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To Make the Jelly
Take one cow heel, one large shank of beef, five pounds of knuckle of veal, two onions, a bouquet of sweet herbs; put all on to boil in six quarts of water, with salt and spices. Carefully remove the scum as it rises; let it boil seven hours; strain and set away to cool. When cold remove the fat; turn the jelly into the stewpan, being careful to leave the sediment; add the stock from the turkey bones, also the gravy which came from the turkey while roasting; the whites and shells of six eggs. Set on the fire; when it boils draw it aside and let it stand fifteen or twenty minutes. Run through a flannel jelly bag, and season with Worcester sauce. Place the turkey in a mould in which you have previously put a small quantity of the jelly to form; pour in the rest and set away to cool. When required, turn out on a platter.
This is the aspic for a moulded cold turkey, and it is really two operations: a long collagen extraction, then a clarification. Neither is difficult, but the second is unforgiving of a rolling boil.
- The hinge: never let the clarification boil hardOnce the egg whites and shells go in, bring the stock up slowly and pull it aside the moment it lifts. A hard boil shreds the raft and drives the coagulated albumen back through the liquid, and no amount of straining will make it clear again.
- Cow heel and knuckle of vealBoth are collagen, which is the entire point — this jelly sets without added gelatine. Cow heel (ox foot) is still sold at halal and Caribbean butchers; split pig's trotters work the same way. Veal knuckle can usually be ordered from a butcher as "veal knuckle bones, sawn." Five pounds of veal knuckle, plus the cow heel and beef shank, in six quarts of water is a generous ratio and should set firm.
- Seven hours is not an exaggerationCollagen converts to gelatine slowly at a bare simmer. Keep the surface barely trembling; a genuine boil emulsifies the fat into the liquid and clouds the finished jelly beyond rescue.
- "Spices"Unspecified, as was usual. For a savoury aspic, a dozen peppercorns, two cloves, a blade of mace and a bay leaf with the herb bouquet is in period and will not fight the turkey.
- A flannel jelly bagA conical bag of napped wool, scalded before use. Four layers of damp cheesecloth in a sieve, or a wetted cotton pillowcase, do the same job. Let it drip untouched — squeezing pushes fines through and undoes the clarification.
- Cool it fast, not slowlyThe instruction to "set away to cool" assumes a cold larder. Six quarts of stock left on a modern counter sits in the bacterial danger zone for hours. Divide it among shallow pans, chill quickly, and refrigerate; the fat cap lifts off just as cleanly.
- Test the set before you commitChill a spoonful on a saucer. It should be firm enough to hold a cut edge at refrigerator temperature. If it is slack, reduce the clarified stock further, or bloom a little gelatine into it — roughly a teaspoon or more of powdered gelatine per cup, adjusting by test until a chilled spoonful holds a cut edge.
- Moulding and turning outThe thin first layer sets a clear base so the turkey does not sit against the metal. Dip the mould in hot water for five to ten seconds, no longer, before inverting. The quantity here is large, and there will likely be jelly left over after a single mould is filled.
- ServingA moulded turkey on this scale is a buffet dish for twelve or more. Keep it refrigerated until the moment it goes to the table; aspic softens and weeps quickly in a warm room.
Aspic like this was the standard finish for cold poultry on Victorian and Edwardian sideboards, and its logic is thrift as much as display: the turkey carcass, the roasting-pan gravy and the trimmings all go back into the pot, so nothing from the roast is wasted. The clarification with egg white and crushed shell is a technique often associated with classical French practice, though it was long established in English kitchens too — the raft traps suspended particles as it rises — and cookbooks of this period may well have assumed a cook already knew it, which could explain why the instruction here is only three clauses long. The recipe reads as the second half of a larger dish, most likely a boned and moulded turkey served cold the day after a roast. Worcestershire sauce as the seasoning is the Anglo-American touch.