweetbread, you’ll notice that it’s comprised of two pieces. One piece, rather long and scraggly, is the pancreas and is called by the French, the gorge, meaning “throat.” The second piece, a nicely formed and tight round, is the thymus, called by the French, the noix, meaning nut. Of the two pieces, the noix is the most desirable because it better holds its shape and is easier to cut into nice even slices. When buying sweetbreads, try to get just the noix; by no means, accept just the gorge.
Virtually all recipes put sweetbreads through an initial blanching and weighting to firm them up and help them keep their shape. Ideally, they should be soaked in salted water overnight (they’re very perishable) in the refrigerator. The salt helps draw the blood out of any veins visible on the surface. The next day, they should be covered with cold water, the water slowly brought to the simmer, and the sweetbreads spread out on a sheetpan. Another sheetpan, weighted with a pot or some cans, is placed on top and the hold contraption allowed to rest in the refrigerator for at least 6 hours.
Once the sweetbreads have been weighted, little pieces of fat and tissue should be removed and the sweetbreads are ready for cooking.
While sweetbreads can be fried, they are usually either sautéed or braised. To braise sweetbreads, sweat some mirepoix, put the sweetbreads on top in a single layer, add a little good broth—enough to come about a fourth up the sides of the sweetbreads—and perhaps a little wine (Madeira is good). Cover loosely with foil and bake for uncovered about 25 minutes in a medium oven until the sweetbreads feel firm to the touch. They are then ready for slicing and serving.
Before slicing, however, make a sauce with the braising liquid in the pan. One approach is to boil down the liquid until it caramelizes, deglaze with a little broth or wine, and finish with cream and/or butter. Other ingredients such as mushrooms, herbs, or truffles can also be added to make elaborate and luxurious sauces.
One of the most luxurious dishes I’ve ever encountered were the truffled sweetbreads tasted at Joel Robuchon’s restaurant, Jamin, in Paris. The sweetbreads had been weighted and sliced—standard for sautéing—coated with egg yolk and dipped in finely chopped truffles so that the sweetbreads ended up being actually black. The sweetbreads were then gently sautéed in clarified butter.
Of course sweetbreads can be sautéed in less rarefied ways by lightly flouring them or breading them by flouring, dipping in beaten egg and finishing with fresh breadcrumbs. They should then be gently sautéed in clarified butter. Once sautéed, you can serve sweetbreads with a sauce. What is most typical is simply a little butter cooked in the pan until it froths. You can also add a few capers, some lemon juice, and tiny crispy croutons to make sweetbreads à la grenobloise.

