French cuisine has a special delicate taste. Sometimes an unexpected combination of ingredients gives rise to a truly memorable, original work of culinary art. When getting to know the cuisine of France, it is worth considering the dishes by studying each region separately.
But this dish is served in every part of it. The name of the consommé is elegant and the taste is delicate. You can’t help but be transported to France of the last century, where this dish is especially popular among restaurant orders.
His story takes us to France in the eighteenth century. For the warring French army, a competition was announced for the best preparation of a dish stored both at home and in military situations.
The Parisian chef won, proving that if you pour juice into a boiled bottle and close the lid tightly, it will not spoil. The first dish sent to the military was chicken broth, with a lot of salt added. It was pre-cooked for several hours. The name consommé has become synonymous for many with a strong, nutritious clear broth. It cools and thickens. Becomes like jelly. Then they started adding seasonings and vegetables.
The different traditions of serving the dish are interesting for historians and the common man. Traditionally, the French eat the broth very hot, accompanied by crispy toasted bread. But in Russia it was served during the reign of Empress Catherine, but certainly with ham. Many Russian restaurants of those years served it in cups.
List of required ingredients
The classic consommé recipe involves using either chicken or beef. Many restaurants make it based on game. Taken:
high-quality chicken meat and bones (0.5 kg);
one carrot (1 piece);
medium onion (1 piece);
egg whites (2 pcs);
a small bunch of parsley;
parsnip rhizome (80 g);
salt (half a teaspoon);
bay leaves (1-2 pcs);
three peas of black pepper.
Step-by-step preparation of the dish.
First you need to separate the chicken skin from the meat part. Country chicken or regular chicken (store-bought) will do. You can take parts of thighs, a soup set - the main thing is that there are bones. Place the chicken on foil.
Then we transfer it all onto a baking sheet. Bake in the oven for 20 minutes at 200 degrees. Why bake before boiling? To obtain a golden color in the broth.
After we take the chicken out of the oven, place the carcass in a deep saucepan (saucepan) and add it to the water. The main thing is that the chicken is covered with water. Together with the chicken, put the fat (juice from roasting) into the pan. Add vegetables and roots to the chicken. Place on medium heat and leave until boiling. Then remove the foam and add salt. Cook over low heat for 120 minutes.
After this, remove the broth from the heat and strain from the bones and pieces of chicken meat. The liquid will be somewhat cloudy, don’t be alarmed. After straining, pour the resulting broth back into the pan to allow to cool. Beat the whites with a fork, but not too much. For each glass of broth, which is 250 ml, take one protein.
Our soup and the base for clarifying the broth in the form of proteins are mixed together in a saucepan and placed on low heat. Then pour the clear broth into plates, cups, and broth bowls. The recipes in the photo show a beautiful yellow clear liquid. You should get a similar consistency and color. The broth is eaten both cold and hot.
Important: when reheating the consommé, do not bring it to a boil. As an addition, fry croutons, stew vegetables or serve a poached egg.
- Ingredients for broth:
- beef pulp on the bone - 800 g;
- water – 2.5-3 l;
- onion – 1 piece;
- carrots – 1 piece;
- parsley root - 1 piece.
- Ingredients for the pull:
- minced beef – 250-300 g;
- chicken egg (white) – 1 piece;
- beef broth – 200-250 ml.
- Preparation time: 03:40
- Cooking time: 00:10
- Number of servings: 6
- Complexity: light
Preparation
Let's cook and lighten the consommé according to the classic recipe, and then consider a few more variations of its presentation.
Making beef broth
Preparing consommé
While the word “consommé” will still seem strange and unfamiliar to many, most people who are interested in cooking know very well that this is an ordinary broth, only clarified. Like any other dish, its preparation has a classic recipe (from minced chicken or beef) and many variations when the broth is prepared on a vegetable or fruit basis (beets, asparagus, oranges are often used). 
