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Lobster, Potted
Pick out all the meat from a medium-sized, freshly-boiled hen lobster, and pound (the white meat of the claws should be pounded apart from the rest) it and the coral in a mortar to a smooth paste. Mix with this a tea-spoonful of anchovy sauce, a grain of cayenne, half a tea-spoonful of white pepper, the eighth part of a nutmeg, grated, and a quarter of a pound of clarified butter. A few shrimps may be added or not. When thoroughly pounded, press the mixture into jars, and pour cool clarified butter over. When the butter is set the lobster is ready to serve. Time, an hour and a half to prepare. Probable cost of lobster, 1s. 6d. Sufficient for half a dozen persons.
A straightforward potted spread, built on cooked lobster, spice and a butter seal. The only real technique is the pounding, and the only real question is how long it keeps.
- The hinge: keep the claw meat separateThe recipe asks for the white claw meat to be pounded apart from the body meat and coral, without saying why; the likely effect is that the paler meat is not wholly absorbed into the coral-pink paste. The book itself still wants everything worked to a smooth paste, so combine the two thoroughly.
- Hen lobster and coralA hen (female) lobster is specified for the coral, the dark roe that turns bright red-orange when cooked and is both colour and seasoning here. Live lobsters are rarely sold sexed now; if your lobster has no coral, the spread will be paler and slightly less rich but no less good.
- QuantitiesThe recipe says only "medium-sized", which might reasonably be taken as around 1 1/2 lb, giving something on the order of 5-6 oz of picked meat. A quarter of a pound of clarified butter is 4 oz (about 115 g), and you will need a further quantity for the seal.
- A grain of cayenneRead this as the smallest pinch, well under 1/8 teaspoon. "Eighth part of a nutmeg" grates out to roughly 1/4 teaspoon; half a teaspoon of white pepper is a lot for 6 oz of meat, so add it in stages and taste.
- Anchovy sauceBottled anchovy essence is still made, though it is far less common on shelves than it was; failing that, use about a teaspoon of anchovy paste, or one mashed oil-packed fillet. It is there for savour rather than an identifiable fish flavour.
- Mortar or machineA food processor does in thirty seconds what the mortar took the better part of an hour to do, which accounts for most of the stated hour and a half. Pulse rather than run it, and stop while there is still a little texture.
- Storage, which the original glosses overThe butter seal was the refrigeration of its day and is not adequate on its own. Refrigerate the pots as soon as the butter sets and eat within two or three days; cooked shellfish held at room temperature under fat is exactly the wrong thing to leave on a shelf.
- ServingThe book says sufficient for half a dozen persons, which for a potted spread means six small servings rather than six main-course portions. Let it stand fifteen minutes out of the fridge so the butter softens enough to spread.
Potting is one of the oldest English preserving methods still eaten for pleasure rather than necessity: meat or fish pounded fine, packed tight to exclude air, and sealed under a layer of clarified butter, a practice well established in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English cookery and still routine when Cassell's was compiled in the 1870s. Potted lobster and potted shrimp travelled well and appeared on breakfast and supper tables and in picnic hampers. The heavy hand with nutmeg, cayenne and white pepper is characteristic of potted goods generally \— spice both flavoured the paste and was believed to help it keep — and the anchovy sauce is a Victorian shortcut to depth of savour, the same instinct that put anchovy essence into so many sauces of the era.