Brochet - Pike, the Fish. Pike in French Cuisine

from
Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman

behindthefrenchmenu@gmail.com

 

    

Pike.
Photograph courtesy of katdaned
www.flickr.com/photos/katdaned/2951756603/

    

Brochet or Grand Brochet du Nord
Pike; Northern Pike; American Pike; Jack; Jackfish or Pickerel.

Pike are one of the tastiest freshwater fish. They have firm white flesh and are much appreciated both on their own and as an essential part of many freshwater fish stews. Pike is also the fish behind the original French quenelles, pike meat dumplings.  

Two grilled baby pike.
Photograph courtesy of Alpha
www.flickr.com/photos/avlxyz/47080864/ 

Pike is popular in France

Pike is a popular game fish, and much more frequently seen on French fish restaurant menus than those of North America or the UK. Pike is a very bony fish, and the smaller fish served in restaurants require a great deal of work in the kitchen. However, from listening to a French chef discussing this, I discovered how they speed up the deboning process. A small whole pike that will be served baked, braised, or grilled is first lightly-cooked for 10 to 15 minutes in a fish stock. Then the pike’s otherwise very problematic bones may be easily removed. After deboning the fish, it may be prepared as filets or re-assembled and baked as a whole fish, cooked, and served without bones.

Pike
Photograph courtesy of Biodiversity Library.
www.flickr.com/photos/biodivlibrary/6007967093/

(N.B. When reading a menu with the word Brochet, count the numbers of t's.  A menu may be offering brochettes, so watch the spelling. Brochettes (note the two t's) are skewers of grilled meat, fish, or vegetables. Brochet with a single "t" is pike, the fish). 

Quennels.

Initially, pike was the only fish used to prepare quenelles, fish dumplings. Traditionalists still consider it an act of lésé majesté when fish quenelles are made with any fish other than pike. These pike dumplings originated in the 18th century and were initially sold by bakers. Bakers made flour and or puff pastry dumplings that could be added to a soup. Then, adding pike and later poultry or veal to the bread or puff pastry dumplings was a relatively short and tasty step.   

Quenelle de Brochet, Sauce Nantua.
Sauce Nantua is a Béchamel sauce today flavored with shrimp butter, though it was initially made with freshwater crayfish for which the town and lake of Nantua in the department of Ain in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes; was famous. Today, from over-fishing and pollution, any crayfish in Nantua will not be local, and tomato paste may assist with the sauce’s color, but it remains a tasty sauce. The town of Nantua still has a reputation for creative chefs.
Photograph courtesy of Jean-Marc ALBERT
www.flickr.com/photos/jeanmarcalbert/8300073072/

Pike on French menus:

Quenelle de Brochet au Sauce Mornay - Pike dumplings with a Mornay sauce. Sauce Mornay is a child of Sauce Béchamel, which itself is a nutmeg flavored white sauce. To make Sauce Mornay from a Sauce Bechamel, add Gruyere or Parmesan cheese. Quenelles will be the main dish, the French plat principal.

Terrine de Brochet aux Petits Legumes – A pike fish pate made together with young vegetables. A pike pate is very different from a pike quenelle. Quenelles are made with 50% or more puff-pastry or flour, and the sauce is of great importance. A pike pate will be at least 75% fish, with little or no flour. Pike terrines may be decorated with vegetables or shrimp and rarely served with a sauce.

Salmon and pike terrine.
Photograph courtesy of Adrian Scottow.  
www.flickr.com/photos/chodhound/5649493436/

Brochet du Lac, Fumé à Froid, Garni de Salades - Cold-smoked, lake caught pike served with small salads.

Brochet au Beurre Blanc Nantais – Pike, served with Nantaise butter sauce. The butter sauce from the city of Nantes. Sauce Beurre Blanc or Sauce Beure Blanc Nantaise is made with crème fraiche, butter, a dry white wine, (locally that would be a Muscadet, elsewhere it may be a Chablis), lemon, and shallots. This sauce is one of the tastiest and most popular butter sauces served with white fish, seafood, or vegetables. The city of Nantes is the capital of the region of the Pay du Loire.

