Florentine or à la Florentine is a term from classic French cuisine that refers to dishes that typically include a base of cooked spinach, a protein component and Mornay sauce. Chicken Florentine is the most popular version. Because Mornay sauce is a derivation of béchamel sauce which includes roux and requires time and skill to prepare correctly, many contemporary recipes use simpler cream-based sauces.[1][2][3]
History edit
Culinary lore attributes the term to 1533, when Catherine de Medici of Florence married Henry II of France. She supposedly brought a staff of chefs, lots of kitchen equipment and a love of spinach to Paris, and popularized Florentine-style dishes. Food historians have debunked this story, and Italian influence on French cuisine long predates this marriage.[4] Pierre Franey considered this theory apocryphal, but embraced the term Florentine in 1983.[5]
Auguste Escoffier included a recipe for sole Florentine in his 1903 classic Le guide culinaire, translated into English as A Guide to Modern Cookery. It is recipe 831 in that translation. Escoffier called for poaching the fish in butter and fumet, a stock made of fish bones, cooking the spinach in butter, covering the dish with Mornay sauce, garnishing it with grated cheese, and finishing it in an oven or salamander.[6] In his 1936 cookbook L'Art culinaire moderne which was first translated for American cooks in 1966 as Modern French Culinary Art, Henri-Paul Pellaprat included five recipes for spinach-based Florentine dishes with Mornay sauce. The protein components were chicken breasts, cod fillets, sweetbreads, stuffed lamb breast and oysters.[7] Craig Claiborne published a recipe for oysters Florentine with Mornay sauce in The New York Times in 1958.[8]
Variations edit
A quiche containing spinach is often called "quiche Florentine".[9] Poached or soft-cooked eggs served on spinach with a Mornay sauce or equivalent is often called "eggs Florentine".[10]
Chicken Florentine edit
Chicken Florentine gained popularity in the United States as early as 1931, although the quality of the dish was uneven, and canned mushroom soup was sometimes used as a quick sauce in the years that followed.[11] By the 1960s and 1970s, the general quality of the dish had deteriorated to "casserole" and "wedding banquet" food.[12]
Writing in The New York Times in 1971, Claiborne praised a restaurant version of chicken Florentine, describing the chicken as "batter‐cooked and served with mushrooms in a lemon sauce".[13] Contemporary cookbook authors are attempting to "restore" the dish to "its elegant roots",[14] with "clearer, brighter flavors".[15]
References edit
- ^ de Laurentis, Giada. "Chicken Florentine Style". Food Network. Retrieved September 12, 2021.
- ^ Gaines, Joanna (April 3, 2020). "Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner: One-Skillet Chicken Florentine from Joanna Gaines' New Cookbook". Parade. Retrieved September 6, 2021.
- ^ Zumstein, Debra; Kazary, Will (2007). Carolina Cooking: Recipes from the Region's Best Chefs. p. 130. ISBN 9781423602033.
- ^ Campanini, Antonella. "The Illusive Story Of Catherine de' Medici: A Gastronomic Myth". The New Gastronome. University of Gastronomic Sciences of Pollenzo. Retrieved September 12, 2021.
- ^ Franey, Pierre (October 5, 1983). "60-minute Gourmet: Chicken breasts enhanced with a spinach stuffing". New York Times. Retrieved September 6, 2021.
- ^ Escoffier, Auguste (1907). A Guide to Modern Cookery. W. Heinemann. p. 284.
- ^ Pellaprat, Henri-Paul (1966). Kramer, René; White, David (eds.). Modern French Culinary Art. World Publishing Company. pp. 444–445, 526, 585–586, 636, 653.
Adapted for the American Kichen by Avanelle Day
- ^ Claiborne, Craig (December 11, 1958). "Frozen Vegetable Dishes Asset for Spur-of-the-Moment Suppers; Seven Products Are Introduced - Ready To Serve In Jiffy". New York Times. Retrieved September 12, 2021.
- ^ The Food Guys (May 5, 2019). "This Recipe For Quiche Florentine Gets A Thumbs-Up From Popeye". Montana Public Radio. Retrieved September 12, 2021.
- ^ Goodfriend, Wendy (September 10, 2011). "Mollet Eggs Florentine". KQED. San Francisco. Retrieved September 12, 2021.
- ^ "Easy Chicken Florentine". Campbell's. Campbell Soup Company. 2014. Retrieved September 6, 2021.
- ^ Staff (2020). The Complete Cook's Country TV Show Cookbook Includes Season 13 Recipes: Every Recipe and Every Review from All Thirteen Seasons. America's Test Kitchen. p. 30. ISBN 9781948703383.
- ^ Claiborne, Craig (March 5, 1971). "The Food Is Fine but Oh, the Decibels". New York Times. Retrieved September 6, 2021.
- ^ Staff (2021). The Chicken Bible: Say Goodbye to Boring Chicken with 500 Recipes for Easy Dinners, Braises, Wings, Stir-Fries, and So Much More. America's Test Kitchen. p. 199. ISBN 9781948703550.
- ^ America's Test Kitchen (February 4, 2019). "Rethinking Chicken Florentine with clearer, brighter flavors". Associated Press. Retrieved September 6, 2021.