The Cook's Oracle; and Housekeeper's Manual Part 28

To ascertain the age, examine the first joint of the forefoot; you will find a small k.n.o.b, if it is a leveret, which disappears as it grows older; then examine the ears, if they tear easily, it will eat tender; if they are tough, so will be the hare, which we advise you to make into soup (No. 241), or stew or jug it (No. 523).

When newly killed, the body is stiff; as it grows stale, it becomes limp.

As soon as you receive a hare, take out the liver, parboil it, and keep it for the stuffing; some are very fond of it. Do not use it if it be not quite fresh and good. Some mince it, and send it up as a garnish in little hillocks round the dish. Wipe the hare quite dry, rub the inside with pepper, and hang it up in a dry, cool place.

Paunch and skin[141-*] your hare, wash it, and lay it in a large pan of cold water four or five hours, changing the water two or three times; lay it in a clean cloth, and dry it well, then truss it.

To make the stuffing, see No. 379. Do not make it too thin; it should be of cohesive consistence: if it is not sufficiently stiff, it is good for nothing. Put this into the belly, and sew it up tight.

Cut the neck-skin to let the blood out, or it will never appear to be done enough; spit it, and baste it with drippings,[141-+] (or the juices of the back will be dried up before the upper joints of the legs are half done,) till you think it is nearly done, which a middling-sized hare will be in about an hour and a quarter. When it is almost roasted enough, put a little bit of b.u.t.ter into your basting-ladle, and baste it with this, and flour it, and froth it nicely.

Serve it with good gravy (No. 329, or No. 347), and currant-jelly. For another stuffing, see receipt No. 379. Some cooks cut off the head and divide it, and lay one half on each side the hare.

Cold roast hare will make excellent soup (No. 241), chopped to pieces, and stewed in three quarts of water for a couple of hours; the stuffing will be a very agreeable subst.i.tute for sweet herbs and seasoning. See receipt for hare soup (No. 241), hashed hare (No. 529), and mock hare, next receipt.

_Mock Hare._--(No. 66.*)

Cut out the fillet (_i. e._ the inside lean) of a sirloin of beef, leaving the fat to roast with the joint. Prepare some nice stuffing, as directed for a hare in No. 66, or 379; put this on the beef, and roll it up with tape, put a skewer through it, and tie that on a spit.

_Obs._ If the beef is of prime quality, has been kept till thoroughly tender, and you serve with it the accompaniments that usually attend roast hare (Nos. 329, 344, &c.), or stew it, and serve it with a rich thickened sauce garnished with forcemeat b.a.l.l.s (No. 379), the most fastidious palate will have no reason to regret that the game season is over.

To make this into hare soup, see No. 241.

_Rabbit._--(No. 67.)

If your fire is clear and sharp, thirty minutes will roast a young, and forty a full-grown rabbit.

When you lay it down, baste it with b.u.t.ter, and dredge it lightly and carefully with flour, that you may have it frothy, and of a fine light brown. While the rabbit is roasting, boil its liver[142-*] with some parsley; when tender, chop them together, and put half the mixture into some melted b.u.t.ter, reserving the other half for garnish, divided into little hillocks. Cut off the head, and lay half on each side of the dish.

_Obs._ A fine, well-grown (but young) warren rabbit, kept some time after it has been killed, and roasted with a stuffing in its belly, eats very like a hare, to the nature of which it approaches. It is nice, nouris.h.i.+ng food when young, but hard and unwholesome when old. For sauces, Nos. 287, 298, and 329.

_Pheasant._--(No. 68.)

Requires a smart fire, but not a fierce one. Thirty minutes will roast a young bird, and forty or fifty a full-grown pheasant. Pick and draw it, cut a slit in the back of the neck, and take out the craw, but don't cut the head off; wipe the inside of the bird with a clean cloth, twist the legs close to the body, leave the feet on, but cut the toes off; don't turn the head under the wing, but truss it like a fowl, it is much easier to carve; baste it, b.u.t.ter and froth it, and prepare sauce for it (Nos. 321 and 329). See the instructions in receipts to roast fowls and turkeys, Nos. 57 and 58.

