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Chicken Salad with Mayonnaise Sauce

A historical recipe from Margaret Brown's French Cookery Book, by Margaret Brown (1886).

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A historical recipe

Margaret Brown's French Cookery Book, by Margaret Brown (1886). Project Gutenberg eBook #44915.

From an old book: a historical recipe, not current advice. Its methods, additives and storage may be unsafe by today's standards. Its words name: raw egg. Check current food-safety guidance before following this.

France

Known as a French recipe, with similar versions prepared across other nations.

  • Raw egg. Raw or lightly cooked egg carries a risk, above all for children, older people, anyone pregnant or unwell.

Ingredients 7 ingredients

  1. a teacupful of sweet oil
  2. 1/4 teacupful of vinegar
  3. half teaspoonful of red pepper
  4. 1 teaspoonful of mustard
  5. half pints of olive oil
  6. three heads of lettuce
  7. 2 yolks

Cook safely

Keep children and pets away from the hob and the oven, and keep oven gloves and a lid within reach.

  • Boiling water and steam. Turn pan handles inward, away from the edge of the hob. Lift lids away from you, and pour hot water away from your body: steam burns too.
  • Sharp knives. Cut on a board that doesn't slip (a damp cloth under it helps), and curl the fingers of the hand that holds the food.

Method

  1. One pair of chickens, boil them done;
  2. let get cold, skin them, and cut up in small dices;
  3. 2 dozen stalks of celery;
  4. cut up 4 white heads of lettuce, medium size;
  5. 1 of the white hard heads must be cut up with the celery and chicken.
  6. Take a teacupful of sweet oil, 1/4 teacupful of vinegar, a light half teaspoonful of red pepper, salt to taste, 1 teaspoonful of mustard, 1 medium-sized tablespoonful Worcestershire sauce;
  7. mix that all up together with the chicken and celery;
  8. let the celery be perfectly dry.
  9. Take a medium-sized Irish potato, boil it done, squeeze it through a fine sieve;
  10. put in it a teaspoonful of mustard, cayenne pepper to taste, 2 yolks of raw eggs and 2 boiled ones mashed up very fine.
  11. Now beat the potatoes and eggs well up together, add half teacupful of vinegar, a little at a time, and the contents of 3 half pints of olive oil;
  12. work it one way till it becomes perfectly stiff and light;
  13. put it in ice-box 1 hour and let get cold.
  14. When you dish up put salad on dish, put the sweet oil dressing all over the top as an icing.
  15. Boil red beets and carrots, cut them into diamonds, roses, etc., and garnish the salad with it and sprigs of parsley;
  16. take the other three heads of lettuce, cut in four quarters, take one-quarter and put in center of salad, and put the others around the dish with parsley.

Plating

Cookware for this recipe

  • Saucepan
  • Chef's knife
  • Sieve
Source Public domain in the USA
Credit

From Margaret Brown's French Cookery Book, by Margaret Brown (1886). Digitised by Project Gutenberg, eBook #44915 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44915). Public domain in the USA; its status may differ elsewhere.

What was changed: As printed, from the book's text; Project Gutenberg's header and licence removed. Ingredient lines were read out of the text by a program. A historical recipe, not current advice.