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Partridges, Braised, with Celery Sauce
Singe, draw, wipe, and truss two partridges with their wings inside. Lay a piece of pork rind in a saucepan, adding one carrot and one onion, both cut in slices, two bay-leaves, one sprig of thyme, and the two partridges. Season with a pinch of salt and pepper. When they have assumed a good golden colour, moisten with half a pint of white broth, then put the saucepan in the oven, and let the birds cook for twenty minutes. Serve with a pint of hot celery sauce poured over. (See CELERY SAUCE.)
A short entry that assumes you have already read the rest of the book: it gives no oven temperature, no finishing step, and cross-references its own sauce. A few points fill the gaps.
- The pork rind is the pointThe rind lining the pan renders as it heats, greasing the vegetables and giving the birds something to brown against without scorching. A couple of ounces of fatty bacon or salt pork skin does the same job; without it the whole thing sticks and burns.
- There is a browning step hidden in the wording"When they have assumed a good golden colour" means you colour the birds and vegetables on the stovetop first, uncovered, over moderate heat. Only then do you add liquid and move the pan to the oven.
- White brothA pale unthickened stock, made from veal or poultry and not browned first. Any light chicken stock works; avoid dark beef stock, which will muddy both the colour and the celery sauce.
- Half a pintCassell's is working in imperial measure, so half a pint is 10 fl oz, about 1¼ US cups. It should come partway up the birds, not cover them.
- Oven heatNot stated. A moderate oven, 350F, is right for a braise of this length; the birds are already coloured, so nothing is gained by going hotter.
- Twenty minutes is for young birdsA young partridge of about 1 lb will be done in roughly that time; current guidance for game birds is an internal temperature of 165F, with the thigh juices running clear. An older bird, or anything frozen and defrosted, will still be tough at twenty minutes and wants 40-50 minutes. Cook to temperature rather than to the clock.
- SubstitutingFarmed partridge is sold by game dealers and online; two poussins or Cornish hens braise the same way and take about the same time, though the flavour is milder.
- The pan liquidA pint of celery sauce over two small birds is generous by modern taste. Strain the braising liquid and stir a few spoonfuls into the sauce before serving; it is the most flavourful thing in the pan, and the recipe makes no further use of it.
- YieldTwo partridges serve two as a main course, or four as a small course in the multi-course dinners this book was written for.
Braising game birds with celery is often recommended in Victorian cookery writing for a practical reason: partridge shot in autumn is lean, and older birds are dry and sinewy when roasted, so the covered pan with rind, root vegetables and a little stock salvaged what the spit would ruin. Celery came into season alongside the game season, and a celery sauce was one of the recognised accompaniments to partridge, pheasant and boiled fowl, appearing in that role in English cookery books through the nineteenth century. The bare, telegraphic style here is characteristic of the dictionary format: readers were expected to look up CELERY SAUCE separately, and to know already what singeing, drawing and trussing involved.