Consommé
Template:Short description Template:Use dmy dates Template:Infobox foodConsommé (Template:IPA (Template:Pronunciation) is a type of clear soup made from richly flavoured stock or broth that has been clarified, a process that traditionally uses egg whites to remove fat and sediment. A later technique for clarification employs gelatin filtration. Consommés are most commonly made from beef or veal, but chicken, fish and game variants are recognised in French cuisine. They may be served on their own – hot or chilled – or be used as the basis of many soups, sauces and stews.
Etymology and history
In French usage the word dates back to the fourteenth century as the past participle of Template:Lang, meaning consumed, accomplished or finished.<ref name=dic>"Consommé", Template:Lang. Retrieved 19 June 2025</ref> By the sixteenth century the word was used as a noun meaning a "finished" soup – a concentrated and clarified meat broth as opposed to a simple stock or broth.<ref name=ocf>Davidson, p. 211</ref> The first edition of the Template:Lang (1694) defines it as "Template:Lang" – strong succulent broth of very well-cooked meat.<ref name=dic/> The word is first recorded in English usage in 1815,<ref name=oed>Template:Cite OED</ref> and in Don Juan (Canto XV, 1824), Lord Byron writes of "The salmi, the consommé, the purée".<ref name=oed/> In French usage each of the three syllables is given approximately equal stress. In Anglophone usage the main stress may be on the first syllable (Canadian and modern British pronunciation), the second (earlier British pronunciation) or the third (American pronunciation); in Australian usage either the first or second syllable may be stressed.<ref name=oed/><ref>"English pronunciation of consommé", Cambridge Dictionary, Cambridge University Press, 2025; "consommé", The Canadian Oxford Dictionary, Oxford University Press, 2004 Template:Subscription; and "consommé", Australian Oxford Dictionary, Oxford University Press, 2004 Template:Subscription</ref>
Alexis Soyer published his recipe for consommé in his Gastronomic Regenerator (1846): Template:Blockindent
Both Soyer and a later French chef, Auguste Escoffier, use consommé for the basis of many soups, sauces and stews as well as for serving on its own. Soyer includes it in more than a hundred of his recipes, from Template:Lang to Template:Lang.<ref>Soyer, recipes 9 to 1359 Template:Lang</ref> Escoffier gives recipes for consommés of chicken, fish and game ("the necks, breasts, and shoulders of venison and of hare, old wild rabbits, old pheasants, and old partridges may be used").<ref>Escoffier, pp. 6–7</ref> He distinguishes between consommés served at dinners, garnished, in soup plates and those served at suppers: "These, being only served in cups, either hot or cold, do not allow of any garnishing, since they are to be drunk at table. They must therefore be perfect in themselves, delicate, and quite clear".<ref>Escoffier, p. 8</ref>
In Template:Lang (1914) Louis Saulnier gives recipes for more than a hundred variants of consommé, including Template:Lang (oxtail consommé with asparagus tips, diced mushrooms with tarragon and chervil); Cyrano (beef consommé with duck and Parmesan); Template:Lang (mutton consommé with pearl barley); George Sand (fish consommé with crayfish and morels); Mikado (chicken consommé with tomato); Template:Lang (beef consommé with leeks); Rossini (chicken consommé with truffles and foie gras); and Rothschild (game consommé with Sauternes).<ref>Saulnier, pp. 33–39</ref>
In their 1961 book Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Simone Beck, Louisette Bertholle and Julia Child say this about clarifying consommé: Template:Blockindent
Varieties
Double consommé is made to double strength.<ref name=ocf/> One method is to double the quantity of meat used in the recipe; another is producing one of normal strength and reducing it to half its volume.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
In a 2007 New York Times article<ref name=nyt>Template:Cite news</ref> Harold McGee set out an alternative method for clarifying broths, originating among chefs of the molecular gastronomy movement: gelatin filtration, relying on some of the properties of a super-saturated solution of gelatin, created by freezing, to remove macroscopic particles that cause cloudiness from a water-based stock. This method is distinct from traditional consommé both in technique and in final product, as gelatin filtration results in a gelatin-free broth, while traditional consommé gives a final product rich in gelatin, with a correspondingly rich mouthfeel. A traditional consommé gels when chilled; a gelatin-filtered consommé does not.<ref name=nyt/>
What is advertised as beef consommé is available in cans. A proprietary brand on sale in Britain in 2025 contained water, sherry (3%), beef gelatin, yeast extract, salt, sugar, beef extract (0.2%), onion extract, black pepper extract, parsley extract, sunflower oil, mixed peppers, spice extracts (celery, nutmeg, pimento, cinnamon, capsicum) and niacin.<ref>"Baxters Chef Selections, Beef Consomme Soup 400g", Sainsburys. Retrieved 19 June 2025</ref> In the US a proprietary brand contained "beef stock (water, dried beef stock), gelatin, yeast extract, salt, sugar, natural flavoring, monosodium glutamate, tamari soy sauce (water, soybeans, salt), caramel color, citric acid, carrots, beef stock, soy sauce (water, soybeans, salt, wheat), onions, celery, beef tallow, dried beef, dried carrots, wheat and soy".<ref>"Campbell's Condensed Beef Consommé Soup, 10.5 oz Can", Walmart. Retrieved 19 June 2025</ref> Beck, Bertholle and Child state that they do not recommend tinned consommé.<ref>Beck et al, p. 111</ref>