Talleyrand's nonsense
Sir: I disagree with Jennifer Paterson's recipe for Cockaleekie, the Scottish national dish (Food, 26 April).
The boiling fowl should not be cut up and browned in butter as she directs, nor should the leeks be fried and then cooked with the fowl 'in 21/2 quarts of beef or veal stock'. The bird is left whole and simmered in water with seasoning, and a later addi- tion of leeks, for two hours or more. It is then served whole as a main dish with an egg sauce poured over it and is sometimes garnished with poached eggs as well. It is the resulting chicken stock which makes the famous broth. Sometimes stewed prunes are added to this, or served separ- ately as a compote. Jennifer Paterson disapproves of the prunes, apparently because they were 'sev- erely criticised by Talleyrand'. But what did he know of traditional Scottish cook- ing? After all, it was Talleyrand who declared that though the English have 360 religions they have only one sauce, while the French have 360 sauces and only one religion (disregarding the Edict of Nantes). Of course like so many statesman he was talking nonsense, though this has not stopped people quoting him ever since. My own collection of early cookery books shows that we then had at least a score of first-rate English sauces. There was an excellent currant sauce for roast pork, a sorrel sauce for duckling, a lemon and liver sauce for poultry, and one made with cucumbers for roast mutton which I find very good indeed.
I do not find it necessary to go for guidance to a man whom Napoleon des- cribed as 'shit in silk stockings'.
Sheila Hutchins
Cookery Editor,
Daily Express, Fleet Street, London EC4
Previous page
