Читать книгу Cakes and Ale - Edward Spencer Mott - Страница 52

Bone a goose, a turkey, a hare, and a brace of grouse; skin it, and cut off all the outside pieces—I mean of the tongue, after boiling it—lay the goose, for the outside a few pieces of hare; then lay in the turkey, the grouse, and the remainder of the tongue and hare. Season highly between each layer with pepper and salt, mace and cayenne, and put it together, and draw it close with a needle and thread. Take 20 lbs. of flour, put 5 lbs. of butter into a pan with some water, let it boil, pour it among the flour, stir it with a knife, then work it with your hands till quite stiff. Let it stand before the fire for half an hour, then raise your pie and set it to cool; then finish it, put in the meat, close the pie, and set it in a cold place. Ornament according to your taste, bandage it with calico dipped in fat. Let it stand all night before baking. It will take a long time to bake. The oven must be pretty hot for the first four hours, and then allowed to slacken. To know when it is enough, raise one of the ornaments, and with a fork try if the meat is tender. If it is hard the pie must be put in again for two hours more. After it comes out of the oven fill up with strong stock, well seasoned, or with clarified butter. All standing pies made in this way.

Verily, in the eighteenth century they must have had considerably more surplus cash and time, and rather more angelic cooks than their descendants!

During cold weather the interior of the coach should be well filled with earthenware vessels containing such provender as hot-pot, hare soup, mullagatawny, lobster à l’Américaine, curried rabbit, devilled larks—with the matériel for heating these. Such cold viands as game pie, pressed beef, boar’s head, foie gras (truffled), plain truffles (to be steamed and served with buttered toast) anchovies, etc. The larks should be smothered with a paste made from a mixture of mustard, Chili vinegar, and a little anchovy paste, and kept closely covered up. After heating, add cayenne to taste.

Gourmets interested in menus may like to know what were the first déjeuners partaken of by the Tsar on his arrival in Paris in October 1869.

On the first day he had huîtres, consommé, œufs à la Parisienne, filet de bœuf, pommes de terre, Nesselrode sauce, chocolat.

Next day he ate huîtres, consommé, œufs Dauphine, rougets, noisettes d’agneau maréchal, pommes de terre, cailles à la Bohémienne, poires Bar-le-Duc.

The writer can recall some colossal luncheons partaken of at dear, naughty Simla, in the long ago, when a hill station in India was, if anything, livelier than at the present day, and furnished plenty of food for both mind and body. Our host was the genial proprietor of a weekly journal, to which most of his guests contributed, after their lights; “sport and the drama” falling to the present writer’s share. Most of the food at those luncheons had been specially imported from Europe; and although the whitebait tasted more of the hermetical sealing than of the Thames mud, most of the other items were succulent enough. There were turtle soup, and turtle fins; highly seasoned pâtés of sorts; and the native khansamah had added several dishes of his own providing and invention. A young florican (bustard) is by no means a bad bird, well roasted and basted; and though the eternal vilolif (veal olives) were usually sent away untasted, his snipe puddings were excellent. What was called picheese (twenty-five years old) brandy, from the atelier of Messrs. Justerini and Brooks, was served after the coffee; and those luncheon parties seldom broke up until it was time to dress for dinner. In fact, our memories were not often keen as to anything which occurred after the coffee, and many “strange things happened” in consequence; although as they have no particular connection with high-class cookery, they need not be alluded to in this chapter.

But, as observed before, I am of opinion that luncheon, except under certain circumstances, is a mistake.