Home › The Principles of Cookery › Sheep's Kidneys, Broiled, Superior
Sheep's Kidneys, Broiled, Superior
Broil the kidneys as before. Lay them on a dish with the hollow part uppermost, and put in the centre of each a tea-spoonful of savoury butter prepared as follows. Put two ounces of fresh butter into a plate, and work into it with a silver or wooden spoon a dessert-spoonful of finely-chopped parsley, half a tea-spoonful of green onions chopped small, the juice of half a lemon, and a little pepper and salt. Serve immediately. If preferred, a tea-spoonful of tartar sauce (see TARTAR SAUCE) may be put into the hollow of the kidney, and Harvey's or Worcester sauce may be served with it. Time to broil the kidneys, eight to twelve minutes. Probable cost, kidneys, 4d. to 6d. each.
A straightforward grilled kidney with a compound butter, assuming you have already read the preceding entry in the book. The only real difficulty is the butchery, which the original takes for granted.
- "Broil the kidneys as before"In Victorian British usage this means cooking over or under direct heat, i.e. grilling. Split each kidney lengthwise almost through, skewer it flat so it cannot curl, and cook under a hot grill or over coals.
- Preparation the recipe omitsSheep's kidneys arrive in a tough, papery membrane and a coat of suet, both of which must be stripped off before splitting. The white core at the hinge should be snipped out with scissors.
- TimingEight to twelve minutes is generous for a lamb kidney split flat. Six to eight will do, and they are best pulled while still faintly pink at the centre; taken past that they turn granular and dry.
- Cut side up, then overStart hollow side up so the juices collect, then turn briefly to colour the outer face. Serving hollow side uppermost, as directed, keeps the melting butter in the dish rather than on the plate.
- Savoury butter quantitiesTwo ounces is about 57 g of butter; a dessert-spoonful is roughly two teaspoons. The recipe puts only a teaspoonful into each kidney, so it makes far more butter than the kidneys will take.
- Green onionsSpring onions or scallions, using the green tops. Chives are a fair substitute and closer to the intended delicacy than raw onion.
- The bottled saucesHarvey's sauce is no longer generally available; it was an anchovy-and-soy relish of the same family as Worcestershire, which is the obvious stand-in. "Worcester sauce" is Worcestershire sauce, still exactly what the book means.
- ServingAlmost always a breakfast or savoury course in this period. Hot buttered toast under the kidneys catches the butter and is the traditional accompaniment.
Grilled kidneys belong to the great age of the British hot breakfast, when a sideboard in a comfortable household might carry kidneys, bacon, devilled meats and a dish of eggs under covers. The "savoury butter" here is a maitre d'hotel butter under a plainer name -- butter worked with parsley, lemon and seasoning, a French hotel technique that had long since naturalised in English kitchens. The instruction to work it with a silver or wooden spoon is often said to reflect a worry of the period about iron and steel discolouring lemon juice and parsley. Cassell's gives this version as "superior" simply because it adds the butter to the plain broiled kidney of the preceding entry, a common pattern in the dictionary: a basic method first, then dressed variations. The costing in pence per kidney, offered without comment, is a reminder that offal was cheap everyday eating rather than the delicacy it has since become.