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GOOSE, GRAVY FOR (another way)
Put the giblets of the goose into a saucepan, with half a pound of gravy-beef, three or four green sage-leaves, two small onions, a piece of toasted crust, some whole pepper, a little salt, and three pints of water. Bring the liquid to a boil, skim, and simmer gently for two hours and a half. Strain, and thicken with a little flour, and boil once more. Before serving, a glass of port or claret may be added, if liked. Probable cost, 8d., exclusive of the giblets and wine. Sufficient for two pints and a half of gravy.
A giblet gravy built as a proper stock: three pints reduced slowly to two and a half, then lightly thickened. Nothing here is difficult, but the yield is generous by modern standards and the beef is doing more work than the goose.
- Quantities in modern termsThree pints is 60 fl oz / about 1.7 litres (the book uses imperial pints of 20 fl oz). Half a pound of gravy-beef is 225 g. The finished 2.5 pints is roughly 1.4 litres, which is more gravy than one goose needs; halve everything unless you want stock left over.
- Gravy-beefThis is lean shin or leg — connective-tissue-rich cuts sold for long stewing. Shin, boneless beef shank or the cheaper end of chuck all work. Its job is body and savour, not meat to serve.
- GibletsNeck, heart, gizzard and (if you want) the liver. Modern birds often come with the giblets in a sealed bag inside the cavity; if yours does not, ask the butcher. The liver turns the gravy bitter if simmered the full two and a half hours, so add it in the last twenty minutes or leave it out.
- The toasted crustA piece of well-browned bread crust, contributing colour and a faint roasted bitterness. Browning the giblets and beef hard in a little fat first does the same job more reliably; use both if you like.
- Skimming is the hingeSkim thoroughly as it comes to the boil, as the recipe directs, and keep the pot at a bare tremble afterwards. A hard simmer works the fat into the liquid and the gravy can taste greasy as a result.
- Thickening"A little flour" is roughly 1 tbsp per pint of strained liquid. Slake it in cold water or work it into an equal weight of butter first, whisk in, and boil a full minute or two to cook out the raw starch.
- SageThree or four fresh leaves for around 1.7 litres is a light hand — the goose stuffing usually carries the sage. Dried sage is much stronger; a pinch is plenty.
- The wineA "glass" in books of this period is usually reckoned at about 2 to 2.5 fl oz / 60–70 ml. Add it off the heat at the end, or boil it briefly to drive off some of the alcohol; port makes the gravy noticeably sweeter than claret.
Roast goose was the standard festive bird in British households well before turkey displaced it, and it arrives at the table having given up a great deal of fat and very little useful pan juice — hence the long tradition of making its gravy separately from the giblets while the bird roasts. Cassell's New Dictionary of Cookery, a late-Victorian household compendium that ran through many editions, characteristically gives several versions of the same preparation and prices each one: the 8d. costing here reflects a period when cookery books were addressed to households keeping accounts as closely as they kept recipes. The sage is not incidental — sage and onion is the near-invariable English seasoning for goose and duck, and its use with fat birds is generally traced to the belief that the herb aided digestion of rich meat.