provide the same number of large truffles as there are ortolans; cut
a hole in each truffle and fill it with French forcemeat. Season the
birds well, and lay them on their backs on the truffles. Set them
in a deep stewpan, and cover with slices of bacon--in this method
of cooking, bacon is admissible--and about ½ pint stock (veal) and
½ pint port wine. Stew for 20 minutes, or a trifle longer, closely
covered. Take out the truffles and ortolans, strain the sauce through
a hair sieve, and when cool remove every particle of fat; reduce it
by gentle reboiling to about one half the quantity, then add ½ pint
brown Spanish sauce; reduce again, and resoak toast in this sauce
and arrange the truffles and ortolans on it, piling them up in the
dish. Ortolans can be dressed in any of the ways suitable for other
small birds, such as quails, larks, and wheat-ears, but, being so
expensive, few people are disposed to other than cook them plainly
without trying any experiments which may or may not answer. (E. J.)
_Partridges_ (Perdrix, perdreaux).--Partridges are excellent in
pies and puddings, or _en salmis_, made as directed for grouse, and
any fragments left over are well disposed of in _croustades_ and in
little paper cases, while the carcases are invaluable for making
stock.
Boiled.--(_a_) Take 2 partridges (not at all high), truss them as
fowls are trussed for boiling, and put them into a panful of boiling
water, salted to taste; let them boil slowly 15-20 minutes. Then
serve on a bed of either celery, mushroom, onion, or tomato sauce.
(_b_) Put them in plenty of boiling water, boil them for 15 minutes,
and serve with celery sauce made thus: Take the white part of 6 heads
of celery, wash, pare, and cut it into pieces about 1 in. long; boil
these in plenty of water until tender, and strain. Meanwhile, take 1
gill white gravy, ½ pint cream, and a little butter rolled in flour.
Boil it up till it is thick and smooth, add a little grated nutmeg,
put in the celery with a little salt, and give the whole a boil up.
Stir in (off the fire) the yolks of 2 eggs beaten up with the juice
of a lemon, pour some of the sauce over the birds, and serve the
remainder in boats. It is perhaps an improvement to boil the celery
in stock instead of water.
Braised.--(_a_) Truss 2 birds as for boiling, and lard their breasts
very finely with fat bacon, put them into a small braising pan over
2 slices bacon, add 2 small onions stuck with 6 cloves, 2 carrots
cut in pieces, a bundle of sweet herbs, pepper and salt to taste, a
cupful of stock, and one of white wine; place a buttered paper over
all, and braise them gently for 2 hours, keeping a few hot embers on
the lid of the pan. Serve with their own liquor, strained, and well
freed from fat.
(_b_) Aux choux.--To make this, truss a brace of partridges as fowls
are trussed for boiling, mince about a ¼ lb. fat bacon, put it into
a saucepan on the fire, and when it is quite hot put in the birds,
and toss them in this till well coloured all over; meanwhile blanch
a small cabbage or a savoy in salted water, drain it, squeeze all
the water from it, chop it up, and put it into the saucepan with the
birds; add pepper and salt to taste, a bundle of sweet herbs, and 2
or 3 pork sausages, moisten with a little stock, and let the whole
simmer for 2 hours. Remove the bundle of herbs, and serve with the
cabbage and the sausages each cut in two, round the birds.
Broiled.--Take a young partridge, by no means high, split it down the
back, flatten it with the cutlet bat, brush it over with liquefied
butter or olive oil, sprinkle it with pepper and salt, and put it
into a double gridiron; broil over a brisk fire, first on one side
and then on the other, just long enough to set the flesh; serve over
a lump of _maître d’hôtel_ butter.
Pie.--Cut the breasts or fillets and the legs off 2 or 3 birds,
sprinkle them with pepper and salt, and cook them in the oven,
smothered in butter and covered with a buttered paper. Pound the
carcases and make of them some good gravy, but do not thicken it.
