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Sheep's Trotters, Simple Way of Serving
Stew the trotters gently for three or four hours till the bones will come out. They may either be boiled in water, or in a sauce made according to the directions already given in SHEEP'S TROTTERS A LA POULETTE. When tender drain them, let them get cold, cut them in slices, and serve as they are on a dish. Garnish with parsley, and send oil and vinegar to table with them.
A cold dish of boiled sheep's feet, sliced and dressed at table with oil and vinegar. The work is all in the long, gentle simmer and in sourcing the feet at all.
- SourcingSheep's or lamb's trotters are a halal and West Indian butcher staple and can be ordered from most independent butchers; supermarkets rarely carry them. Ask for them scalded and scraped, with the hooves off and the dew claws removed, or you will spend an hour singeing hairs over a gas flame.
- Clean them firstEven prepared trotters benefit from a scrub and a soak in cold water for an hour or two, then a five-minute blanch in boiling water, drained and rinsed, before the long stew. This removes scum and gives clear, clean-tasting jelly.
- "Gently" is the hingeBare simmer, surface barely trembling, for three to four hours. A rolling boil emulsifies the fat and turns the liquid cloudy and greasy, and the trotters break apart before the bones will slip free cleanly. A pressure cooker does the job in about 50 minutes if you are willing to lose the clarity.
- Boning while hotBoning -- the bones come out most easily while the trotters are still warm, though the recipe itself says simply to drain them, let them get cold and cut them in slices. Boning them warm and pressing the meat between two plates to chill, so that the natural gelatin sets it firm enough to slice neatly, is a modern extension rather than what is directed here.
- The cooking liquidWater gives a plain result. If you go the sauce route referenced here, the poulette base is a white stock or velouté finished with egg yolk and lemon, which is not really suited to a dish served cold and sliced. For this version, cook them in salted water with an onion, a carrot, a bay leaf and a few peppercorns.
- Dressing at table'send oil and vinegar to table' most likely means cruets passed round rather than a made vinaigrette, though the book does not say so. A sharp dressing suits the rich, gelatinous meat; something like three parts oil to one of wine vinegar with plenty of salt works, and chopped shallot or capers are a possible addition, though the recipe calls for neither.
- YieldFour trotters give a modest starter for two to three people. Allow two per person if it is the main item on the plate.
Trotters were cheap protein and, more importantly, a household source of gelatin in an era before packet leaf gelatine was universal; the same feet that made this cold sliced dish were also boiled down for the stock that set jellies and aspics. This is the plainest of the treatments recorded, alongside the French-influenced à la poulette version with its egg-and-lemon sauce. Serving cold cooked offal in slices with oil and vinegar is a pattern that runs through European cooking, from the Italian insalata di nervetti to the various brawns and head cheeses of the British table, and it survives in Britain today chiefly in pig's trotters rather than sheep's. The disappearance of sheep's feet from the ordinary kitchen is often attributed less to taste than to changes in how slaughter and butchery were organised, though this remains speculation.