1480 | Chicken Fritot à la Villeroi.
—Procure two fine Philadelphia chickens weighing from two to two and a half pounds each. Singe, draw, wash, and wipe well. Cut off the two legs from each chicken, then carefully cut off the breast on both sides of each chicken, leaving the small fillets attached to the breast-bone; entirely cut away the breast-bone of each chicken, then cut both breasts in half, cross-wise. Make a light incision on the joint of each leg, take out the small bone from the first to the second joint, which will easily detach, cut off the feet. Nicely pare all; and place them on a dish. Place the carcases in a saucepan with all the small bones and parings, scald the feet in boiling water for three minutes; remove, pick off the skin, which can be easily done, and return them to the saucepan; lay the rest of the chickens on top of this, pour in two quarts of fresh water, place the pan on the range and let just come to a boil; then thoroughly skim. Season with one tablespoonful of salt. Now with a skimmer take up the breasts, legs, wings, and fillets; lay them on a dish to cool off. Add to the broth six whole peppers, two cloves, one bay-leaf, one sprig of thyme, very little nutmeg, one medium-sized, scraped carrot, cut into four pieces, and one small, sound onion; then let boil for twenty minutes without covering the pan. Place in a saucepan four heaped tablespoonfuls of good butter, and eight tablespoonfuls of flour; thoroughly mix together; place on the range, and cook very slowly for ten minutes, without browning, stirring once in a while. Strain the broth into a bowl, and then very gradually add to the flour, sharply and continually stirring meanwhile; let slowly boil on the corner of the range for twelve minutes. Have in a bowl the yolks of three eggs and the juice of one good, sound lemon; mix well together. Remove the sauce from the range, add to the eggs a ladleful of sauce, little by little, stirring briskly meanwhile.
Now add the eggs to the saucepan, place it on the range again, briskly stirring until it comes to a boil. Remove it from the fire, strain through a fine sieve into another saucepan.
Have a flat pan with fresh bread-crumbs at the bottom, dip one by one the pieces of chicken in the sauce, then lay them in the pan over the bread-crumbs, side by side; lightly sprinkle a little bread-crumbs over, and let cool off five minutes. Then steep each piece in beaten egg, then fresh bread-crumbs; fry them in hot fat for eight minutes, or until they have obtained a good golden color. Remove and thoroughly drain them. Have a hot serving-dish with a folded napkin; nicely dress the pieces over, decorate the dish all around with two sound lemons cut in quarters, and a little parsley greens. Add to the sauce in the pan a gill of sweet cream; heat up without boiling, pour it into a sauce bowl, and send all to the table.