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Beef Fritters
Scrape one pound of meat from a piece of cold roast beef, and season it with pepper and salt. Have ready a batter made with three-quarters of a pound of flour, and about half a pint of water. Blend these two well together, and stir in a piece of butter about the size of an egg, which has been melted before the fire. Whisk the whites of two eggs, and add to the batter with the scraped meat. Stir well, and drop only a small quantity at a time into the pan, when the lard or dripping is boiling. Turn, that both sides may be brown. From eight to ten minutes will be sufficient to cook them over a steady fire. Dry, and send to table on a napkin. Probable cost, about 6d. to 8d., without meat. Sufficient for two persons.
A Victorian way of using up the Sunday joint: cold roast beef scraped to a coarse mince, bound in a thick fritter batter and deep-fried. The batter proportions are the part that needs attention.
- The batter is stiff by designThree-quarters of a pound of flour (about 2 3/4 cups) to half a pint of water (10 fl oz in British measure, so 1 1/4 cups) gives a paste rather than a pourable batter. That is deliberate — it has to hold a pound of meat in suspension and drop from a spoon without spreading. Add the water gradually and stop when it is thick enough to mound.
- Half a pintThis is an English book, so the pint is 20 fl oz and the half-pint is 10 fl oz, not the American 8. The recipe also says "about", which is a signal that flour absorbency varied and you should judge by the batter.
- Butter the size of an eggRoughly 2 oz, or 4 tablespoons. Melting it "before the fire" simply means gently, without browning.
- Scraped, not choppedScraping cold beef with the edge of a spoon or a blunt knife shreds it along the grain and leaves the connective tissue behind. A food processor turns it to paste and the fritters go dense; pulse briefly or chop by hand if you are not scraping.
- Whites onlyThe two whisked whites are the only leavening in the recipe. Note that they go in together with the scraped meat; whisk them to soft peaks and fold gently so they do not collapse.
- Frying temperatureThe recipe gives no temperature. 'Boiling' lard or dripping means fat hot enough that a drop of batter surfaces and colours within seconds, which in modern terms is somewhere in the usual deep-frying range of about 350-375F. The recipe allows eight to ten minutes over a steady fire; since the meat is already cooked, colour is the guide.
- Dry, and a napkinDrain on paper and serve piled on a folded cloth — the Victorian equivalent of a rack, meant to keep the undersides from steaming soft on a hot plate.
- YieldAs stated, sufficient for two persons with the full pound of meat. The recipe does not say how many fritters that makes.
Fritters of this kind belong to the great Victorian literature of re-cooking, the branch of household economy devoted to the joint on its second and third day. The costing tells the story: sixpence to eightpence "without meat", because the meat was assumed to be already in the house and already paid for. Scraping is often said to have been the usual treatment for cold beef — a spoon drawn across the cut face lifts the muscle fibre and leaves gristle and hard edges behind, giving a texture no grinder reproduces. Fried things were commonly served on a folded napkin, for croquettes, whitebait and fried potatoes alike; the linen absorbed fat.