Sauté-Type

Name: Sauté-Type (Sauté-modèle)
Yield: Servings: 4
Cuisine: French
Ingredients: Salt, pepper; About 3 tablespoons flour; Small amount Cognac or other eau de vie: marc, Armagnac, Calvados, etc.; Healthy pinch finely crumbled dried herbs (thyme, oregano, savory); Plus a choice of leek greens, oregano, savory, marjoram, lovage; Stock or bouillon; Chopped fines herbes (tarragon does not mix well with herbs other than parsley, chives, and chervil, but it may be used alone, discreetly, and is more interesting with white meats; it also goes well with tomatoed sauces), fresh basil flowers and leaves torn to fragments, finely chopped fresh marjoram flowers and leaves, small amount of finely chopped tender young savory (best mixed with parsley); 8 ounces small mushrooms (or halved or quartered if larger), rapidly sautéed, salted, in butter over high heat; Thyme, bay leaf, parsley (including root, if possible), branch of celery . . .; 2 tablespoons olive oil; Croutons, cooked gently in butter, tossed often, until golden and crisp but not hard; they may be tossed at the last minute over a higher flame with a persillade—finely chopped or pounded garlic mixed with chopped parsley. For a formal presentation, the stew meats are presented on a heated platter, sauce and other garnish poured over, and the croutons are fashioned—2 or 3 to a slice—from thin slices of bread, in the form of triangles, a clove of garlic rubbed over each crisp triangle, a point of each dipped first in sauce, then in chopped parsley, and arranged, crown-like, parsleyed tips pointing out, around the edge of the platter; The carrots from the stew—or 5 or 6 ounces peeled small carrots (or carrot sections) cooked with ¼ cup water, salt, pinch sugar, 1 tablespoon butter until tender and glazed, all liquid evaporated; Parsley, bay leaf, thyme (or mixed herbs); Tiny new potatoes, scraped, rinsed, wiped dry, cooked gently, salted, in butter, tossed often, until tender but not browned; Garlic (same as in marinade—or the equivalent if meats not marinated); or 1 large frying chicken (or 5 or 6 thighs and drumsticks, attached or separated as preferred: 30 to 40 minutes from time of moistening); or 2½ pounds lamb shank (1½ to 2 hours from moistening); Tender artichoke hearts, whole, halved, or quartered, depending on size, stewed, salted, in butter until only just tender; Green vegetables (peas, beans, peeled broad beans), rapidly parboiled; 2 ounces fresh fat pork (impractical with poultry), cut into strips about 1 inch long by something less than ¼ inch square; About 5 ounces lean salt pork cut into lardons (⅓-inch widths cut from thick slices), parboiled for a minute or two, rinsed, drained, and cooked until superficially crisp with carrots and onions at the beginning, then put aside to be added with other garnish later on; or 2 pounds boned veal shank (about 1½ hours); ½ teaspoon (or less) sugar (particularly useful in the presence of tomato); 8 ounces carrots, peeled, split if large, cut into 1-inch lengths; 1 clove garlic, peeled; Cider; 1 medium onion, finely sliced; or 1 rabbit (see rabbit sautés for method of cutting up: 30 to 40 minutes from moistening); 1 tablespoon finely chopped parsley; 8 ounces onions, peeled, coarsely cut up

Sauté-modèle

Preparation info

Servings:
4

Difficulty
Easy

Appears in

Simple French Food

By Richard Olney

Published 1974

About

Ingredients

Basics

2 pounds beef heel or chuck, cut into approximately 3-ounce pieces (count 1½ to 3 hours cooking from time of moistening)
or

Europe
France
Main course
Mediterranean

Method

The strips of fat pork, rolled and tossed until well coated in the mixture of garlic, herbs, and seasoning, are each forced with one’s finger into a deep, narrow incision pierced with the grain of the meat using a small knife; depending on the size and the structure of each piece of meat, it may receive one, two, or three lardons. The double purpose of seasoning interiorly, forming tiny pockets