French cooking, pre-Julia Child

I read that once upon a time Julia Child, after developing a vinaigrette recipe to perfection, learned the same recipe was in Ali-Bab's book written in 1907. Child took the high road. If the recipe was in Ali-Bab, she said, then she wouldn't use it.

A French cook named Ali-Bab? I googled it and came up with a lot of Turkish Restaurants. It took some more digging to find the book and its true name: Encyclopedia of Practical Gastronomy. The book was translated to English in 1974, which explains the faux-retro look of the cover. (In the 70s, we loved sepia.) Not that I knew anything about it then. I bought a used copy off e-bay, out of curiosity.

Ali-Bab is the pen-name of a French geologist born in 1855, whose real name was Henri Babinski. (Further trivia -- his brother was Dr. Joseph Babinski, who made history by discovering a reflex, which is now called the "Babinski sign.")

During his mining career, the geologist Babinski traveled extensively to far-flung locations and spent a lot of time in mining camps. After a hard day mining, nobody wants to come in to an inferior camp meal, and why should they? Babinski developed his cooking techniques over time, and he learned from other camp cooks in the regions where he traveled.

When he retired back to Paris, he put down his thoughts about cooking, resulting in a rambling treatise covering everything he either knew (or at least believed) about the history of cooking and differences between countries and their cuisines. The "encyclopedia" is fun to read, partly because it's antique and partly because it's just plain weird.

For example: "Prehistoric man ate mostly standing up, in haste, pursued by his peers and by wild animals, both of whom were always ready to snatch away his food."

I have owned the book for about three years but never tried any of the recipes.

Until now!

It turns out everything basic about French cooking is really, truly, here in this book-- author's eccentricities aside. French onion soup, with variations. Sole meuniere (can't even find that in Julia Child, even though it was supposedly her grand awakening to food.)

I chose to take on Sole au Vin Blanc, Sauce A La Creme.

The fun begins when you realize you get to add 3/4 cup wine to the sauce. To celebrate, I chose a French blancs de blancs (because Chardonnay would be wrong).

Vieux Papes, (Old Popes!), a bargain at $7.99.

For the heck of it, I added a liberal splash of Vieux Papes to the water for steaming the carrots too. It's a good thing -- the outcome, I mean. Very tasty.

The recipe calls for crayfish (same as crawfish) but Whole Foods didn't have any (maybe too early for the season?) No crawfish, what a relief! Oops I mean -- what a shame! 

And so I bought shrimp instead.


 First, you layer the sole, casserole style, with salt, pepper and parsley. (How much salt and pepper? He doesn't say. See recipe below.)

Bake this for 20 minutes. At what temperature? Monsieur -Bab declines to comment. So I guessed, eh, 350 degrees. Antique recipes are charming like that.

Buttering parchment paper, to cover the casserole

Also, apparently they didn't cover casseroles with aluminum foil, so you get to butter parchment paper, if you have some hanging around that you hardly ever use, like I do.

Shallots, to sautee with mushrooms

 
While the fish bakes, chop your shallots and your mushroom stems, then dip them in lemon juice.

Dipping mushroom caps in lemon juice

After 20 minutes, remove the casserole from the oven, add the sauteed vegetables, and bake for another 10 minutes (I upped the temperature to 375, because 350 didn't seem like enough umph.)

And when it comes out of the oven, add the cream. La voila! (Is a casserole feminine?)

 

 Results:  Very delicate, and delicious. The shrimp are pretty but maybe not flavorful enough, so next time I'll either use crawfish or something with a little more flavor. And I'll be more liberal with the salt and pepper. (Since he didn't specify the amount, I have only myself to blame.)