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Fowl, to Boil
Pick, singe, and truss the fowl; press the legs into the sides, and make the breast a good shape. Plunge into hot water lightly salted, and boil gently for about three-quarters of an hour. Serve with ham, tongue, or bacon. For sauce, either parsley, lemon, or oyster is suitable. A little should be poured over the fowl, and the remainder should be served in a tureen.
A plain boiled bird, written for cooks who bought poultry whole and unplucked. The one thing to get right is the heat: the water must never move beyond a lazy simmer, or the breast tightens and dries even while it sits in liquid.
- "Boil gently" means simmerHold the water at about 180-190F, with only occasional bubbles breaking the surface. A rolling boil shreds the outside of the breast before the thigh is done and clouds the broth.
- A "fowl" is not a modern broilerIn nineteenth-century usage fowl generally meant a mature hen, tougher and more flavourful than anything sold as chicken today. Three-quarters of an hour, as given here, suits a young bird of 3-4 lb; an older hen may want considerably longer before the leg meat gives way.
- Pick and singeBoth steps assume a bird bought with feathers on. Singeing burned off the fine hairs left after plucking, once done over a spirit flame or twist of burning paper. Supermarket poultry needs neither, though a check for stray pinfeathers around the wings is worth the minute.
- TrussingPressing the legs into the sides and shaping the breast keeps the bird compact so it cooks evenly and looks presentable whole. Kitchen twine around the legs and a turn to hold the wings against the body does it.
- DonenessJudge by thermometer rather than clock: 165F in the thickest part of the thigh, away from bone. The juices from a simmered bird run pale and give little away.
- Salt and the cooking liquidThe water is only "lightly salted," which sits well with the salty accompaniments of ham, tongue or bacon. Keep the broth: it is the base for the parsley or oyster sauce and better stock than anything you will open from a carton.
- Oyster sauceIf you take that option, the oysters go in at the very end and need no more than a minute or two in the hot sauce. Anything longer and they shrink to rubber.
- ServingA 3-4 lb bird serves four, more if it is one of several dishes. The instruction to pour a little sauce over and send the rest in a tureen is worth following; a whole boiled fowl drowned in sauce looks worse, not better.
Boiled fowl was the standard treatment for a bird past its laying years, when roasting would only have proved how tough it was. Long, gentle immersion softens the connective tissue and yields a bowl of good broth as a second dividend, which is why the method persisted in British kitchens long after tender young chickens became easy to buy. The pairing with ham, tongue or bacon is a familiar Victorian contrast: pale, mild poultry against something cured, salty and pink, the two carved together on the plate.