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Liver Cutlets
Fry in a little butter a quarter of a pound of lean ham or bacon, then half a pound of calf's liver; cut the liver into thick slices, then mince all very finely, adding one ounce of fine bread-crumbs, a table-spoonful of dried herbs, pepper and salt to taste, a mushroom chopped fine, and a tea-cupful of good brown gravy. Shape the mixture into small cutlets, brush over with egg and crumbs, and fry in boiling fat. Drain, place a tiny piece of macaroni at the end of each to imitate a bone, and serve very hot.
A Victorian croquette dressed up as a chop: cooked liver and ham minced, bound with gravy and crumbs, then shaped, breaded and fried. The whole thing stands or falls on the wetness of the mixture.
- Bind first, then chillA teacupful of gravy into half a pound of liver and an ounce of crumbs gives a very soft mixture that will slump in the pan. Add the gravy a spoonful at a time until the mince just holds together, then chill it for at least an hour before shaping so the cutlets keep their edges.
- A teacupfulVictorian teacup measures were not standardised; a teacupful was commonly reckoned at roughly a gill to a third of a pint (about 5-6 fl oz). Treat it as an upper limit rather than a measurement to hit.
- Don't cook the liver twice overThe liver is fried, minced, then fried again inside the cutlet. Give the slices only enough time in the butter to firm and lose their raw colour in the centre; liver taken to well done at this stage turns grainy and chalky in the finished cutlet.
- Mincing'mince all very finely' would have meant a knife on a board or a hand mincer, either of which leaves some texture. A food processor pulsed a few times will do it; run it continuously and you get pate.
- Dried herbsA tablespoon of dried herbs probably points to the mixed sweet-herb blends of the period, typically thyme, marjoram and parsley, though the recipe names none. Start with a teaspoon and taste the raw mixture off a fried scrap.
- Boiling fatDeep fat at 350-375F. Below that the egg-and-crumb coat soaks; above it the crumbs colour before the inside is hot through, which matters here since the filling is already cooked and needs only three to four minutes.
- The macaroni boneA short length of macaroni set into the end of each cutlet after frying, as the recipe directs. The original does not say whether it is raw or cooked, and it appears to be decoration rather than something to eat.
- YieldRoughly eight small cutlets, enough for three or four as a light main course or a savoury entree.
Cassell's belongs to the era when the English kitchen was expected to turn cheap offal into something that looked like a company dish, and the liver cutlet is the technique in miniature: a mince bound with gravy, moulded to the outline of a lamb chop and finished with a stub of macaroni standing in for the bone. The macaroni bone turns up in other period recipes for moulded and forcemeat mixtures, and it suggests how much Victorian dining cared about the look of a dish on the platter. Liver was among the cheaper butcher's goods, calf's liver the mildest and dearest of them, and pairing it with fried ham or bacon both seasoned the mixture and supplied fat that liver lacks. Dishes of this kind sat in the ambiguous space between the entree and the savoury, appearing at luncheon or as a made dish built from what the larder already held.