Brochet au Beurre Blanc Nantaise
Pike with a Beurre Blanc sauce.
Photograph courtesy of Maison Graviere

Brochet Braisé au Champagne -  Pike, braised in champagne. I have enjoyed this dish where a sparkling cremant from the Alsace was used instead of Champagne, and it was terrific.

Matelote de Brochet, Perche, Anguille, Tanche au Vin Blanc – A matelote is a freshwater fish stew. Here pike, freshwater perch, freshwater eel, and tench are in the stew. French freshwater fish stews often contain pike, as they are a tasty fish. A stew like this will be prepared with added white wine and herbs. Pike is a bony fish, but when cooked in a stew or soup the bones mostly dissolve. Pike bones add significantly to the taste and texture of fish soup.

 Matelote de Poissons au Reisling.
A  fish stew with Reisling wine.
Photograph courtesy of Cuisine Collection

Pike are among the longest though not the heaviest European freshwater fish. Large fish, caught in the wild, can reach over 120 cm (40”) or more. The pike that a restaurant buys may have been caught in the wild; however, they will not be that large. Most wild pike will be much smaller, between 1.5 kilos – 3 kilos (3 lbs – 7lbs) and 55 cm – 70 cm ( 2ft – 2.5 ft) long. Pike are also raised on fish farms, and these will be even smaller. The smallest sold may be just 500 grams (1.1lb). A 500-gram pike will serve two, or one if you are very hungry. When the head, tail, and bones have been removed, some 200-250 grams of meat will be left. Pike’s long aerodynamic shape gave pike its name. According to Dictionary.com, the origins of the name pike, the fish, comes from Old English, where the word pic meant a point.

Catch your own pike.
Photograph courtesy of Fiske Tretton.
www.flickr.com/photos/fisketretton/9912777054/

N.B. Translated French menus may sometimes confuse brochet which is pike in English with a fish called pike-perch in the UK and zander in the USA.  Pike-perch/zander is a somewhat similar-looking fish and called sandre or perche-brochet in French. Pike-perch/zander comes from a different family to pike, and it is a different tasting fish.

Pike in the language of France’s neighbors: 

(Catalan - lluç de riu or luci), (Dutch - snoek), (German – hecht )  (Italian - luccio), (Spanish - lucio).

Pike in other languages:

(Chinese (Manadarin) - 白斑狗鱼); (Danish- gedde); (Greece - tούρνα,  tourna), (Hebrew -  pickerel tzfoni -  פיקרל צפוני), (Icelandic – gedda); (Japanese – kawakamasu); (Latvian – gjedde);  (Polish – szczupak); (Portuguese –Lúcio); (Rumanian – Ştiucă);  (Russian - obyknovennaya schuka); (Ukrainian –shtschuka); (Turkish - turna baligi). For these translations, thanks go to FishBase: Froese, R. and D. Pauly. Editors. 2014.  FishBase. World Wide Web electronic publication. www.fishbase.org, version (11/2014).

--------------------------------

Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman

 

behindthefrenchmenu@gmail.com

 

Copyright 2010, 2015, 2017, 2020.

--------------------------------

Are you searching for the explanation of words, names,
or phrases on French Menus? 

Just add the word, words, or phrase that you are searching for to the words "Behind the French Menu" and search with Google. Behind the French Menu’s links include hundreds of words, names, and phrases that are seen on French menus. There are over 470 articles that include over 4,000 French dishes with English translations and explanations. 

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Échalotes - Shallots. Shallots on French Menus. Shallots are One of the Most Important Herbs in the French Kitchen

from
Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman

behindthefrenchmenu@gmail.com

 

Shallots.
Photograph courtesy of Burpee

    

Échalotes -  Shallots.   

French chefs love shallots as their taste is light, slightly sweet and poignant; very different to their cousins which include onions, garlic, and chives. The smaller and younger shallots are preferred in the French kitchen as they are considered to have more flavor. However, there are many varieties of shallots and while one may be treated as a vegetable, another may be used as a herb, and a third somewhere in between. The shallot’s flexibility is highly appreciated and like its cousins, is a relative of the lily, the flower. (In North America, shallots are often considered to be a small onion or a type of garlic, which they are not). 

