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Leveret, Roasted
Leverets may be used when hares are out of season; they should be trussed in the same way, and may be stuffed or not (with hare stuffing), according to preference. A leveret is best when larded, but if this cannot be done, cover it either with thin slices of fat bacon or with a thickly-buttered piece of white paper. Roast it before a brisk fire, and baste it constantly, and a few minutes before it is taken down remove the bacon or paper, dredge a little flour over it, and froth it nicely. Serve it very hot, and send red currant jelly to table with it as well as the following gravy, a little of which may be put in the dish and the rest in a tureen. Thicken half a pint of stock with a small piece of butter rolled in flour, let it boil for about ten minutes, then stir a wine-glassful of port into it, boil up once more, and serve. Time, an hour to roast the leveret. Sufficient for four or five persons. Probable cost, 4s.
A Victorian spit-roasting recipe that translates readily to an oven, provided you keep the animal covered and basted — young hare is very lean and dries out fast.
- What a leveret isA leveret is a hare in its first year, and noticeably smaller than a full-grown hare, though dressed weights vary a good deal. Wild hare is not sold in most supermarkets; a game dealer will supply one, and a large rabbit is a common stand-in, though the meat is paler and milder.
- A brisk fireThe original means an open fire with the meat turning in front of it. The book gives no oven temperature; as a modern approximation, start hot and then moderate — roughly 425F for the first 15 minutes, then 350F for the remainder — with the bacon or buttered paper left in place.
- Larding and the baconThis is the hinge of the recipe. Lean young hare has almost no internal fat, so either lard the saddle and legs with strips of pork fat or wrap the whole thing in fat bacon. Skipping both, even with constant basting, gives dry meat.
- Buttered white paperA greased paper wrapper, the period's answer to foil. Use parchment, well buttered, tied in place with kitchen string; ordinary paper and foil both work, but foil steams rather than roasts.
- Froth it nicelyAfter the covering comes off, dust with flour, baste with the hot fat and return to a hot oven for a few minutes so the flour blisters into a light golden crust. It is a browning step, nothing more.
- The hour to roastAn hour suits a small leveret near a fierce fire. Judging by temperature is more reliable: much beyond about 160F at the thickest part of the leg the meat dries and toughens, though it will not be pink at that point.
- Half a pint of stockTen fluid ounces in imperial measure, so about a cup and a quarter. A wine-glassful in this period is usually reckoned at around 2 fl oz. Use good brown or game stock; butter rolled in flour is a beurre manié, and the recipe's ten minutes of boiling cooks out the raw flour taste.
- YieldFour to five as written, which is realistic for a small leveret only if the gravy, jelly and a substantial side of potatoes are doing their share.
Hare being "out of season" in Victorian Britain was a customary, culinary matter rather than a statutory one, so a cook working outside the season had to find something else os standstandanding in when hares are out of season. The pairing with red currant jelly and port is the standard nineteenth-century treatment for all dark game, meant to answer the meat's strong, slightly iron taste with sweetness and acid. The instruction to lard, and the fallback of bacon or buttered paper, reflects how much leaner wild game is than farmed meat. The costing at 4s. is a reminder of the book's audience: it was written for households keeping accounts, where the price of a dish mattered as much as the method.