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Beef, Bachelor's, Stew
Take a piece of meat weighing from three to four pounds. If beef, from the rump, fillet, or buttock, or a fillet of veal of the same weight; pepper and brown the meat in a stewpan, using a small quantity of good butter. Cut up two or three carrots into thick slices, remove the white parts of them with an apple-corer, and place them on the top of the meat. Then add three-quarters of a pint of water, and cover up tightly to simmer over a very slow fire. In about three-quarters of an hour turn the meat over, but still keep the carrots on the top, and add four or five small onions, a little mushroom ketchup, and salt, and cover again tight as before. Simmer on the side of the fire for another hour or more, but always observing to add a little boiling water if required. Veal may be served up with green peas, a little ham, and the juice and rind of a lemon. Time, from one hour and three-quarters to two hours. Sufficient for four persons. Average cost, 3s. 6d.
A one-pot braise with almost no liquid, built to look after itself on the cool side of a coal range. The transfer to a modern hob or oven is straightforward, but the timing is optimistic.
- The hinge: keep it barely simmeringThree-quarters of a pint of water for a 3-4 lb joint is a braise, not a stew, and it relies on a tight lid and the gentlest heat. On a gas or electric hob use the smallest burner at its lowest setting, or move the covered pan to a 300F oven, which holds the temperature far more reliably than "the side of the fire".
- Cuts'Buttock' is an older name for the round, so rump and buttock correspond broadly to modern rump, topside/top round and silverside; British 'fillet' here is the beef tenderloin, which is wasted on a two-hour braise and will go dry. Use rump, top round or, better still, chuck. Veal 'fillet' in this period usually meant meat from the leg, sold today as veal leg or cutlet meat.
- TimingOne and three-quarter to two hours will get a 3-4 lb piece of round only to the tough-but-cooked stage. Expect 2.5 to 3 hours, and judge by feel: the meat should yield to a fork with no springiness. Chuck may take longer still.
- Liquid measureThree-quarters of an imperial pint is 15 fl oz, about 1.75 US cups. Top up with boiling, not cold, water so the pan never drops out of a simmer.
- Coring the carrotsOlder carrot varieties had a pale, fibrous core that stayed woody through long cooking, hence the apple-corer. Modern carrots do not need it, so slice them thick and skip the step; keeping them on top of the meat, as the recipe insists, holds them clear of the small amount of liquid so they steam rather than boil.
- Mushroom ketchupA thin, dark, salty mushroom-and-spice liquor, not tomato ketchup. It is still sold by some British specialists; a tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce, or soy sauce with a little mushroom soaking liquid, gives a similar savoury depth.
- Salt lateSalt goes in with the onions, roughly halfway. With so little liquid the seasoning concentrates as it reduces, so season lightly then correct at the end.
- The veal variationPeas, chopped ham, and lemon juice and zest are finishing additions, not braising ones. Add the peas in the last ten minutes and the lemon off the heat, or the acid will dull the peas and the zest will turn bitter.
- Yield and costFour generous portions, with potatoes or bread to catch the small amount of concentrated gravy. The 3s. 6d. is a nineteenth-century figure and cannot be converted usefully; it is offered by the book as a guide to household budgeting rather than as evidence of cheapness.
The "bachelor's" label in a Victorian household book generally marks a dish that needs no cook, no sauce-making, no second pan and almost no attention -- the sort of thing pitched at a man living in lodgings with a single fire. The "Time / Sufficient / Average cost" formula belongs to the Victorian dictionary-style cookery books, which ran large numbers of such entries alphabetically, and slow braises of this kind, differing mainly in the flavouring liquor, are common in them. Mushroom ketchup was the period's default savoury bottle, older than tomato ketchup and at this date still more common in English kitchens; it was a usual way of giving a plain water-braise the depth that a stock pot would otherwise supply. The instruction to core the carrots with an apple-corer reflects older vegetable varieties rather than fussiness, and the direction to simmer "on the side of the fire" describes the cooler edge of a coal range top, the closest thing a small household had to a low oven.