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Hotch-Potch
Take two pounds of the narrow half of the round of beef. Cut it into pieces about two inches square, and put them into a stewpan, with a few scraps of fat beef or veal, five pints of water, and half a pint of beer. Let these boil up, then add two large carrots sliced, two onions, two sticks of celery, two turnips, and some pieces of cauliflower. Cover the saucepan closely, and simmer gently for three hours. Melt two ounces of butter in a saucepan. Mix a table-spoonful of flour smoothly with it. Let it brown, dilute it with a little of the broth, season with ketchup, and add it to the rest of the stew. Let the broth boil up once more, and add pepper and salt to taste. Serve in a large dish. Put the meat in the middle, the vegetables round, the gravy over all, and send to table as hot as possible. Hotch-potch may be made with beef, mutton, lamb, fowl, or pickled pork, and with vegetables varying according to the season. A mixture of two kinds of meat is very good, and some cooks mince the meat instead of serving it in cutlets. Probable cost, 2s. for this quantity. Sufficient for six or seven persons.
A long-simmered beef and vegetable stew of the plainest sort, written when broth and boiled meat were expected to come to the table together. The one change worth making is the timing of the vegetables.
- Stagger the vegetablesThree hours will reduce sliced carrot, turnip, celery and cauliflower to threads. Give the meat two hours on its own, add the root vegetables for the last 40 minutes and the cauliflower for the last 10.
- Imperial liquid measuresFive imperial pints is 100 fl oz, about 12 US cups or 2.8 litres; the half pint of beer is 10 fl oz, roughly 285 ml. A mild brown ale or bitter arguably suits it better than anything strongly hoppy.
- The cut of beefThe "narrow half of the round" is best understood as the lean end of the round (topside or silverside) — very lean, and after three hours' simmering it is likely to be dry and stringy rather than tender, despite the scraps of fat the recipe adds. Chuck, shin or brisket gives the same 2 lb of stewing meat with the connective tissue that makes it succulent.
- Ketchup means mushroom ketchupIn a book of this date, unqualified "ketchup" is the thin, dark, salty mushroom or walnut sauce, not tomato. Mushroom ketchup is still sold; Worcestershire sauce or a spoonful of soy is the nearest substitute. Start with a teaspoon and taste.
- Simmer, do not boil"Boil up, then simmer gently" is the whole method. A rolling boil will emulsify the fat into the broth and leave it cloudy and greasy; hold it at a bare tremble, lid on, and skim in the first ten minutes.
- Brown the roux properlyTwo ounces of butter to one tablespoon of flour is a very loose roux by modern proportions — closer to a tablespoon of butter's worth of thickening in a lot of fat. Cook it to a nut brown for flavour, then whisk in hot broth off the heat to avoid lumps; if the finished stew is thinner than you want, reduce it rather than adding more flour.
- Salt at the endThe recipe seasons only after three hours, which is sensible: under a close lid the liquid still concentrates somewhat, and beer and mushroom ketchup both bring salt of their own.
- Yield and serviceSix or seven portions, as stated. Served as directed — meat heaped in the centre of a warmed dish, vegetables around, gravy over — it needs boiled potatoes or bread and nothing else.
Hotch-potch is the English spelling of a word that runs back through Middle English hochepot to Old French hochepot, from hocher, to shake or jumble together; the legal term "hotchpot", for property pooled and redivided among heirs, comes from the same root, though the earliest attestations of the legal and culinary senses lie close together and their order is disputed. In Scotland the name attached itself particularly to a summer soup of young lamb or mutton with the season's first peas, carrots and turnips. Cassell's, characteristically, gives a generic frame instead: a cheap cut, water, a little beer, whatever vegetables the season offers, and a note that beef, mutton, lamb, fowl or pickled pork will all do. The costing — two shillings for six or seven people — is the point of the entry as much as the method, since this is a dish designed to turn a cheap cut into a full table.