A stew is simply a braised dish in which the element(s) being braised is/are cooked with a small amount of liquid; the braised elements are cut into relatively small chunks.
Most of us are familiar with meat stews, all of which follow certain predictable patterns. One tip: most recipes call for browning the cubes of meat before braising, a messy and time-consuming job. Your stew will be almost as good if you skip this step and just begin the stewing with the raw meat. If you do decide to brown the meat, the method is somewhat fraught because of the tendency of the meat to release liquid as it’s being browned, causing it to steam instead. To avoid this, use the heaviest pan you have, get it nice and hot with a little oil in it, and brown the meat a few cubes at a time. Whatever you do, don’t fill the pan all the way at once, but add the pieces of meat gradually. When it comes time to turn the meat, turn only a few pieces at a time. If you turn the meat too quickly, it will cool the pan and, again, the meat will steam instead of brown.
If you want to make a meat stew that transcends the usual norms, try larding each piece with a strip of fatback marinated with a little garlic and Cognac. This will provide the requisite fat that’s required to keep the meat moist. Once the meat is browned (or not), it can be combined with the braising liquid and any aromatic ingredients including vegetables (such as onion and carrot) and a bouquet garni. The pot should be covered and the meat braised in a 275 degree oven for about 3 hours.
Virtually all meat stews are made in the same way, only the braising liquid and the aromatic garniture (flavorful root vegetables such as onions or carrots) can be altered to come up with different basic flavors. But the great variety of stews comes about, not from changes to the aromatic garniture or braising liquid, but to the final garniture, in other words, those ingredients added to the stew at the end or near the end. For example a boeuf bourguignon is defined by being braised in red wine and garnished with glazed pearl onions, lardons (little strips of rendered bacon), and mushrooms. Ideally, or at least classically, these ingredients should be cooked separately and only be added to the stew just before it is served. Variations are endless such that virtually any vegetable can be cooked and added to the stew at the end.
Fish stews function somewhat differently. In old-fashioned country cooking, a fish stew might involve a simple heap of fish simmered with a little white wine, cider, or even seawater. The fish is boiled (whereas it should be simmered), the stewing liquid thickened (usually with beurre manié), and the final garniture added. The problem with this method is that you end up with a pile of whole cooked fish and a stewing liquid in which the wine hasn’t had long enough to cook.
My own way to circumvent these problems is to filet the fish, make a simple broth with the heads and bones, and then braise the filets in the broth at the last minute. In this way the stewing liquid has time to cook and the fish is much easier to eat.
Little is said about vegetable stews which is a pity since they can be eminently satisfying. One obvious approach is simply to combine the vegetables (cut into appropriate size pieces and shapes) and simmer them together with some kind of braising liquid as likely as not, water. A more sophisticated approach is of course to add the vegetables at different times according to how long they take to cook. Last, you can cook all the vegetables separately, using the method that best suits them, and combine them just before serving. Keep in mind that a vegetable stew can be served alone (they’re fabulous as a first course) or it can be used as a garniture for a meat or seafood stew.

You’ll learn a lot a lot about fish soups and stews if you make a bouillabaisse but it also helps to study soups and stews from other countries.
The oldest and most simple approach to making a fish soup is simply to toss whole cleaned fish into salted water—even sea water—or a little wine and serve them whole with the broth served either first or surrounding the fish in large soup plates. But nowadays most Americans don’t know how to eat a whole fish or don’t feel like wrestling with one especially when there’s a lot of potentially messy broth out there. To solve this problem, filet the fish, make a broth with the bones and heads and add the filets only at the last minute.
More sophisticated fish soups and stews follow certain patterns. Typically the broth contains aromatic vegetables in addition to fish heads and bones. In places where small fish are abundant, the basic broth may be made with whole baby fish. Japanese cooks may start out with dashi; Thai cooks may start out with a light broth flavored with kafeer lime leaves, lemongrass, and fish sauce; Indian cooks may incorporate curry leaves; European and American cooks are likely to flavor the basic broth with shallots or onions and perhaps carrots and a little celery and also include wine. Once the basic broth is prepared, it is used to poach the filets of fish. Once the fish has been cooked, the broth is often finished with a final flavoring or thickener. In Western dishes, beurre manié is likely to be added near the end of cooking or, if the dish is a stew, the poaching liquid can be reduced and finished with butter. European cooks also like cream. Few things are as good as a few clams steamed open in wine and their liquid finished with a dollop of French butter. The French thicken their stews with aioli or rouille. Southeast Asian cooks like to finish their stews and soups with coconut milk while Indian and Brazilian cooks often use nut butter such as cashew butter or peanut butter.

I mention sorrel because it is not appreciated as much as it should be. It looks a little bit like spinach—not as dark—but tastes distinctly sour as soon as you bite into a leaf. Most people think of it as an herb to be chopped or shredded and then sprinkled into sauces. Truth be told, sorrel has very little of a distinct flavor that would make it useful as an herb, but it does have a sprightly acidity that makes it wonderful when served as a vegetable (it can be combined with spinach) or worked into a soup.
Don’t boil or blanch sorrel as you would spinach or it will just melt away and loose flavor. It is better to put it in a pan with a little butter or reduced cream and just stew it until it “melts,” for a minute or two. Sorrel also makes one of the best possible soups. You can make a soup out of a leek and potato base by simply stirring in sorrel a minute or two before the cooking is completed. The soup should then be pureed and finished with cream, although you don’t need a lot of cream. Another method, used to make the classic potage Germiny, requires good veal or chicken broth. The broth is used to cook the sorrel, the soup is pureed and thickened with egg yolks. It is then finished with cream. Some versions call for chervil. This soup can be served hot or cold. For more about using egg yolks, see crème anglaise, page 000. To make sorrel sauce, deglaze a pan used for sautéing (fish, say), add a little chiffonade (thin strips) of sorrel and heat just long enough for the sorrel to loose its color. Add cream or butter.
I have also encountered sorrel mousse. Make a potage Germiny, add gelatin to it, let it cool (but not set) in the manner of a Bavarian cream and fold it with cream whipped to medium peaks. Put in molds and allow to set. I got this idea from a triple-layer Bavarian cream (the other mousses were chicken and tomato) out of Richard Olney’s The French Menu Cookbook.