Take the livers of the birds with an equal quantity of calf’s liver,
mince both, and toss them in butter over the fire for a minute or
two; then pound them in a mortar with an equal quantity of bacon,
2 shallots parboiled, with pepper, salt, powdered spice, and sweet
herbs to taste. When this mixture is well pounded, pass it through
a sieve. Put a layer of this forcemeat into a pie dish, arrange
the pieces of partridge on it, filling up the interstices with the
forcemeat. Then pour in as much gravy as is required, put on the
cover of either puff or short paste, and bake for about an hour.
When done, a little more gravy, boiling hot, may be introduced
through a hole in the centre of the crust. If liked, the breasts of
the birds may be larded with fat bacon, and truffles and mushrooms
added, especially if to be eaten cold; also a little melted aspic or
calves’-foot jelly may be added with the gravy. (The G. C.)
Pudding.--Skin a brace of birds, cut them up into comely pieces, and
put them, with a few mushrooms, into a basin lined with suet paste,
add 2 shallots and some minced parsley, season with pepper and salt,
put in a very little stock or water, cover up the pudding, tie it up
in a cloth, and boil it for about 3 hours.
Roast.--(_a_) Pick, draw, singe, and truss, placing a slice of bacon
over the breast of each bird. Roast at a moderately brisk fire,
removing the bacon a few minutes before the birds are done. Serve
with plain gravy and bread sauce in boats. (_b_) Carefully drawn,
singed, and trussed, the partridges should, with a piece of butter
in the inside, be put down to a brisk fire, well basted with butter
and dredged with flour to froth up well. Like grouse, they should
be roasted quickly, and if in proper condition--that is to say,
tender--not “high,” must not be overdone, or they will be frightfully
dry. About 20 minutes, or a little less, if the birds are young, will
suffice. Partridges should be served on a toast with gravy, fried
crumbs and bread sauce, and may be garnished with watercress or lemon.
Salad.--Trim all pieces carefully, and remove the skin from them;
beat up in a basin 3 parts olive oil and 1 of tarragon vinegar, with
pepper and salt to taste, and some finely minced tarragon, chervil,
or garden cress; dip the pieces of partridge in this, arrange them
on a dish with some lettuce or endive dressed in the same sauce, and
ornament the dish with hard-boiled eggs, pickled gherkins, anchovies
(thoroughly washed), capers, &c. Mayonnaise sauce may be used instead
of this plain dressing; and, if there is enough of the pieces of
breast, they may be inclosed in a border of aspic jelly, and the
salad put in the centre with the other pieces.
_Pheasant_ (Faisan).--The hen pheasant is esteemed the better bird.
Great caution must be exercised in “hanging” the pheasant just long
enough to become tender and develop its fine aroma without getting
too high. Pheasants are trussed in the same manner as partridges,
and it is no longer customary to serve them with the tail feathers.
A slice of fat bacon is fastened over the breast, and is removed
towards the close of roasting to allow the bird to take colour.
Pheasants are also often larded, and roasted with a piece of paper
over the breast. The fire should be clear, but not too fierce, as the
white flesh of the pheasant requires somewhat slower cooking than
the brown meat of the grouse and partridge. About 40 minutes will
generally be found sufficient to roast a pheasant, which should be
thoroughly done, as nothing is more detestable than white meat in the
slightest degree undercooked.
Roast.--Pick, draw, singe, and truss, placing 2 shallots and 1 oz.
butter inside the bird. Lard the breast very finely, tie a thin slice
of bacon over the larding, and roast the bird at a moderate fire,
basting it frequently with butter. A few minutes before the bird is
done remove the slice of bacon so as to let the larding take colour.
Serve with plain gravy, fried breadcrumbs, and bread sauce. Time,
about 30 minutes.
With Truffles.--Bone a pheasant, stuff it with some sliced truffles,
place some thin slices of fat bacon in a casserole, skin the bird,
and place over it some more bacon, covering it thoroughly; add a
little veal gravy, seasoned with pepper and salt. Cover close and
simmer until done, taking care it does not burn. This is served cold,
garnished with clear jelly, 2 or 3 hard-boiled eggs cut into shapes,
and sliced gherkins.
