(1968). Pigeons With Crawfish (Pigeons Aux Ecrevisses)

Cook some small crawfish with salt, white wine and parsley; break off the tails and suppress their shells in order to be able to pare them, chop up the fragments and add them to a little bread forcemeat finished with fine herbs and egg-yolks. Break the breastbones of two or three pigeons so as to remove the bone, fill up the empty space with the prepared forcemeat, truss and braise them with very little moisture, then strain off the stock, free it of fat and add to it a few spoonfuls of the crawfish stock, thickening with raw egg-yolks diluted with cream, then put in the crawfish tails, untruss the pigeons, dish them and pour the sauce over.

(1969). Pigeons With Green Peas (Pigeons Aux Petits Pois)

Truss six pigeons as for an entree (No. 178), returning the livers to their original place, Melt some chopped fat pork in a saucepan, add to it a quarter of a pound of small five-eighths inch squares of bacon and fry for a few moments, then remove them with a skimmer. Put the pigeons into this saucepan with five or six small onions for each bird, brown slightly and slowly, then add one and a half quarts of green peas, a bunch of parsley and the bacon. Two minutes later moisten with two gills of stock (No. 194a), boil for five minutes and withdraw the saucepan to a slower fire, push into the oven, and finish cooking the peas and pigeons, then drain out the birds, untruss and dress them on a dish; thicken the peas with kneaded butter (No. 579), and place them around the pigeons.

(1970). Pigeons With Olives-Breasts (Filets De Pigeons Aux Olives)

This entree is dressed in the hollow of a cooked paste border (No. 10) cut into points and open-worked with a pastry cutter. The band intended for making the border should be cut out on a floured table as soon as it has been rolled; fasten it on a dish a quarter of an inch from the inside edge, spreading it slightly; egg it over with a brush and dry for a few hours. After this paste is dried, lay inside of it a wooden foundation covered with more of the same paste rolled out thin. Besides this, prepare a little raw chicken forcemeat (No. 89) mixed with an equal quantity of baked liver forcemeat (No. 80) pounded and passed through a tammy. Poach this forcemeat in a pyramidieal mold rounded and smooth an inch and a half high, placed in a bain-marie; unmold this pyramid in the center of the dish, for it is intended to uphold the entree. Select a few dozen of the finest and largest Spanish olives procurable; stone and blanch them to stuff with foies-gras forcemeat (No. 78). Singe six young but large pigeons quite fleshy, fill the breasts with a spoonful of grated fat pork and fresh chopped truffle peelings; truss and cover with fat pork, then cook in some good stock; as soon as done remove to untruss; detach the breasts from the back, remove the two fillets from both breasts, sup. press the skin, pare and take off the minions.

Lay the six fillets from the left side in a small sautoir, mask them with a little espagnole sauce (No. 414) reduced with the pigeon stock and Madeira; cover and keep them hot. Pare the other six fillets, mask them also on the inside with a layer of baking forcemeat thickened with a little raw forcemeat, smooth well, and range these fillets in another small sautoir having a little half-glaze on the bottom to heat the forcemeat; warm it while glazing over with a brush. At the last moment unmold the pyramid, lay the fillets around alternating them, and all turned in the same direction standing almost upright. Dress a part of the olives in the center space formed by the circle on top of the pyramid, and range the others around the open-worked border. Cover the fillets lightly with the sauce, also the garnishings and serve more separately.

Fig,. 380.