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Rice Croquettes, Savoury
Boil half a pound of rice till it is thick, soft, and dry, drain it, and, if liked, mix with it when it is taken from the fire a table-spoonful of grated Parmesan, a pinch of powdered mace, and a little white pepper. Let it get quite cold, then form it into balls, inserting in the centre of each ball a table-spoonful of any savoury mince, such as turkey, fowl, rabbit, or oysters, stewed for a few minutes in thick white sauce. Cover the mince entirely with the rice, dip the croquettes in egg and bread-crumbs, and fry them as before. The rice may be boiled in milk, water, or stock, and seasoned in accordance with the mince which is to be served with it. If boiled in water a few spoonfuls of rich white sauce stirred into it when it is almost dry enough will greatly improve it. Time to fry, five to seven minutes. Sufficient for five or six persons.
A Victorian arancino in all but name, and the whole thing hinges on the rice being cold, stiff and dry before you shape it. The original assumes you have already read the sweet croquette recipe a few lines above, which is where "fry them as before" comes from.
- The hinge: dry, cold riceCook the rice until it is genuinely stiff and pasty, not fluffy and separate, then spread it on a tray and chill it thoroughly. Warm or wet rice will not hold a filling and will burst in the fat.
- Which riceHalf a pound is about 225 g, roughly 1¼ cups. Use a short or medium grain (pudding rice, arborio, carnaroli); long-grain and basmati stay too separate to bind.
- "Fry them as before"Almost certainly frying in a deep pan of hot fat, though the instruction it points back to is not on this page. Modern equivalent: 2-3 inches of neutral oil at 350-360F, a few croquettes at a time so the temperature holds.
- Frying timeThe original gives five to seven minutes. At a steady 350-360F, with everything inside already cooked and chilled, 3-4 minutes to deep gold is generally enough.
- The filling must be stiffWhatever mince you use, bind it in a béchamel thick enough to hold its shape on a spoon and chill it hard. A loose filling turns to steam and blows the croquette open.
- If using oystersGive them well under a minute in the hot sauce, just until the edges ruffle. The "few minutes" of the original, plus the frying, produces rubber.
- MaceGround mace is still sold but has become uncommon; it is the outer covering of the nutmeg, usually described as more delicate and less sweet than the nut itself. A pinch is genuinely a pinch here, enough to sit behind the cheese.
- CoatingEgg-and-crumb once carefully, or twice for insurance if the filling is generous. Dry breadcrumbs, not fresh, and rest the coated balls in the refrigerator for 20 minutes before frying.
- Yield"Sufficient for five or six persons" as a savoury course; the quantity of rice and the tablespoon of mince per ball suggest something in the region of a dozen egg-sized croquettes, served hot.
Rice croquettes belong to the wider nineteenth-century family of crumbed and fried leftovers that also gave English kitchens the rissole and the cutlet-shaped croquette, and the method is often said to derive from French professional practice, where stiff rice and thick reduced sauce were both standard larder items. The list of fillings, turkey, fowl, rabbit and oysters, reads as a picture of what a late Victorian household actually had left over after a large dinner. It is a technique lesson in using up cooked meat: cold starchy rice made to wrap a spoonful of something rich.