The concept of “consommé” came to us from France; it first appeared in the 16th century. There are two versions of the origin of this word. According to the first, the basis of “consommé” is the phrase “cook for a long time”; according to the second version, the verb “to absorb”, which was transformed into the culinary concept of “rich”. Having gone through a long journey (almost five centuries), consommé has turned into a heavily salted strong broth, which is served with a pie.
Nutritionists in many countries are arguing among themselves about the harm of this dish. Due to the fact that it is very rich, the human body accumulates excess cholesterol. However, this only harms those who consume such broth too often. Moreover, if you use lean meat or chicken breast to prepare consommé, it may well pass for a dietary dish.
Cooking consommé is practically no different from preparing regular broths; roots, onions and carrots are added in the same way. Its only difference is double boiling. After this, a clarifying mass is prepared, which turns the broth into consommé.
Egg whites are used for clarification. They are pre-beaten, mixed with minced meat (culinarians call such a mass a pull-off), sent to a boiling broth, boiled and filtered again. 
That is, the whole cooking process is incredibly simple - bring to a boil, remove, strain (thereby removing excess fat), boil again and clarify. The base for the consommé is ready, and then everything depends on the recipe and personal taste preferences. For example, you can serve it with meatballs with the addition of boiled roots, carrots and green beans; the first dish will turn out very tasty and festively beautiful.
And to make it elegant in French, let's talk about how consommé is served and what it is eaten with.
How to submit?
It seems that there are no special difficulties in preparing consommé, however, we had to tinker with it, cook the broth, strain it, and strain it. So this dish is unlikely to be an everyday dish; most often it is prepared for some special family dinners. Therefore, you need to serve it beautifully, use appropriate dishes (soup plates from the service or broth cups). It is desirable that the dishes be snow-white, then sunlight will penetrate into the broth and emphasize all its beauty and transparency.
In some restaurants it has become fashionable to serve consommé in glassware (glasses or even wine glasses).
Often, soup side dishes are placed in the clarified broth, that is, ready-made products that serve to diversify the serving of consommé. Of course, they should look beautiful too. For example, if carrots are used, they can be cut into gears or stars. Since the French invented consommé, they also invented soup side dishes to serve it:
- "Caroline." These are specially fried pancakes cut into very thin strips.
- "Brunoise". This variation uses celery and leek stalks. They need to be cut into thin strips and lightly fried in a dry frying pan.
- Poached eggs.
- Fried or boiled mushrooms.
- Ready-made pasta.
- Meatballs.
- Most often, consommé is served with profiteroles (as shown in the photo above). This is a small pastry made from choux pastry.
As a rule, soup side dishes are served on a separate dish and everyone puts them in their own portion as desired. Be sure to serve chopped fresh herbs (basil, parsley, dill, oregano) with the consommé and soup side dish.
Consomme (consomme, French) is a heavily boiled, very strong and fairly salty broth made from meat or game, boiled on the bones, seasoned with spices and clarified in a special way. In the classic version, consommé is prepared using beef or chicken broth. When cooled, consommé may turn into a jelly.
From the history of the dishAt one time, it was this property that determined the popularity of consommé - the first canned food for Napoleonic troops was prepared with consommé filling. Thick vegetable stew, thick meat soups, and boiled beans were preserved in this way. Before the October Revolution, consommé was quite popular in Russia (there are mentions in the works of classic literature). It is interesting that the spread in Russia began much earlier than the Patriotic War of 1812. During the reign of Catherine II the Great, many French chefs worked in Russia, preparing food according to recipes existing in their national culinary traditions. In many Russian restaurants it was very popular to prepare and serve consommé with profiteroles and ham. Typically, consommé soup was served hot in bouillon (soup cups) with slices of still warm, lightly toasted bread.
How to prepare consommé?
Consommé is prepared from beef (veal) or chicken, and sometimes from game.
