French · Lyon · main

Quenelles de Brochet, Sauce Nantua

Name: Quenelles de Brochet, Sauce Nantua
Prep time: 1 h 28 min
Total time: 3 h 28 min
Cuisine: French · Lyon
Ingredients: skinless pike fillet — 400 g; regular milk — 250 g; all-purpose flour — 125 g; unsalted butter — 100 g; eggs — 150 g; egg whites — 200 g; beef kidney suet — 120 g; salt — 5 g; white pepper — 3 g; nutmeg — 1 g; crayfish — 500 g; unsalted butter — 150 g; carrot — 80 g; shallot — 40 g; brandy — 60 g; dry white wine — 150 g; all-purpose flour — 30 g; regular milk — 300 g; heavy cream — 200 g; tomato paste — 30 g; gruyere — 40 g

Quenelles de Brochet, Sauce Nantua reads richness 6.9, umami 5.9 and salinity 4.1 on Palate's 0–10 flavor X-ray — a French · Lyon main, about 3 hr 28 min. Measured from the recipe itself: ingredients and technique.

The flavor X-ray — six axes, 0–10

Umami & Savory — 6.9 / 10
Sweet & Fruity — 4.0 / 10
Sour & Bright — 3.3 / 10
Bitter & Earthy — 1.5 / 10
Rich & Fat — 7.8 / 10
Aromatic & Spice — 2.4 / 10

The measured notes (of 18)

Richness 6.9 · Umami 5.9 · Salinity 4.1 · Marine & Briny 3.5 · Sweetness 3.2 · Nutty 3.1 · Fruity 2.8 · Sourness 2.6 · Citrus 2.3 · Funk & Ferment 2.2 · Allium 2.1 · Floral 1.5 · Earthy 1.4 · Warm Spice 1.1 · Herbaceous 1.1 · Bitterness 0.7 · Heat 0.6

What's in it (21)

skinless pike fillet — 400 g
regular milk — 250 g
all-purpose flour — 125 g
unsalted butter — 100 g
eggs — 150 g
egg whites — 200 g
beef kidney suet — 120 g
salt — 5 g
white pepper — 3 g
nutmeg — 1 g
crayfish — 500 g
unsalted butter — 150 g
carrot — 80 g
shallot — 40 g
brandy — 60 g
dry white wine — 150 g
all-purpose flour — 30 g
regular milk — 300 g
heavy cream — 200 g
tomato paste — 30 g
gruyere — 40 g

Time & effort: about 3 hr 28 min (1 hr 28 min active) · effort: involved

Nutrition (per 100 g, engine-estimated): 152.4 kcal, 11.9 g protein, 10.7 g fat, 15.2 g carbs

Dietary: Contains meat · Contains seafood · Contains dairy · Contains egg — engine-derived; double-check anything allergy-critical.

How it's cooked (9 steps)

Make the panade first. Bring the milk, the 100 g of butter and half the salt to a full boil, tip in the flour all at once and beat hard with a wooden spoon. Keep it over medium heat and keep beating for 3 to 4 minutes, until the paste comes away from the sides in one lump and leaves a dry film on the base of the pan. That drying step is what stops the quenelles collapsing. Spread it on a plate and chill it thoroughly.
Purée the cold pike in a food processor until it is completely smooth, then add the cold panade in pieces, then the suet, then the eggs and whites one at a time. Everything must stay cold; if the bowl warms, the fat smears instead of dispersing and the quenelles will be heavy. Season with the rest of the salt, the pepper and the nutmeg, pass the mixture through a drum sieve if you want the classic silken texture, and chill it 2 hours.
Test before you commit. Shape one quenelle with two wet dessert spoons and poach it in barely shivering salted water at about 80°C for 12 minutes. It should swell to nearly double and feel springy, not rubbery and not weeping. If it falls apart, beat another white into the mix; if it is dense, beat in a spoonful of cold cream.
Shape the rest and poach them in a wide pan of water held at 80°C — a surface that trembles without a single bubble — for 15 to 18 minutes, turning them once. Lift them onto a cloth to drain and cool. They can sit a day in the fridge at this point and are arguably better for it.
For the crayfish butter, sauté the crayfish and the diced carrot and shallot in 2 tablespoons of the 150 g of butter over high heat for 4 minutes, until the shells turn scarlet. Warm the Cognac, add it and let it flame out, then pour in the white wine and simmer 10 minutes.
Pound the whole lot — shells and all — in a mortar or blitz it hard, work in the remaining soft butter, then press it through a fine sieve with real force. What comes through is a coral-coloured butter and it is the entire flavour of the sauce; the shells left behind should be dry.
Make a white béchamel with the 30 g of flour, an equal weight of the crayfish butter and the 300 ml of milk, cooking the roux 2 minutes to a blond sandy paste before adding the milk. Simmer 10 minutes, then stir in the cream and tomato paste and reduce until it is nappe — it should coat a spoon and hold a drawn line. Whisk in the rest of the crayfish butter off the heat, in pieces, and do not let it boil again or the emulsion will break and go oily.
Lay the quenelles in a buttered gratin dish, spoon the sauce over, scatter the Comté and bake at 200°C (400°F) for 15 minutes. They puff up as they heat; serve them the moment they do, because they subside within a few minutes.
Substitutions: unsalted butter can stand in for the beef kidney suet; whole shell-on prawns can stand in for the raw crayfish; Aligoté can stand in for the dry white wine.

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Every number above is Palate's engine-measured estimate, computed from this recipe's ingredients and techniques — not human-tasted ratings or reviews.