REFORMED CUTLETS

Delicious lamb from French and Indian Chefs

London’s Pall Mall is a famous street, if a trifle dull when you walk along it, unless you like very grand old buildings. It is noted for clubs in which the great and good (nearly all male, until women stormed the bastions to gain the right to join). Some are very snooty about who joins and perhaps the most democratic is that of the Royal Automobile Club (the “R.A.C.”).

Club members are able to sink into deep leather chairs and read “The Times”. Talking, if there is any, is very, very quiet and the whole atmosphere I find stifling. It is said that in one of these great edifices a member relaxing in his chair after lunch, died, but was not “disturbed” for several days and only after beginning to pong a bit. The food is essentially English. Simple grills and roasts. Boiled, mashed or roast potatoes. Over-cooked cabbage or other green vegetable. One of the best known is probably the Reform Club (pictured above), which once employed a great foreign cook, the Frenchman Alex Soyer, illustrated below.

It was Monsieur Soyer, the elegant figure on the right of the drawing, who originally created the now classic dish for the Reform Club of London’s Pall Mall area — and this breaded, fried lamb cutlet is still on the menu almost 160 years after the chef’s death, in 1858, aged just 48.

It is not complex: breaded lamb with a tangy vinegar-based sauce. There are many variations, some involving truffles and various wines. But I regard this one as the authentic one, which uses ham in both the breading and the sauce. Together they look most appetising.

The Sauce:

1 tablespoon butter 1 medium onion, chopped

60 g – 1/4 chopped ham

1 medium chopped 2 tablespoons port wine 1/4 cup red wine Vinegar 50 cl /2 cups chicken stock 2 bay leaves 1 small bunch thyme 1 teaspoon corn-flour Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

The Lamb:

cup

For the sauce:

For the Lamb:

of

carrot,

finely

finely

finely 1 kg / 2 lbs of lamb rib chops, with bones (about 8 chops) 4 ounces ham, very finely chopped (about 1/3 cup) 2 tbsps finely chopped fresh parsley 90g / 3 oz breadcrumbs 30g / 1 oz all-purpose flour 2 eggs, beaten 125 ml / Half cup vegetable oil 1. Melt butter in a medium skillet over medium high heat. 2. Add onion, ham and carrot, and cook until onions are soft and ham is just beginning to crisp, about 4 minutes.

3. Add port and vinegar and cook until almost totally reduced, about 2 minutes, then add stock, bay leaves and thyme, bring to a simmer and reduce by half, about 20 minutes.

4. Mix cornstarch with 2 tablespoons water and add to simmering sauce; once sauce has thickened, season to taste with salt and pepper.

1. Place rib chops on a cutting board, and using a mallet, gently flatten each chop until it is 1/2 inch thick. Do your best to ensure that the meat stays attached to the bone.

2. Combine ham, parsley and breadcrumbs on a plate and mix with your fingers until well combined.

If any of my readers know the writing of P.G. Wodehouse, they will know something of London Club life and at least some of the characters who frequented it. Like his English country house scenarios, Wodehouse’s club-land was a somewhat exaggerated depiction of the real thing.

Clubs for professional people, for philanthropists, explorers, actors, writers, artists, scientists and lots more thrived from the late seventeenth century to quite late in the 1980s. Long established ones, owning the freeholds or long-leaseholds of their properties survived, as others closed due to ever-rising costs of rates, services and staff.

One of these was a haunt of journalists and lawyers, “The Wig and Pen” club at the entrance to “Newspaper-land”, Fleet Street. I still have my Wig and Pen Club Life Membership Card, but it has only sentimental value, because the club closed in 2003 and now a Thai restaurant operates on the site, and the cards that they accept aren’t those of membership – they are Visa, Amex, Diners and so forth.

The director-general of a French organisation I once worked for always stayed at a very English club in Pall Mall, where the food, at lunch and dinner, was awful, the beds hard, the service not of the finest, but the breakfast was very English, very large and included in the room price. I asked his assistant why he did this when he could well afford any of the 5-star hotels nearby. “Ah”, he said, “’E like ze Ingleesh break-fast, so he don’t have to have ze Ingleesh lunch”. 1 large onion, peeled and sliced. 1 green pepper, cored, de-seeded and finely sliced. 50 g butter 1 large apple, peeled, cored and thickly sliced. 1 tablespoon flour. 1 tablespoon curry powder. 50 cls chicken or meat stock. 50 g Sultanas - soaked in warm water until soft and plump, (about 15 mins). 2 large tomatoes, peeled and quartered. Cold cooked lamb. Accompany with boiled rice, apple chutney, mango chutney and lemon quarters.

1. In a large frying pan, melt the butter over medium heat and fry the onion and pepper slices until they are transparent but not browned. 2. Add the apple slices and fry for about 5 minutes. 3. Remove the pan from the heat and with a wooden spoon stir in the flour and curry powder and mix well.

4. Stir in the stock slowly, until the sauce is smooth, then transfer to a medium sized saucepan. 5. Drain the sultanas and add them and the tomato quarters to the curry sauce. 6. Cut the cold lamb into small cubes and add to the sauce and simmer gently for 30 minutes.

7. Serve on boiled rice with the apple and mango chutney. Squeeze the lemon quarters over.