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Rice Soup, Made with Fresh Meat
Take one pound of the knuckle of veal, one pound of gravy-beef, half a pound of lean ham, and any bones and trimmings that may be at hand. Cut the ham into dice and the meat into pieces an inch square. Dissolve a slice of fresh butter in a stewpan, put in the ham, then the rest of the meat, and add two carrots, two onions, each one stuck with one clove, half a dozen outer sticks of celery, a bunch of sweet herbs, and a blade of mace. Cover the stew pan closely, and let its contents steam over a gentle fire until the gravy flows from the meat. Pour this gravy out, and shake the stewpan over the fire till the meat is brown, pour over it three pints of boiling water, and let it stew gently until the liquor is reduced to a quart. Skim carefully, strain, and then add it to the gravy. Put into it two ounces of rice which has been boiled in water till tender, drained, and dried. Season the soup with pepper and salt, and serve very hot. Time, three hours. Probable cost, 2s. 8d. Sufficient for five or six persons.
This is a clear consommé-style soup built by the old two-stage method: draw the juices out of the meat first, reserve them, then brown what is left and make stock from it. Getting that sequence right is the whole recipe.
- The hinge: pour off the gravy before browningThe meat is first steamed under a tight lid over low heat until it releases its juices, and those juices are removed and set aside. Only then do you raise the heat to brown the meat, and the reserved gravy goes back at the end so its flavour is not caramelised away.
- Gravy-beefA Victorian butcher's term for lean, gelatinous stewing beef from the shin or leg. Beef shin, or shank meat off the bone, is the direct substitute; chuck will work but gives less body.
- Knuckle of vealThe lower leg joint, valued for gelatine rather than meat, and rarely stocked now. Veal shank or osso buco cuts serve the same purpose; a pound of pork shank or extra beef shin plus a split marrow bone is a reasonable stand-in.
- Blade of maceOne piece of the dried outer covering of nutmeg, warmer and less sweet than nutmeg itself. About a quarter teaspoon of ground mace, added late, approximates it.
- A slice of fresh butterRoughly an ounce, or two tablespoons. "Fresh" here means unsalted, as distinct from the salted butter kept for preservation; the ham brings plenty of salt on its own.
- Liquid and reductionThree pints is 60 fl oz in imperial measure, a little under two litres; reducing to a quart means about 40 fl oz. The book allows three hours in total for the dish; keep the pot at a bare tremble so the soup stays clear.
- The riceTwo ounces is a scant third of a cup dry. Boiling it separately and drying it keeps starch out of the clear broth, so do not be tempted to cook it in the soup. Long-grain rice suits this best; add it just before serving so it does not swell into porridge.
- Salt at the endHalf a pound of lean ham in a soup that reduces to a quart before the reserved gravy goes back is a lot of salt, and reduction concentrates it. Taste before adding any.
- YieldThe book's five or six servings are soup-course portions, not a main dish.
The technique Cassell's teaches here -- drawing the juices, browning the drained meat, then long slow extraction with water -- is the standard nineteenth-century route to a clear, deeply flavoured broth without commercial stock of any kind. The pairing of veal knuckle for gelatine with beef shin for flavour is the same logic behind French consommé, and the small handful of separately boiled rice is a garnish in the older sense, meant to give the spoon something to find rather than to thicken. The "probable cost, 2s. 8d." is characteristic of Cassell's and of its late-Victorian audience of households running to a budget.