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Curry Croquettes
The remains of any kind of cold meat will do for this dish. Free half a pound of meat from skin and gristle and excess of fat, and pass it through the mincer. Have ready some boiled rice. Put into a saucepan one ounce of butter and one small chopped onion, fry it, but do not let it get brown, then stir in a dessertspoonful of curry powder and half an ounce of flour. When cooked, but not browned, add the meat and the juice of a quarter of a lemon; let this cook a little longer, and mix in the boiled rice, and one gill of stock. Beat up one egg, and add it to the mixture; stir just long enough to bind the egg, add a pinch of salt, and spread the mixture on a dish. When cold, shape into balls of equal size, egg and bread-crumb them, and fry in boiling fat to a light brown. Drain, and dish up in a pile, garnished with fried parsley. Probable cost, 1s. 3d.
A Victorian way of turning Sunday's cold joint into something worth serving again. The one thing to get right is the moisture: the mixture must be stiff enough to hold a ball after chilling, and the recipe gives you no rice quantity to guide you.
- The hinge: a firm, well-chilled pasteAdd the stock cautiously and stop when the mixture just holds together in a mass — a wet paste will burst in the fat. Spread it thin on a plate and refrigerate at least two hours, or overnight, before shaping.
- A gillIn a British book of this period, a gill is a quarter of an imperial pint, about 5 fl oz (150 ml). Treat it as a maximum rather than a fixed amount.
- Unspecified rice"Some boiled rice" is genuinely open. About 4 to 6 oz cooked weight (roughly a cup) against half a pound of meat gives a mixture that binds without tasting like a rice ball; more rice means less stock.
- Curry powderA dessertspoonful is roughly two teaspoons. Commercial British curry powders of this period are generally reckoned to have been milder and more turmeric-forward than many blends sold today — taste the roux and adjust before the meat goes in.
- Cook the powder outFrying the curry powder and flour in the butter without browning is what removes the raw, dusty edge. Give it a full minute or two over low heat; scorched curry powder turns bitter and cannot be rescued.
- Egg as binder, off the heat"Stir just long enough to bind the egg" means residual heat only. Let the pan cool a moment before the egg goes in, or it will scramble into threads instead of setting the mixture.
- Boiling fatVictorian shorthand for deep fat hot enough to brown quickly; in modern terms around 350-375F (175-190C). The croquettes are already cooked through, so you are only colouring the crumb — two to three minutes is enough.
- Fried parsleyDry sprigs thoroughly, then drop into the same fat for a few seconds until they stop hissing and turn brilliant green. Wet parsley spits violently.
- YieldAbout eight to ten croquettes, enough for three or four as a light main course with chutney and a salad.
Croquettes were a mainstay of the late-Victorian and Edwardian kitchen, and Cassell's, like Mrs Beeton before it, devotes considerable space to what could be done with "the remains" of a joint — without reliable cold storage, cold meat had to be used quickly, and disguising it well was a professional virtue. The curry powder here is the domesticated British kind: an all-purpose blend sold ready-mixed by grocers from the late eighteenth century onward, a shorthand for the flavour of Anglo-Indian cookery rather than any dish from India. Rice bound into the mixture rather than served alongside it reads as a thrift measure. The closing "probable cost, 1s. 3d." is characteristic of the book, which costed its dishes as a guide to household expenditure.