Lobster Soup, or Bisque

Original Recipe

Have ready a good broth made of three pounds of veal boiled slowly in as much water as will cover it, till the meat is reduced to shreds. It must then be well strained. Having boiled one fine middle-sized lobster, extract all the meat from the body and claws. Bruise part of the coral in a mortar, and also an equal quantity of the meat. Mix them well together. Add mace, cayenne, salt and pepper, and make them up into force meat balls, binding the mixture with the yolk of an egg slightly beaten. Take three quarts of the veal broth and put it into the meat of the lobster cut into mouthfuls. Boil it together about twenty minutes. Then thicken it with the remaining coral (which you must first rub through a sieve), and add the force meat balls and a little butter rolled in flour. Simmer it gently for ten minutes, but do not let it come to a boil, as that will injure the color. Serve with small dice of bread fried brown in butter.