In France, sea urchins are served at places that serve oysters for about 10 times the price of the oysters. My first taste of a sea urchin was in such a place and I was immediately struck by the juxtaposition of sea-like flavors with sweetness. It was a little bit like an oyster flavored with chocolate—which was not at all a bad thing. In fact, other than caviar, it was the best thing I’d ever tasted out of the sea.
Sea urchins are not at all inviting to look at—they’re usually black although sometimes green or violet, disk shaped, and covered with spikes, not something you want to step on at the beach. To open a sea urchin, cut through the small opening at the center to the outer perimeter. Cut around the sea urchin to remove the top half. This will expose the roe—usually a bright orange—which is the part we eat.
When I returned from France in the late 1970s and opened my restaurant, sea urchins could be bought for 25 dollars a case. A case probably held a hundred. After having paid $2.50 each in a Paris restaurant, this was an amazing boon that led to all manner of creations—the pureed roe was worked with butter and used to finish seafood sauces or the roe was served in small mounds as a garniture for fish. We even made a soup out of it.
Many of these creations came about because we had so many sea urchins and they weren’t bad, but now, given that sea urchins are very expensive, it makes more sense to eat them raw, for their flavor is best when they’re not cooked.
If you’ve never tasted a sea urchin, your best bet is to order uni sushi (or sashimi) in a Japanese restaurant.

Both a noun and a verb, to sauté something literally means to “jump” it. This makes sense in those cases in which sautéing is carried out by continuously shaking the pan so that what it is you’re sautéing is being constantly redistributed. This encourages the food to brown evenly and also prevents the accumulation of steam which would make the food soggy. Mushrooms are an example of a food that can be sautéed in this way. Keep in mind when sautéing such that you’re tossing the ingredients over the heat, that it’s best to use a pan with sloping sides. The sides make it easy to toss the food by jerking suddenly on the pan. The best pans I’ve found for this are French cast iron.
Sometimes sautéing doesn’t mean jumping at all but carefully turning over with tongs or fork. An example of this would be pieces of chicken. When sautéing meats or fish, use a heavy pan and one with straight, not sloping, sides. Because the pan is heavy it can be preheated and will retain heat as it’s used for the sautéing. Be sure to use a pan that will hold the food in a single layer. If the food is crowded in, it will steam; if it’s not crowded enough, the pan will burn in those areas that aren’t covered. A straight-sided sauté pan is really only necessary if you plan to make and reduce a sauce in the pan. If you try to reduce a sauce in a pan with sloping sides, the sides become covered with sauce and burn.
Usually the purpose of sautéing is to form a brown crusty (and very flavorful) layer of caramelized juice on the surface of meats, seafood and vegetables. Experts (including Escoffier) often say that this crust seals in juices and keeps further juices rom escaping, but in fact this isn’t the case. The crust does, however, retain much of the flavor of what’s being sautéed and should be encouraged. If the food starts to steam—if the pan is too crowded or the heat not high enough—the crust will break down and cause further steaming.
A sauté is also a dish. When referring to chicken (as in “chicken sauté”), a sauté is a dish in which the chicken has been cooked completely in a pan with butter or oil, the chicken removed, the fat discarded, and a sauce built in the pan. The chicken is then reheated in the sauce. A sauté contrasts with a braise or a fricassee because no liquid comes in contact with the chicken except for during the final reheating.
When the term “sauté” is applied to dishes made with red meat, it is referring to a kind of mock stew in which the meat is quickly browned without being cooked through, a sauce made in the pan, and the meat just reheated before serving. Beef Stroganoff is an example of such a dish. The trick to making a successful beef or lamb sauté is to make in essence a stew, using cheap stewing cuts and whatever braising liquid you choose such as red wine or broth. You then reserve the stewing liquid and thicken it to just the degree you like. Just before serving you quickly sauté the cubed meat, using the highest heat possible (to avoid cooking the meat all the way through while still browning it), let the meat cool (without stacking it which would cause it to steam) and then reheat it in the sauce just before serving. The magic of such dishes is that your guests are expecting a stew but then bite into rare red meat.

