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Goose Soup
When a goose is boiled, a good soup may be made of the liquid, but it is well to use stock, instead of water, in which to boil the bird. Put the giblets as well into the saucepan, together with half a pound of lean ham, an onion, a carrot, and a head of celery, or half a tea-spoonful of pounded celery-seed. Skim well and simmer gently, until the goose is sufficiently cooked. Take it up, together with the giblets, the former of which may be served with onion sauce, and the latter made into a pie. Strain the soup, season it with cayenne, and add half a tumblerful of sherry or Madeira. No salt will be required if the ham has been used. Time to boil, two hours. Sufficient for two quarts of soup. Probable cost, 8d., exclusive of the meat and wine.
A frugal Victorian two-for-one: the goose is poached for the table and its broth becomes the soup. The instructions assume you already have stock and a bird large enough to feed a household.
- The hinge: skim, and skim againGoose is very fatty, and the whole success of this soup depends on removing that fat. Skim continuously during simmering, then chill the strained broth and lift the solidified cap off before reheating. Unskimmed, it is close to undrinkable.
- Two hours is for a boiling gooseTwo hours is for a large, mature bird gently poached. A modern goose of 8-10 lb may reach 165F at the thigh sooner than that; go by temperature rather than the clock, and pull the bird out when it is done rather than letting it collapse into the broth.
- GibletsA giblet set usually comprises gizzard, heart, liver and neck. Many cooks keep the liver out of a broth, as it can turn it bitter and cloudy; save it for the pie or a pate. Modern birds often come with the giblets in a bag in the cavity.
- Half a tumblerfulA Victorian tumbler ran roughly 8-10 fl oz, so this is about half a cup of sherry or Madeira. Add it at the end, off the boil, and use a dry amontillado or a Sercial rather than a sweet cream sherry.
- Salt and the hamThe advice to add no salt assumes a heavily brine-cured ham. Supermarket ham is milder, and if you are also using commercial stock the salt levels are unpredictable. Taste at the end and adjust.
- Celery seedHalf a teaspoon of pounded celery seed stands in for a whole head of celery. Ground celery seed is potent and slightly bitter; err low, as a scant half teaspoon in two quarts is plenty.
- Yield and servingTwo quarts, or six to eight first-course servings. The broth is thin by design; if you want body, reduce it rather than thickening, since the flavour is rich enough to take concentrating.
- CostEightpence excluding meat and wine is the cost of the vegetables and seasoning alone, a reminder that the recipe was sold as a way of getting a second dish out of an expense already incurred.
The entry is an argument for economy, showing how one goose yields a boiled bird with onion sauce, a giblet pie and two quarts of soup. Boiled goose is largely forgotten now, roasting having won out, but a tough older bird or a spent breeder repaid slow poaching in a way it never repaid the oven. Boiling in stock rather than water was a common habit of Victorian professional kitchens. The sherry or Madeira finish and the cayenne belong to a period taste that often seasoned clear soups with fortified wine.