_Pigeon_ and Beefsteak Pie.--Take 2 pigeons and ¾ lb. rump steak,
quarter the pigeons and slice the steak very thin, put on each slice
of steak a small piece of fat bacon, season it with pepper, and roll
it up. Season the pigeon with pepper, salt, and powdered spices, and
put a piece of butter on to each piece, then arrange the pigeons,
and the rolls of steak in a pie dish with a few hard boiled yolks of
eggs; pour in a small quantity of meat or calves’-foot jelly, just
made liquid, cover over the pie, and bake for about 1 hour in a well
heated oven.
_Plover_ (Pluvier, Vanneau). Fillets.--Take 3 plovers, and out of the
breast of each skilfully cut 2 fillets, lay them in a buttered tin,
sprinkle them with pepper and salt, and cover them with a buttered
paper. Cut up the carcases, and put them in a saucepan with a piece
of bacon and a little butter, an onion, and a carrot, sliced; toss
them on the fire for 5 minutes, moisten with stock, add any mushroom
trimmings, and let the sauce simmer for 2 hours; strain off the
liquor, and, having carefully removed all fat, thicken it with a
little butter rolled in flour, adding at the time of serving a few
drops of lemon juice. Put the tin containing the fillets in the oven
for a short time just to set them; then turn them into the sauce, and
keep them quite hot until the time of serving; arrange a neat border
of sippets, fried in butter, round a dish, dispose the fillets in the
centre, and pour the sauce over.
Roast.--Pluck, singe, and remove the gizzard, but nothing else. Tie a
thin slice of bacon over each bird; put them to roast at a brisk fire
over slices of toasted or fried bread laid in the dripping-pan, one
for each bird; baste well with butter; remove the bacon just before
serving, and sprinkle the birds with salt. When done lay them on the
toast, serve with plain white sauce in a boat, and garnish with cut
lemon.
Toast.--See Snipe.
_Quail_ (Caille).--Quail as seen in England, has generally been
subjected to a process of artificial fattening, but the wild birds
of the south--at least those taken in autumn--have some advantage in
flavour over their semi-civilised compeers. The modes of dressing
them are almost endless, but when simply roasted they are delicious.
To roast quails, pluck, draw, singe, and truss them; then cover the
breast of each bird with a vine leaf, and over that place a thin
sheet of fat bacon; tie this on with thread, and put the quails on a
long skewer, attach it to the spit, roast for 10-15 minutes before
a clear fire, and serve (if preferred) on toast. The excessively
delicate and ethereal aroma of the quail renders the addition of
sauce not only unnecessary but injudicious.
In Cases.--Bone some quails, and divide each one in two; put the
livers on one side, and set the bones and trimmings to boil in some
good stock, broth, or even water, with carrots, onions, parsley,
pepper, salt, a few cloves, a bay leaf, and a few pieces of ham or
bacon. When well reduced, strain this gravy and put it by. Cut up the
quails’ livers, as also some fowls’ livers, or some calves’ liver,
all in small dice; do the same with half their quantity of bacon. Fry
a few shallots a bright yellow in plenty of butter, then put in the
liver and bacon with minced parsley, pepper, and salt, and a little
powdered spices. Toss the whole on the fire for a few minutes, then
turn out on a sieve and pass the mixture through while hot. Have some
paper cases ready oiled, put a layer of this “farce” into each, then
a moderate-sized piece into each half quail; roll it up neatly, and
place in its case with a thin slice of fat bacon over it. Bake them
in the oven not longer than 10-15 minutes. At the time of serving
thicken the gravy mentioned above by mixing a little flour with some
butter, and then adding the gravy to it. Fill with gravy, and strew a
little finely-minced parsley over each case. The pieces of bacon may
be removed or not at pleasure before serving.