A lily, the prettiest member of the Amaryllidaceae family.
Photograph courtesy of oatsy40
www.flickr.com/photos/oatsy40/25933338625/ 

Fresh shallots

Fresh shallots are preferred. However, they are only available fresh for five to six months a year, with the different varieties having seasons that last for one to two months.  In France, the best restaurants will have an all-year-round supply of fresh hot-house shallots. However, for lesser mortals, shallots, like their cousins, onions, and garlic, may be stored.  

Shallot flowers.
Photograph courtesy of Sterling College
www.flickr.com/photos/sterlingcollege/19996116128/ 

Shallots on French Menus.

Onglet de Bœuf Sauce Échalotes – A North American hanger steak, a U.K. skirt steak, served with a shallot sauce. Here the shallot is treated as both a vegetable and an herb. The sauce will be made of gently fried shallots made into a sauce with white wine and probably crème fraiche. 

Hanger steaks are only rarely on the North American steak house menus as they are considered tough. However, French chefs choose their meat very carefully and prepare these steaks very well. 

A well-prepared hanger steak is delicious, and it will not be tough unless it was over-cooked. These are the steaks most often used in France's very popular "steak frites," steak and French fries. N.B.: On French menus, if the onglet, the hanger steak noted here, and a bavette, a flank steak, were to be exchanged, one for the other, none of us would notice the difference! To order a steak in France, cooked the way you like it, click here.  

  

Shallots and garlic in the market.

Photograph courtesy of Numeria Zayas

www.flickr.com/photos/rarehero/5477916604/

 

Moules au Vin Blanc, Échalotes, Persil et Crème –  Mussels and white wine, shallots, parsley, and cream. The ever-popular moules frites was originally a Belgian creation. The French have adopted this dish and have kept up the quality and options. French fries will be usually be served on the side.

    

Grilled Rabbit Roulade
A roulade indicates a dish where meat or fish, or in this case rabbit, is rolled around a filling and then cooked.  In this dish, the filling was carrot purée, haricots verts, baby carrots, and roasted shallots, all flavored with thyme juice. Chefs may also use the name roulade for other stuffed or filled dishes, and that is how your dessert menu may offer a roulade au chocolat.
Photograph courtesy of Premshree Pilla
www.flickr.com/photos/premshree/3605612149/

   

Poitrine de Poulet Farcie, Sauce au Romarin, Farcie avec Champignons et Échalotes – Chicken breast flavored stuffed with button mushrooms and shallots and served with a rosemary sauce.

 

Shallots in a Balsamic vinegar marinade.
Photograph courtesy of Annie Mole.
www.flickr.com/photos/anniemole/5268162511/

 

Saucisson Cuit Sauce Échalote et Gratin Dauphinois - A pre-cooked sausage, often similar to a salami, cooked again, and served with a shallot sauce and Gratin Dauphinois.  France has many different sausages, from pork sausages that require cooking to salami type sausages that may be eaten cold. Once upon a time, each type of sausage had its own name; however, that is no longer the case. The French words saucisse and saucisson came to England with the cooks who accompanied William the Conqueror's armies in 1066. So, in the English language, we also have sausages as a general term for all types of sausages. With a menu listing like this, you should ask for more information about the sausage, you may be missing something special if you pass. 

   

 Gratin Dauphinois is also called Pommes de Terre Dauphinoise. The potatoes are sliced, layered, and baked with olive oil, cream, and milk and lightly flavored with garlic for this dish. Some versions add onions, and nearly all add grated cheese, usually Gruyere, that is browned, gratiné, just before serving.

    

Gratin Dauphinoise.
Photograph courtesy of Le Journal des Femmes Cuisine

 

Velouté d’Échalottes - A velvety shallot soup. A veloute is one of the original five mother sauces, and its silky texture has carried over to soups. A velouté on the menu today will usually indicate a soup with a velvety, silky texture. (Mother sauces were the basic sauce in French cuisine and used for the preparation of all other sauces. Four mother sauces were first categorized by the organizer of French Haute Cuisine Antonin Carême. Seventy years later this group of sauces were reclassified as five by Auguste Escoffier, the most famous of the early 20^th century chefs).