Most of us assume a hare is just a big rabbit. This is not the case at all as hare, which is very large relative to rabbit, has red meat instead of white and a full gamey and very distinct flavor. It appears on menus in France during the fall, but rarely in the United States, in part, no doubt, because it’s illegal to buy food from hunters, at least for sale in restaurants. Hare is available in the United States (usually from Scotland) but it has been frozen. Frozen meat, while as flavorful as fresh, has the nasty habit of going from rare to well done in about 2 seconds.
While those not accustomed to game may find hare a little strong, for those of us who like it, it is one of nature’s great treasures. The legs can be braised (they tend to be tough but can contribute to the sauce) but the saddle (see under rabbit for more about the anatomy which is similar) should be roasted rare. It can be boned in the same way as a rabbit saddle (see page 000) and stuffed or not with all sorts of delicacies including foie gras and truffles.
Hare’s most famous interpretation is probably the civet, a stew finished at the end with the animal’s blood. An authentic coq au vin is an example of a civet.
My own approach to cooking hare is to bone the saddle (see under Rabbit, page 000) and roast it (stuff it or not) quickly after braising the legs. I chop up the liver, combine it with any blood and an amount of butter equal to the size of the liver, and work the mixture through a strainer. When the saddle is roasted, I whisk some of the braising liquid from the legs into the giblet butter and then return this mixture back to the pan of braising liquid. I heat but don’t allow the sauce to reach to the simmer. I slice the saddle and serve the sauce on top or, if I’m presenting the whole thing at the table (a rather dramatic sight), I’ll sauce the whole saddle on a platter.
Hare is available frozen (the sale of fresh authentic game is illegal in the U.S.) from Scotland. It is sold by purveyors of fine poultry products.

While few foods are as prosaic as carrots, it’s hard to imagine cooking without them. They are part of the standard aromatic collection of vegetables that are traditionally added to stews, soups, and braises.
They’re included here because I have a couple of tips and a few things to look out for. First, never boil carrots in a large pot of water or you’ll leach out their natural sugars and flavor. It’s better to slice them and cook the slices in a pan with enough water to come about halfway up the sides. Traditionally the carrots are cooked covered with a round sheet of parchment paper. The idea behind the paper is to allow the braising liquid to evaporate but still ensure that those carrots not submerged in water will steam. You can also use a sheet of aluminum foil. It’s easier, however, to simply partially cover the pan and adjust it, moving it off or on, according to how the carrots are cooking. The goal is to get the liquid to evaporate at the same time the carrots are done. If they seem done, but there is still water in the pan, remove the lid and turn up the heat. If the carrots are hard and there’s very little liquid left, consider adding more water and cooking them completely or barely covered. When the carrots are done, you can serve them as is (add a little butter) or sprinkle them with herbs such as parsley or chervil.
It can get boring to always cook carrots sliced. In classic French kitchens, carrots are often “turned” into football shapes before they are braised (or more properly “glazed,” see 000) or roasted. The advantage to turning the carrots, other than rendering them decorative, is so they roll around in the pan a little bit when the pan is shaken. This helps them to cook evenly. The downside is the labor involved and the fact that turning takes a certain amount of practice and skill. Also, the best part of the carrot, the deep orange outer part, is discarded with the trimmings.
A better system is to cut the peeled carrot into 1-inch or so sections, cut the sections into wedges—they’ll yield different numbers of wedges depending on their thickness—and then use a paring knife to snap the woody central core out of each of the wedges and discard it or put it in the stock pot.