Roast.--Pluck, draw, singe, and truss them; then cover the breast
with a vine leaf (if obtainable), and over that place a thin sheet
of fat bacon; tie this on with thread, and put the quails on a long
skewer, attach it to the spit; roast for about 10 minutes before a
clear fire, and serve (if preferred) on toast.
_Rabbits_ (Lapereaux).--In selecting rabbits for the table, the
housekeeper should know that small claws and teeth denote youth,
and that when the claws are long, thick, and curved, protruding far
beyond the fur, the animal is generally more than 4 years old, and,
of course, on this account less desirable than his offspring. The
Belgian hare-rabbits are considered the best of all as food; and,
whatever the preference of the consumer may be, it should never be
forgotten that wild rabbits, if not usually so plump, are as a rule
more gamey in their flavour, and are said to be far less subject to
diseases of all kinds than the tame, bred and pampered as these are
upon a more or less artificial diet. A wild rabbit, carefully roasted
and served with all the accessories which are given to a roasted
hare, becomes a very fair imitation of this latter dainty; and if it
will not actually “jug,” it makes a most excellent curry, whilst the
liver, properly fried, is a very toothsome little mouthful indeed.
Baked.--Open a 2 lb. tin of rabbit round the side (all tins should be
opened in this way if the meat is required to be turned out without
breaking); place the tin in boiling water to melt the jelly; pour
the liquid into a saucepan, and add half a teacupful of gravy, which
should be seasoned, but not thickened. Grate 3 oz. breadcrumbs; add a
dessert spoonful of marjoram, a teaspoonful of thyme, a teaspoonful
of chopped parsley, and ½ lb. minced ham or bacon. Mix together, and
season with pepper and salt; put a thin layer of this mixture at the
bottom of a pie dish well buttered, then a layer of rabbit and a
layer of seasoning alternately until the dish is full. Pour the gravy
over all and cover with a dish, and bake 15 minutes.
Boiled.--Truss the rabbits, and put them in cold water for 2 hours,
changing the water 2 or 3 times. Put them into boiling water with a
lump of stale crumb of bread, and boil them for 40-45 minutes. Have
ready abundance of onion sauce made thus: take 2 doz. large, or 3
doz. small silver onions, peel them, take off the first coat, split
them and throw them into cold water, and boil them till they are
tender, changing the water twice, then squeeze and rub them through a
colander. Put into a stewpan ½ lb. butter, or ¼ lb. butter and 1 gill
cream, dredge in carefully a little flour and a little salt, throw in
the onions, and shake them up gently till the mixture is smooth; keep
stirring all the time.
Having the rabbits piping hot, smother them in the onion sauce, and
garnish with lemon and sippets. An excellent sauce for boiled rabbit
may also be made by boiling and pounding the liver. Add to this some
good veal stock, or broth from the rabbit, season with mace and
allspice, boil up and strain; then roll a piece of butter in flour,
throw it into a stewpan, and before it colours pour in the previous
mixture and add a little minced and blanched parsley.
Curried.--Place ¼ lb. butter into a stewpan on the fire, slice into
it a good-sized onion or 2 small ones, and fry till they become a
golden brown (being very careful not to let them burn); add one
tablespoonful of curry powder, mix and fry lightly; then put the
rabbit (which ought to be previously cooked and cut in pieces) in
the pan; keep stirring a few minutes; throw in gently a little salt,
and add slowly a teacupful of milk; stir it all well together on
the fire, keeping it covered for ¼ hour, and, when it looks thick,
squeeze the juice of a lemon into it. If it appears too rich, skim
the butter off, and add a little more milk.
Cutlets.--Soak the rabbits all night, and pour boiling water over
them before cooking. Cut cutlets out of the back and hindlegs. Roll
these in egg and breadcrumbs, and serve with potatoes cut thin and
fried in butter.