Ingredients:
- 1 kg lean beef (or veal) with bones or 1 chicken;
- 1 onion;
- carrot;
- roots;
- peppercorns;
- Bay leaf;
- clove
Preparation:
The broth is boiled with bones and even paws in 2 liters of water with the remaining ingredients. From the well-cooked broth, carefully remove the fat floating on the surface with a spoon - you get an unclarified consommé. Next, to lighten the finished broth, strain it through a thick sieve into another saucepan. We put it on the fire, bring it to a boil and put a mixture of raw minced meat and egg whites into the pan (the whites act as a pull-off). When pieces of the mixture (meatballs, one might say) float to the surface, they are removed, after which the broth is filtered again. Next, it’s a matter of taste.
Consommé with egg
You can prepare, for example, poached consommé or Parisian egg consommé. Peeled celery, carrots, green peas or green beans are finely chopped, cauliflower is divided into small florets and boiled in pre-prepared consommé broth until tender. Immediately before serving, place a poached egg into each soup cup. Season with chopped herbs (parsley, rosemary, basil, coriander, but not dill!).
About the optionsIn modern versions, you can, of course, prepare consommé with fish, potatoes, noodles and other ingredients. In the French version, consommé broth is usually served with baguette croutons - they are immersed in a cup of broth, sprinkled with grated cheese and herbs.
Consommé with asparagus
You can prepare consommé with asparagus. Wash the veal bones and add cold salted water to the pan. Cook for about 
half an hour, removing noise and fat. Wash and peel the asparagus shoots. We tie them with chef's string and place this bundle in boiling bone broth. Boil for 10-15 minutes. Now you need to prepare minced meat from lean minced meat (beef, veal or chicken). Let's pass the meat through a meat grinder. Lightly season the minced meat with dry spices. Strain the broth twice. Cut the cooked asparagus shoots into pieces. Let's form meatballs from the minced meat - lower them into the boiling, strained broth. Add asparagus and 30 grams of natural butter. Immediately before serving, season generously with herbs and ground black pepper. You can put a slice of lemon in each cup. It is good to serve such a delicious dish with a glass of aperitif (dry sherry, for example).
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Consommé is a pleasure for the elite and those who understand something about cooking, because it is not for nothing that a properly prepared consommé is called by some the building block of the foundation of haute cuisine. Although in fact it is just an ordinary broth, a consommé prepared according to all the rules is akin to a small culinary feat. Consommé is best served at the beginning of a meal; it will stimulate the appetite without overloading the stomach, leaving room for subsequent dishes.
This broth, under its French name, entered the daily menu of Russian cuisine at the beginning of the 19th century, and according to French custom it was served in cups and with the obligatory addition of ham. “...In Moscow, until 1812, the custom of serving broth in cups before dinner, which was called consomme from the French word, was not yet known,” says P. A. Vyazemsky in his “Notebook.” “At an evening with Vasily Lvovich Pushkin ( uncle of the famous poet), who always loved to brag about innovations, served such a broth to the guests, according to custom, which he probably brought from St. Petersburg or Paris. I. I. Dmitriev, a famous poet and publicist, refused to drink it. Vasily Lvovich runs up to him and says: “Ivan Ivanovich, but this is consomme!” “I know,” Dmitriev answers, with some annoyance, “that this is not chamomile, but still I don’t want to drink...”
So, consommé is a clarified, salted, sometimes double-cooked broth. In classical cuisine, consommés made from chicken and beef broth are known. The so-called dish was born several centuries ago in the homes of ordinary peasants. In modern (restaurant) cuisine, consommé has evolved into a strong and heavily salted broth, served with a baked pie. On restaurant menus you can also find consommé not only made from meat, but also from asparagus, broccoli, beets, oranges and other vegetables and fruits.
Features of preparing consommé
1. Meat selection
Preparing consommé is incredibly interesting and simple. The main secret of a delicious consomme is a properly prepared broth. What is the key to a delicious broth? That's right - meat. It is best to prepare broth for consommé from fresh or chilled meat. If it turns out that you bought frozen meat, then you need to defrost it properly - in the refrigerator or after washing it in cold water, place it in a sealed container and leave it at room temperature for 2-3 hours. Do not defrost meat in water or in the microwave.
