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Lamb, Fricassee Of
Take a breast of lamb, cut it into small pieces about an inch and a half square, season these with a little pepper and salt, and put them into a stewpan with an onion stuck with four cloves, a sprig of basil, two bay-leaves, and three ounces of fresh butter. Cover the stewpan closely, and let it steam gently for half an hour, shaking it occasionally to prevent sticking. Pour over it a pint of boiling water, cover closely once more, and simmer for an hour. At the end of that time strain the sauce, and thicken it with a table-spoonful of flour, mixed smoothly with a little water; stir into it three dessert-spoonfuls of chopped capers; boil all two or three minutes longer, and serve on a hot dish. Garnish with parsley and slices of lemon. Time to stew, about an hour and a half. Probable cost, 10d. per pound. Sufficient for three or four persons.
A plain braise of breast of lamb in butter and water, finished with a caper sauce. Nothing here is difficult, but the cut and the fat both need managing.
- The cutBreast of lamb is the belly flap — layered fat, thin meat and rib bone. Most butchers will sell it cheaply if you ask ahead, and it is often sold as a whole rolled joint. Ask for it bone-in and cut across the ribs into the inch-and-a-half pieces called for; boneless breast works but shrinks a good deal.
- Degrease before you thickenThree ounces of butter plus the fat rendered from a breast will leave a substantial slick on the strained liquid. Let it settle a few minutes and skim, or chill it briefly, before adding the flour. Skipping this is the difference between a sauce and an oil emulsion.
- Dessert-spoonfulsA dessert-spoon is roughly two teaspoons, so three of them is about two tablespoons of chopped capers. Rinse brined capers first; salted ones need soaking, since the meat is already seasoned.
- The sauce will be thinOne tablespoon of flour to a pint of liquid gives a barely napping sauce by modern taste. Either use two tablespoons of flour slaked in cold water, or reduce the strained liquid by a third before thickening. Boil it two or three minutes as directed so the flour loses its raw taste.
- The half-hour steamThis first stage is a butter sweat, not a browning — keep the heat low and the lid tight so the lamb gives up juice without colouring. It is what keeps the finished dish pale, which is what "fricassee" implies.
- TimingAn hour of simmering after the sweat is the minimum for breast; an hour and a half to two will get the meat properly yielding and the fat fully rendered. Judge by texture, not the clock.
- Basil and bayA sprig of basil means fresh, and it is best added in the last twenty minutes rather than at the start, where an hour and a half of heat will flatten it entirely. Two bay leaves for a pint of liquid is on the assertive side; one is enough for most palates.
- Cost and yield"10d. per pound" is ten old pence, pre-decimal, and useful only as a signal that this was a cheap dish. The stated three or four servings is fair if you allow about three-quarters of a pound of bone-in breast per person and serve potatoes or plain rice alongside.
Fricassee comes from the French fricasser, often glossed as to fry and stew in one pan, though the word's own origin is obscure and that explanation is traditional rather than established. By the nineteenth century it described a pale stew of white meat abbit — cooked without browning and finished with a light sauce. Cassell's version is an economical English adaptation: the classic French finish with cream and egg yolks is dropped in favour of a flour-thickened liquor and capers, which puts it squarely in the tradition of boiled mutton with caper sauce, one of the staple joints of the Victorian dinner table. The choice of breast is the point of the entry. It appears in a dictionary of cookery aimed at households watching the butcher's bill, and breast of lamb was among the cheapest cuts available — fatty, bony, and rewarding only if given long, gentle heat. Capers and lemon do the same job here that they did with boiled mutton: sharp notes to cut through fat that no amount of skimming quite removes.