Fricassée.--Fry 2 onions cut in slices to a nice brown, and lay them
at the bottom of a stewpan. Open a 2 lb. tin of rabbit, and set it in
a saucepan of boiling water. Keep the tin in the water long enough
to melt the jelly from the pieces of rabbit; pour the melted jelly
among the fried onion, add ½ teacupful gravy, and simmer while the
rabbit is being fried; thicken the gravy slightly, and slide the
rabbit out gently on a plate. Egg, breadcrumb, and quickly fry each
piece brown, or roll each piece well in flour and fry. Put the pieces
carefully into the gravy and onion, leave them 5 minutes near the
fire to imbibe the gravy and get thoroughly hot; toast some thin
slices of bacon in a Dutch oven, put them round a hot dish, and place
the rabbit in the centre. The stew must not simmer after the pieces
of the rabbit are put in, else they will break from the bone. The
difficulty lies in keeping the pieces of rabbit whole, as they are
too much cooked in the tins, and when heated again they often present
a jumbled appearance of strips of flesh and bleached-looking bones.
Pie.--Skin 2 rabbits, wash them thoroughly, and cut them into small
joints. Have ready some lean bacon and 1 lb. rump or beef steak.
Cut both in small pieces, and place them all on a large dish or
a chopping board, sprinkle them well with salt, pepper, chopped
parsley, and thyme. Mix all well together, put them in a pie dish,
adding forcemeat balls or the yolks of hard-boiled eggs. Fill the
dish with water, cover the whole with a light paste. Beat up an egg
with a pinch of salt, glaze the pie with it, and bake in the oven for
2 hours.
Stewed.--Cut a rabbit in pieces, wash it in cold water, a little
salted. Prepare in a stewpan some flour, and clarified dripping or
butter; stir it up until it browns. Then put in the pieces of rabbit,
and keep stirring and turning, until they are tinged with a little
colour; then add 6 onions, peeled, but not cut up. Serve all together
in a deep dish.
With Onion Sauce.--Place a tin of rabbit, when opened, in boiling
water until the rabbit is thoroughly heated; pour off the liquid, and
put a few pieces of butter on the top of the rabbit while in the tin.
When the liquid butter has permeated all the rabbit, slide it out on
a hot dish carefully, so as not to break the pieces, and cover it
with good onion sauce. Serve with a piece of boiled bacon or streaky
pork.
_Rook_ Pie.--(_a_) Soak the rooks in salt and water (having
previously removed the backs and giblets) to draw out the bitterness,
and then proceed as if making a pigeon pie. (A. O. H.)
(_b_) Skin and draw the rooks (6 will make a large pie), cut out the
backbones, taking great care not to break the gall. Put these aside,
as they are not used. Season the other parts well with pepper and
salt, lay them in a deep pie dish, and pour over them ½ pint water,
and a piece of butter the size of a walnut. Cover with a good light
crust, and lay over that again a sheet of buttered paper, as the pie
will take 2½-3 hours baking. (Bessie Tremaine.)
_Snipe_ (Bécassine).--Bisque. Take 6 nice plump snipes, cut the meat
from the breasts, simmer half of them lightly in fresh butter, with a
little salt, to be afterwards cut into scallops; make the rest into a
forcemeat for quenelles to be served in the soup. Take out the larger
bones from the carcases, roughly chopping the latter; put them all
into a stewpan with a little butter, a sprig of thyme, a bayleaf,
a little nutmeg, 3 shallots, and a pinch of pepper; fry them brown
on a brisk fire, and add ½ a pottle mushrooms, chopped, and about a
bottle of Sauterne wine; to this add ½ lb. rice which has been boiled
in broth, 1 qt. white stock, letting it boil gently for 1 hour. Then
drain this through a sieve into a basin, in which allow the liquor
to remain, pounding the rest thoroughly in a mortar; replace this in
the stewpan with the broth they were boiled in, stir it over the fire
for a short time, and rub it through a tammy to remain till wanted.
