Hot Smelt Mousse à la Royale

Ingredients

• butter
• paper
• smelt fillets
• truffle
• smelt mousseline forcemeat
• anchovy fillets
• 1 fine fluted mushroom
• sauce Mousseline finished with Beurre d'écrevisse

Instructions

1. Butter a charlotte mould and line the bottom and sides with equally buttered paper.
2. Prepare enough smelt fillets to line the mould; flatten them very lightly and trim them all to the same length and width.
3. Line the bottom of the mould with the fillets, skin side towards the inside of the mould, setting between each one a fillet of truffle a quarter of their width.
4. Line the sides in the same way, but arranging the smelt and truffle fillets obliquely.
5. Mask the fillets with a layer of mousseline forcemeat a good centimetre thick.
6. On the forcemeat covering the bottom, arrange a layer of truffle slices and cover it with forcemeat.
7. On this new layer of forcemeat, arrange a bed of smelt fillets and anchovy fillets alternating.
8. Finish filling the mould, alternating layers of truffle, forcemeat and fillets, and finish with a layer of forcemeat.
9. Poach the mousse in a bain-marie in a slow oven, covered, allowing 40 to 45 minutes for a mousse made in a one-litre mould.
10. Turn the mousse out onto the serving dish and lift the mould slightly to let the liquid formed inside drain away; sponge up this liquid.
11. Gently remove the mould, take off the paper and pass a moistened brush over the surface to remove any scum formed on the fillets.
12. Place a fine fluted mushroom in the middle and surround the mousse with sauce Mousseline finished with Beurre d'écrevisse.
13. Send a sauceboat of the same sauce separately.