_Obs._ We believe the rarity of this bird is its best recommendation; and the character given it by an ingenious French author is just as good as it deserves. "Its flesh is naturally tough, and owes all its tenderness and succulence to the long time it is kept before it is cooked;" until it is "_bien mortifiee_," it is uneatable[142-+].

Therefore, instead of "_sus per col_," suspend it by one of the long tail-feathers, and the pheasant's falling from it is the criterion of its ripeness and readiness for the spit.

Our president of the committee of taste (who is indefatigable in his endeavours to improve the health, as well as promote the enjoyment, of his fellow-students in the school of good living, and to whom the epicure, the economist, and the valetudinarian are equally indebted for his careful revision of this work, and especially for introducing that salutary maxim into the kitchen, that "the salubrious is ever a superior consideration to the savoury," and indeed, the rational epicure only relishes the latter when entirely subordinate to the former), has suggested to us, that the detachment of the feather cannot take place until the body of the bird has advanced more than one degree beyond the state of wholesome _haut-gout_, and become "_trop mortifiee_;" and that to enjoy this game in perfection, you must have a brace of birds killed the same day; these are to be put in suspense as above directed, and when one of them _drops_, the hour is come that the spit should be introduced to his companion:--

"_Ultra citraque nequit consistere r.e.c.t.u.m._"

_Mock Pheasant._--(No. 69.)

If you have only one pheasant, and wish for a companion for it, get a fine young fowl, of as near as may be the same size as the bird to be matched, and make game of it by trussing it like a pheasant, and dressing it according to the above directions. Few persons will discover the pheasant from the fowl, especially if the latter has been kept four or five days.

The peculiar flavour of the pheasant (like that of other game) is princ.i.p.ally acquired by long keeping.

_Guinea and Pea Fowls_,--(No. 69*.)

Are dressed in the same way as pheasants.

_Partridges_,--(No. 70.)

Are cleaned and trussed in the same manner as a pheasant (but the ridiculous custom of tucking the legs into each other makes them very troublesome to carve); the breast is so plump, it will require almost as much roasting; send up with them rich sauce (No. 321*), or bread sauce (No. 321), and good gravy (No. 329).

? If you wish to preserve them longer than you think they will keep good undressed, half roast them, they will then keep two or three days longer; or make a pie of them.

_Black c.o.c.k_ (No. 71), _Moor Game_ (No. 72), _and Grouse_, (No. 73.)

Are all to be dressed like partridges; the black c.o.c.k will take as much as a pheasant, and moor game and grouse as the partridge. Send up with them currant-jelly and fried bread-crumbs (No. 320).

_Wild Ducks._--(No. 74.)

For roasting a wild duck, you must have a clear, brisk fire, and a hot spit; it must be browned upon the outside, without being sodden within.

To have it well frothed and full of gravy is the nicety. Prepare the fire by stirring and raking it just before the bird is laid down, and fifteen or twenty minutes will do it in the fas.h.i.+onable way; but if you like it a little more done, allow it a few minutes longer; if it is too much, it will lose its flavour.

For the sauce, see No. 338 and No. 62.

_Widgeons and Teal_,--(No. 75.)

Are dressed exactly as the wild duck; only that less time is requisite for a widgeon, and still less for a teal.

_Woodc.o.c.k._--(No. 76.)

Woodc.o.c.ks should not be drawn, as the trail is by the lovers of "_haut gout_" considered a "_bonne bouche_;" truss their legs close to the body, and run an iron skewer through each thigh, close to the body, and tie them on a small bird spit; put them to roast at a clear fire; cut as many slices of bread as you have birds, toast or fry them a delicate brown, and lay them in the dripping-pan under the birds to catch the trail;[144-*] baste them with b.u.t.ter, and froth them with flour; lay the toast on a hot dish, and the birds on the toast; pour some good beef gravy into the dish, and send some up in a boat, see _Obs._ to No. 329: twenty or thirty minutes will roast them. Garnish with slices of lemon.

_Obs._--Some epicures like this bird very much under-done, and direct that a woodc.o.c.k should be just introduced to the cook, for her to show it the fire, and then send it up to table.

_Snipes_,--(No. 77.)

Differ little from woodc.o.c.ks, unless in size; they are to be dressed in the same way, but require about five minutes less time to roast them.

For sauce, see No. 338.

_Pigeons._--(No. 78.)