To the gastronome, these mouthful-size birds are likely to be known by their French name, ortolans. While hunting or capturing them is now illegal, a few manage to make their way to the tables of certain legendary restaurants.
What makes them particularly interesting is the way they are eaten. They are prized for their aroma and flavor and for the impression of bursting fat that occurs in the mouth as one bites into them. However, one is cautioned to chew very thoroughly to capture the essence of the poor little creature. Best of all, while chewing on a bunting, one is supposed to put one’s napkin over one’s face so it hangs down in front of the face in a way that captures the aroma of the bird. The idea is that not a whiff of its perfume be lost. During my one ortolan meal, in a restaurant in Manhattan, I could barely repress a giggle as groups of very serious looking patrons sat around, bent over their plates, with their napkins over their heads.
In my own experience (which, admittedly is limited), ortolans are always served plain, roasted in an intensely hot oven or spit and eaten whole, bones, innards (they’re not gutted), and all. If you ever get your hands on one, serve your best Burgundy.

At it’s most basic, a broth is simply the result of cooking meat, vegetables, or seafood in water. Broth is either white or brown depending on whether the meat and/or other ingredients are first browned.
Broth is ultimately simple to make, but there are a few dos and don’ts. First, don’t add too much water to the solid ingredients—add just enough to cover and if the liquid evaporates some during the cooking, you can add a little water as the cooking progresses. Don’t worry about making the broth too strong as you can always water it down if needed. If it starts out too weak, you’ll have to reduce it to concentrate it. Second, always start out with cold liquid. If the liquid is initially hot, proteins will release liquid containing dissolved albumin. This albumin will hit the hot liquid and coagulate into a very fine cloud that is hard to eliminate. If, on the other hand, you start out with cold water, the albumin is released more slowly and has a chance to tangle up with itself and rise to the top of the pot as froth, which can be skimmed off. Third, broth should never be allowed to boil. If it is, fats and froth that would normally float to the top, get churned back in and make the broth cloudy and greasy. Fourth, the broth should be more or less constantly skimmed to eliminate coagulated proteins and fat that float to the top.
Why is it, that despite taking these precautions, our broth sometimes ends up cloudy? You’ll probably notice this happens less often with brown broth (broth for which the proteins and vegetables are first browned) than with white broth. This is because the browning process coagulates the proteins before liquid is added. When making white broth with veal, be sure to blanch the meat or bones before adding liquid. This gets rid of the albumin and does nothing to eliminate savor. Chicken is different. When making chicken broth with meat, the broth should end up perfectly clear whether the chicken has been cooked first or not—the only advantage to first browning it is for color and a more pronounced savor. If you’re making chicken broth with bones alone, the broth will be cloudy because it didn’t contain enough protein to clarify it.
Broth can be cooked anywhere from 20 minutes (fish broth) to 12 hours (veal bone broth) depending on how long the components in the ingredients take to dissolve in the hot liquid. When cooking knuckle bones (the best providers of gelatin), allow at least 12 hours for the gelatin to render. When cooking meat such as beef or veal, the meat usually gives its all in 6 hours or so; when cooking chicken, allow about 3 hours.
Since the process of simmering meats or fish is expensive, it sometimes makes sense to time your broth-making with your meals. In other words, if you need beef broth, make a pot-au-feu (see page 000) and serve just the meat.
One last tip. When cooling broth, don’t use up all your ice by immediately plunging the hot pot into an ice bath (or by plunging a plastic bag full of ice into the stock pot) but rather let the broth cool at room temperature until it reaches the “danger zone”, about 140 degrees. At this point you should start icing to take it below the lower part of the danger zone (about 60 degrees) before putting it in the fridge.