Let it remain in a cool place. Just before it is wanted for table,
cut the fillets reserved from the breasts into small scallops, and
make the forcemeat up into small quenelles or balls; put these into
the soup tureen, and pour the bisque over them quite hot, but not
boiling. Sippets of fried bread should be handed round with this
soup; they should be cut round, and a small incision cut on one side
of each before frying, so as to be easily able to take out a small
piece from the centre, on which to place a little of the trail. This
must be prepared by putting it into a stewpan with a small piece of
butter, a little pepper and salt, and a spoonful or two of good brown
sauce. They must be fried lightly, and then rubbed through a hair
sieve with a wooden spoon. Fill the croutons with this, warm them for
a minute or two in the oven, and serve them in a plate.
Fried.--Split them down the back, trussing like a spatchcock; put
the trails and livers carefully aside. Heat a frying pan, put in
sufficient lard to half fill it. When boiling, add a little salt;
then fry the birds 10 minutes; place on a napkin in front of fire
to drain and keep hot; pour off all the clear lard; throw a cupful
of sifted breadcrumbs, with the trails and livers, into the gravy
that remains in the pan; fry of a golden colour; serve up round the
snipe: a dash of cayenne added to the crumbs is sometimes liked. All
wildfowl cooked in this way are excellent, the larger birds being cut
into joints.
Pie.--Take 6 couple of snipe, cut the birds into quarters, make a
rich forcemeat of some cold ham, tongue, veal, or chicken, seasoning
with a little sweet herbs, pepper, salt, cayenne, some breadcrumbs,
mushrooms minced fine, mix all together with the yolks of 2 beaten
eggs; place a layer of snipe breast downwards, either in the dish, or
a raised crust--the latter is preferable--then forcemeat, then birds,
then forcemeat, and so on; fill in with some rich gravy, and bake.
When done raise the cover and fill up with gravy; next day place in
ice, and serve cold. Drink Chablis or White Hermitage with this dish.
Roast.--Trim, but do not draw the birds, wrap each in a thin slice
of fat bacon, and roast about 10-15 minutes at a brisk fire. Baste
frequently with butter, keeping a piece of toast in the dripping pan.
Serve on the toast.
Toast.--Half roast some snipe, plover, or woodcock, first removing
the trails. When cold pound the meat, season with pepper, salt, and
a little finely grated lemon peel, make into a mass with the beaten
yolk of an egg; meanwhile place the bones and trimmings in a stewpan
with a little brown stock, a glass of port wine, a little minced
shallot, pepper and salt, let it simmer until the gravy is drawn;
bruise the trails, add them with a little butter and flour to the
gravy, bring to the boil, and strain, adding when ready a squeeze of
lemon. Toast nicely on each side some thin slices bread, butter the
toast and cut into shapes, spread the pounded snipe on these, place
in a Dutch oven to warm, and when lightly brown serve in a hot dish,
pouring the gravy over all.
_Turkey_ (Dinde). Blanched.--Cut the meat into small pieces free from
the bone; season with pepper, salt, and grated nutmeg; put this into
a saucepan with sufficient white sauce to moisten it; let it simmer
very gently for 5 minutes; turn it out on a hot dish, and serve with
tiny fried pieces of bacon all round it. To make the white sauce, put
¼ pint milk into a saucepan, and simmer, with a strip of lemon rind
in it for 5 minutes; mix a dessertspoonful of cornflour in a little
cold milk, and thicken the sauce with it; stir the sauce gently over
the fire for one minute; take out the lemon rind, and stir in ½ oz.
butter after the sauce has cooled for a minute; then heat the turkey
in it.
Boiled.--Wash the turkey in tepid water, and rub it all over with
lemon juice; then put it into a saucepan full of boiling water, with
a large piece of butter, 2 onions, a head of celery, some sliced
carrots, a bunch of parsley and sweet herbs, whole pepper, mace,
cloves, and salt to taste. Let it boil slowly, and remove carefully
any scum that may rise. Serve with celery sauce, or oyster sauce.