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PIGEONS, ROAST (another way)
Roasted pigeons require a brisk fire, and must be well done, and at the same time afford gravy when cut into. Roast the birds, with stuffing in the belly, prepared as follows. Take the livers and hearts of the pigeons, and about double the quantity of the fat of ham or bacon, and beat these ingredients in a mortar to a smooth paste. Moisten some crumb of bread with milk, then press out the milk through a napkin. Add chopped parsley, grated lemon-peel, black pepper, and salt; unite these with white and yolk of egg beaten together, divide the mass into equal portions, and stuff the birds. As pigeons possess scarcely any fat, they are often, while roasting, basted with butter. By way of sauce, melt some butter with a little flour, moisten with veal consomm, and stir in some chopped parsley. Sprinkle the pigeons with a little sauce, and then pour the remainder over them.
A nineteenth-century roast with a liver forcemeat, written for a spit before an open fire. The translation to a modern oven is straightforward; the main decisions are heat, timing and what to do about the veal consommé.
- The hinge: heat, then rest"A brisk fire" means a hot fire; the book gives no temperatures, but roughly 425–450F is a reasonable modern equivalent. Pigeon has almost no fat and very lean flesh, so a slow oven dries it out before it colours. Roast hot, then rest the birds 8–10 minutes so the juices redistribute, which helps give the gravy the recipe insists on.
- "Well done" versus modern practiceThis recipe is explicit that the birds be well done. Today squab is usually served with the breast pink, around 135–140F, because it is much more tender that way; a fully cooked bird will be firm and livery. If you follow the book, expect that texture rather than considering it a fault.
- Which birdFarmed squab (young pigeon, about 12–16 oz) is the closest match and is sold at good butchers and by mail order. Older wood pigeon is tougher and better braised than roasted. Wild birds should not be substituted casually — check local rules on what may be taken and sold.
- TimingA 1 lb squab in a 450F oven takes roughly 15–20 minutes, a little more when stuffed. Stuffed birds are safest judged with a thermometer: the forcemeat contains raw egg and liver and should reach 165F even if the breast is left pinker.
- The stuffing is a panadeBread soaked in milk and wrung out in a cloth is a classic panade; it keeps the liver mixture moist and light. Two pigeon livers and hearts weigh very little, so "double the quantity of ham fat" is a small amount — figure a tablespoon or so of liver and heart per bird against two of finely chopped fatty bacon or unsmoked ham fat. One whole egg will bind forcemeat for several small birds; the recipe does not specify a number.
- Basting and bardingButter basting works, but a thin sheet of fat back or a rasher of streaky bacon tied over each breast (barding) protects it better in a hot oven. Remove it for the last five minutes to let the skin brown.
- Veal consomméAn unsalted veal or light chicken stock is the substitute; reduce a good stock slightly rather than using a cube, which will overwhelm the small quantity of sauce. Butter and flour cooked briefly, moistened with stock and finished with parsley, is a plain velouté — keep it thin enough to pour.
- YieldOne bird per person as a main course, two if the birds are very small. The recipe does not state how many birds it is written for.
Pigeons were a domestic resource long before they were a delicacy: the dovecote was a fixture of English manor and farm buildings from the medieval period onward, valued because squabs fattened themselves in the nest and could be taken young and tender when little other fresh meat was available. By the time Cassell's was compiled in the later nineteenth century, pigeon had become an ordinary market bird in Britain, and cookery books carried a long run of treatments: roast, stewed, in pies, compote, à la crapaudine. The forcemeat here, with the birds' own livers and hearts pounded with ham fat and bound with a bread panade, reflects French professional practice of the period, where nothing edible from a small bird was wasted and the giblets were routinely turned into the stuffing that seasoned it. The insistence that the bird be "well done, and at the same time afford gravy" sets the standard the cook was to aim at.