The best cuts for making a good consommé are the rump and the rump. There is no need to cut the meat before putting it in the pan, but it must be cleaned of films and tendons. An excellent broth is made from bones and tendons. To improve the taste of the broth, sometimes cooks prepare a double consommé. To do this, take twice as many meat products for the same amount of water as with the usual cooking method.
2. Cooking the broth
To properly prepare consommé, place the meat in a saucepan, add cold water and bring the contents to a boil over low heat. During the cooking process, meat juice is released in the form of foam, which must be removed with a spoon or slotted spoon. If this is not done, the foam will turn into flakes that will settle at the bottom of the pan. There’s nothing wrong with this, of course, but the appearance of the dish will suffer. Cook the meat until done, about 2 hours. Remember, to make your broth more fragrant and beautiful, you can use two secrets. Firstly, at the end of cooking, you can add a little clean onion peel or carrots cut in half to the broth. This will make the broth bright and take on a beautiful golden hue. And one more secret. You can add 1 tbsp to the broth. l. lemon juice, which will make the meat much softer and tastier.
Consomme is served hot or cold (consomme is cooled for three hours), often before meals. A few spoons of consommé will whet your appetite. If consommé is served as a first course, it is served with a side dish, which is laid out on a separate plate. Usually these are croutons or pastries, chopped herbs, fried onions, boiled vegetables.
Today, in addition to traditional recipes for preparing consomme, there are its varieties and exotic variations of this dish. For example, loret
- a type of vegetable consommé cooked in meat or chicken broth. Mushrooms and pieces of apples are often added to lorettes to enhance the taste. Navarin
- These are transparent consommés with crayfish tails and chopped herbs. Consommé a la Orleans
prepared with miniature quenelles of minced chicken, tapioca and spinach. Orange consommé is very popular in gourmet restaurants. To prepare it you will need 2 pieces of homemade chicken, 1 piece of protein, 3 pieces of cloves, 30 g of parsley, 500 g of beef, 2 l of beef broth, 350 g of chicken drumstick fillet, 45 g of celery, 500 g of orange. .
Fry the chicken carcasses in the oven. Finely chop the beef and chicken drumsticks. Pour broth into the pan. Add greens. Mix the meat with the protein, add to the boiling broth, cook for 30 minutes. Strain the broth. Wash oranges with hot water. Remove the zest from the oranges and squeeze out the juice. Pour the juice into the broth, add cloves and orange zest, and bring to a boil. Strain again. Refrigerate the consommé for 4 hours. When serving, place 2-3 orange slices along with the peel into plates.
To prepare beef consommé you will need: for the broth: 1.5 kg beef bones, 750 g beef for soup, 2 onions, 1/2 head garlic, 1 tsp salt, a pinch of sugar, 2 carrots, celery 150 g, leek 1/2 stalk, mushrooms 2 pcs., cloves 6 pcs., peppercorns 1 tbsp. l., parsley 1 bunch, ice water 6 l.
For dressing: lean beef 1 kg, carrots 150 g, celery 200 g, leek 1/2 stalk, egg whites 4 pcs., salt
To begin, the bones need to be washed, dried, placed on a baking sheet and placed in an oven preheated to 180 degrees for 20 minutes. At this time, cut the onion into two parts and dry each half in a dry frying pan. Place the bones and soup beef in a large saucepan, pour in 3 liters of ice water, bring to a boil, skim off the foam. Reduce the temperature and simmer over low heat for about 2 hours. Cut the vegetables into pieces and put them in the broth, pour in the remaining water, add spices, set the temperature to medium and cook for another 2 hours. After this, you need to remove the meat from the broth, strain the broth through a sieve and cool.
To season the broth, pass the meat and vegetables through a meat grinder. Lightly beat the egg whites and combine them with minced meat and vegetables, mix. Place this mass in the broth and slowly bring to a boil, stirring constantly and skimming off the foam. Strain the contents through a cloth. Heat the broth again and season with salt and pepper.
On a note!
