When I was introduced recently to jambonnette in the kitchen of Le Cerf in Marlenheim, France, I observed what appeared to be a small, faux jambon, or ham. The dish was a boned-out chicken leg stuffed with a mixture of various ground meats and vegetables in a shape similar to a small ham.

But before I saw my first ready-to-serve jambonnette in that kitchen, I had an opportunity to prepare the farce, or filling. At Le Cerf, the filling contains raw pork jowl; finely diced, cooked mushrooms; finely diced, cooked onions; raw duck foie gras; minced flat-leaf parsley; raw chicken livers and hearts; jellied pig’s feet; salt; pepper; and white bread softened in milk. The pork, duck, chicken, and bread were finely ground and mixed with the other ingredients.

Unfortunately, I never witnessed or participated in the boning and stuffing of the chicken legs so I could only imagine what the process was like. I did, however, see the final dish prepared a number of times. The final cooking consisted of reheating and glazing the jambonnette in a very hot oven. The stuffed leg was apparently precooked as part of its initial preparation. Thus, when the word came to the kitchen that a guest had ordered a jambonnette, one was removed from the refrigerator, plopped in a small cast-iron pan, and placed in a very hot oven. Periodically, the cook would turn the jambonnette and baste it with a little demi-glace. When heated through, the jambonnette was sliced on a bias into a couple of thick pieces and served with the basting sauce and a vegetable garnish.

On one occasion, there was a mistake in an order and the jambonnette became a snack for the kitchen staff—one that we quickly ate with our fingers between other tasks.

I decided that I wanted to learn to make this dish in my own kitchen, but I quickly realized that finding out the details of the recipe was going to be difficult. The cook I was working with spoke very limited English and my French was even worse. When we made the stuffing, no measurements were used. I participated in preparing it twice. On both occasions, the ingredients and their quantities differed.

Back in my room at night, when I checked my various French-English dictionaries, I found that the dish was probably better called a jambonneau instead of a jambonnette. A jambonneau was defined as a cured pork knuckle or a stuffed poultry leg shaped like a pork knuckle. A jambonnette was defined as a cooked charcuterie dish of minced pork shoulder and bacon with herbs, wrapped in caul fat and shaped in the form of a pear. It seemed like we were preparing a jambonneau not a jambonnette.

When I returned home and checked though my many French cookbooks, I found only a couple of recipes for jambonnette—none of which resembled the dish I had tasted in Marlenheim. And I found no recipes for a stuffed poultry leg called a jambonneau. Nonetheless, I felt I had enough information to attempt to recreate the dish.

The following recipe for jambonneau de volaille aux abats rouges is my version of the dish from Le Cerf. The recipe is broken into seven phases. When completed through the fourth phase, the jambonneau can be refrigerated or frozen until needed. The quantities in the ingredient lists below will produce 6 servings.