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Partridges, Roast
Let the partridges hang as long as possible, or the flesh will be hard and flavourless. In cool weather they should be kept fully a fortnight before they are put down to the fire. They may be trussed either with or without the head, though the latter mode is at present more generally preferred. Pluck, singe, and draw the birds, and wipe them carefully, inside and out; cut off the heads, and leave enough skin on the neck to skewer them securely. Draw the legs close to the breast, pass the trussing-needle and string through the pinions and the middle joints of the thighs, and tie and skewer the legs. If the heads are left on, they should be brought round, and turned under the wing, with the bill laid on the breast. To give the birds a plump appearance, pass the needle through the back, below the thighs, then again through the body and legs, and tie the strings firmly. Put the birds down before a clear fire, baste liberally with butter (a quarter of a pound will be required for a brace), and a few minutes before they are taken up flour them well, so that they may brown nicely. The birds may be dished upon fried bread-crumbs, or upon a slice of buttered toast which has been soaked in the gravy in the pan under them, or they may be put on a hot dish, and garnished with water-cress. Brown gravy and bread-sauce should be sent to table with them; two or three thin slices of fat bacon, tied round the birds before they are put down to the fire, will greatly improve their flavour; when obtainable, a large vine-leaf may be laid on the breasts under the bacon. Time to roast a brace of partridges, thirty to forty minutes. Probable cost, 3s. per brace; but the price varies considerably. Sufficient for four or five persons.
An open-fire roast written for birds bought in the feather from a game dealer. The method translates to an oven without much loss, provided the fat is kept up and the cooking kept short.
- Hanging, sensiblyA fortnight in a Victorian larder assumed a cold, airy game safe in autumn, not a modern kitchen. Three to seven days at 0-4C, uncovered and hung by the neck in a refrigerator or cold outhouse, gives all the flavour development most cooks want; discard any bird that smells sour or ammoniac rather than gamey.
- Buy them dressedPlucking, singeing and drawing are the bulk of the labour here and any game dealer will do them. Ask for oven-ready birds with the neck skin left long, which is what the trussing instruction depends on.
- Fire to oven"Down before a clear fire" means spit-roasting with radiant heat and constant basting. In an oven, use 425F on a rack over a pan, breast up, and baste every five minutes or so.
- TimeThirty to forty minutes was for two birds turning before a fire. In a hot oven a partridge takes about 20-25 minutes; the breast should read 145-150F and still be faintly pink at the bone. Rest 10 minutes. Roasted through to grey it becomes dry and livery.
- A brace and a quarter poundA brace is two birds; a quarter pound of butter is 4 oz, or one stick, which is generous but correct for basting rather than eating. The vine leaf and bacon are barding: tie fat bacon over the breasts, remove it for the last five minutes to let the skin colour.
- The flour dredgeDusting with flour a few minutes before the end, then basting again, is the old "frothing" trick. It gives a crisp, freckled brown surface and is worth doing; use it as the bacon comes off.
- YieldFour or five people from two birds reflects a table where the roast was one course among several. Serve one bird per person, or half a bird as part of a longer meal.
- ShotWild-shot birds carry lead pellets. Feel over the breast before serving and warn anyone at the table. Reared red-legged partridge are usually released and shot as well, so do not assume a butcher's bird is clean; only birds killed without shooting will be free of pellets.
Partridge was a mainstay of the English game season, which opens on 1 September and runs through the autumn, and readers would have bought them by the brace from a licensed poulterer whose supply came off shooting estates under the Game Laws. The native grey partridge dominated in the nineteenth century; the red-legged or "French" partridge, introduced in the eighteenth century and long disdained by sportsmen as a runner rather than a flier, is what most butchers sell now. The long hanging, the bacon barding and the vine leaf follow older European practice with small game birds, and the accompaniments the book demands - brown gravy, bread sauce, fried crumbs, watercress - remain the conventional British service for roast game birds. The stated price of three shillings a brace was no trifle against contemporary wages, and suggests a comfortable rather than a grand household.