Consommé is a very heavy dish. Due to the high content of animal fats - a source of cholesterol, consommé is contraindicated for people suffering from cardiovascular diseases, liver and pancreas diseases. Consommé is useful for old people and adolescents, people who are weak, tired, anemic, and exhausted by prolonged ARVI.
Step 1: prepare the meat.
Chicken fillet, rinse under running water, place on a cutting board, cut with a knife into pieces with an approximate diameter 4 by 4 centimeters, maybe a little more or less. Divide the total mass of meat into 2 parts, pass one of them through a fine meat grinder and place in a deep bowl.
Place the second portion of meat in a deep saucepan and fill with clean distilled water. Add to it black peppercorns, bay leaves, onions and carrots, previously peeled, washed under running water and cut into medium cubes with an approximate diameter 1 by 1 centimeter.
Step 2: cook the broth.
Place the pan with chicken meat and water on the stove, turned on to medium level, bring the mixture to a boil and turn the heat down to the lowest level. Cover the pan with a lid so that there is a gap through which steam will escape, and cook the broth until the meat is completely cooked for 1 hour. The fillet pieces cook quite quickly, so your broth can be cooked much sooner. When cooking broth, do not turn on the stove to a higher level! Step 3: prepare a mixture of vegetables and minced meat.
While the broth is cooking, prepare the vegetable and meat mixture. Using a knife, peel the celery root, the remaining onions and carrots, rinse under running water, place one at a time on a cutting board intended for vegetables and chop into small cubes with an approximate diameter up to 5 by 5 millimeters. Mix vegetables with minced chicken using a tablespoon until smooth. Place the shelled chicken eggs into a bowl and beat them until they form a yellow foam using a fork. Pour the eggs into the minced meat, add salt, and mix it thoroughly again with a tablespoon. Step 4: prepare the consommé.
Remove the boiled meat from the finished broth. Strain the broth into another clean, deep saucepan, place on the stove set to high, bring to a boil and turn the stove to medium. 
Very carefully, using a tablespoon, place the minced meat and vegetables into the pan with the broth. Mix the mixture with the broth with a kitchen wooden spatula in a circle, near the walls of the pan, until the slightly grayed minced meat rises. This will take approximately 25 – 30 minutes. As soon as the minced meat rises, immediately stop stirring the ingredients and screw the stove to the smallest level! 
In the middle of the risen minced meat, use a tablespoon to make a small hole and place pre-washed and dry sprigs of dill and parsley into it. Cook the total mass for 30 minutes over low heat, periodically making a small hole in the middle of the surfaced layer of minced meat, trying not to violate its integrity. Taste the broth and add salt if necessary. 
Through 30 minutes turn off the stove. Take a deep saucepan, place a fine sieve on its surface, and place sterile gauze or a paper filter on the bottom of the sieve. Using a ladle, carefully pour the consomme into the sieve and strain it, you should get a crystal clear broth. 
Pour the finished consommé into deep bowls or plates. Step 5: Serve the consommé.
Consommé is served hot, in deep plates or bowls. Sometimes this French dish is complemented with pancakes cut into long strips. 
Or canned peas and any other vegetables. Consommé soup can be served with croutons fried in butter, which are placed on a separate plate. The meat and minced meat from the broth are used to prepare any other second or first courses, and sometimes they are served with soup, placed in a separate deep bowl, as an addition mixed with hot spices and olive oil. Appetizing soup for gourmets! Bon appetit! - − Consommé soup can be prepared from any type of meat, it can be pork, beef, turkey meat or mixed minced meat.
- − In this type of soup you can put any unground spices that are suitable for first courses, for example, cloves, coriander, fresh sage leaves, turmeric and many other ingredients.
- − There are different varieties of consommé soup, but it is always based on broth. Sometimes sweet salad peppers are added to it, which gives a wonderful aroma, savoy or cauliflower, kohlrabi, asparagus, beets, garlic, and much more. It all depends on what mixture of aromas you want to get in the end.
- − Remember that cutting boards and knives must be separate for vegetables and meat products!