  

Frying shallots with chicken
Photograph courtesy of Jeremy Keith
www.flickr.com/photos/adactio/16538142887/

  

Salade de Crevettes Cuite Épicée, Échalotes,  Coriandre, Feuille de Menthe, Citronnelle, Servi sur un Lit de Salade - A salad of spicy shrimps prepared with shallots, coriander, mint leaves and lemon grass. All served on a bed of salad leaves.

The shallot in the French kitchen

There are 13 or more different types of cultivated shallots available in French markets, and France is also the world's largest exporter of shallots. All shallots are descendants of the originals brought back to France by the crusaders.  Like onions, the shallot’s skin comes in a variety of colors with the golden-skinned and purple-skinned varieties leading the field.  Outside of France, there are more varieties. If you are lucky a USA or UK supermarket may have one type of shallot on sale, but farmers’ markets do usually have a small choice. The names will have changed outside of France so don’t be surprised.

A cut raw shallot.
Photograph courtesy of ~jar{}
www.flickr.com/photos/jariceiii/5408051159/

The two most popular shallots in France

    

Griselle or Gris - The Gray Shallot. The Griselle is usually considered the most delicate, though still strong tasting, of all shallots.  Griselle shallots, which are grayish-brown with a purplish-white interior.

   

The Griselle - The gray shallot.
Photograph courtesy of Prosemail

Échalote de Jersey - The Jersey Shallot, Pink Shallot, or Traditional Shallot is nearly as popular. It is a more rounded shallot and has a slightly stronger onion taste than the gray shallot. There are two types of this shallot, a long and a short version.

 

The Échalote de Jersey – The Jersey shallot.
Photograph courtesy of Cuisine à la française

 

The largest shallot.

 

Banane or Ovale - The Banana Shallot. The banana shallot is the longest of all shallots with a bulging center; they reach up to 18 cm (7”) in length. The banana shallot acquired its name through its size, not its shape; they have a taste midway between onion and garlic.

Banane - Banana shallots.
Photograph courtesy of Specialty Products

Shallots grown in bunches and have from three to six cloves. Shallots have very different tastes to onions that grow alone and to garlic than grow with ten or more cloves.   The milder shallots may be served raw as part of a salad, and there will be no strong onion taste to overpower the salad. Neither will there be a strong garlic smell or taste to hide the aroma of the other ingredients.

Lobster Thermidor
A USA version of the historic French dish of Lobster Thermidor made with the North American two-clawed lobster, a creamy Dijon, shallots, and a mushroom sauce and  Emmenthal cheese
Photograph courtesy of NwongPR
www.flickr.com/photos/nwongpr/35401408961/

 The origins of the shallot

The shallot originated in the Middle East, and its name comes from the city of Ashkelon in modern Israel.  According to tradition French Crusaders discovered them and brought them to France.  However, thousands of years before the crusades, Ashkelon was home to those Mediterranean wholesalers, the Phoenicians. The Phoenicians traded with all the countries in the Mediterranean, including Egypt, Italy, Greece, and the South of France. The Phoenicians brought with them many fruits and vegetables. No doubt, the name and more varieties arrived with the crusaders.

 

A view from a hotel room of the Ashkelon marina today.
Photograph courtesy of Planet of Hotels

French members of the shallot family.

For those interested in the varieties of shallots grown in France, PROSEMAIL, the French Shallot and Garlic Growers Association have a good English language website with pictures of all the shallots grown in France:

http://plant-certifie-echalote.org/en/pages/caracteristiques.php

Shallots in the languages of France neighbors:

(Catalan – escalunya), (German – schalotte, delzwiebel, skalonzwiebel), (Italian – scalogno), (Spanish - chalota, chalote,  escalonia).
 

-------------------------------- 

Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman

 

behindthefrenchmenu@gmail.com

 

Copyright 2010, 2015, 2020

 

-------------------------------- 

Are you searching
for the translation or meaning of words, names,
or phrases on French Menus. 

Just add the word, words, or phrase you are searching for to the words "Behind the French Menu" and search with Google. Behind the French Menu's links include hundreds of words, names, and phrases that are seen on French menus. There are over 480 articles that include over 4,000 French dishes with English translations and explanations. 

------------------

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