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Veal, Cold, Hashed
Take about one pound of cold veal, and cut the lean part into thin slices, free from skin and gristle. Season these with a little salt and pepper, and dredge a table-spoonful of flour upon them. Mince a moderate-sized onion finely. Put it in a saucepan with the bones, skin, and trimmings of the veal, and any flavouring ingredients that may be chosen; cover all with stock or water, and simmer the gravy gently for an hour. Strain it, pour it back into the saucepan, and put into it the pieces of veal. Let them simmer in it till they are tender, but without boiling. Add a tea-spoonful of vinegar or lemon-juice. Place the veal on a dish. Garnish with toasted sippets and a little fried bacon. Pour the gravy round the veal, and serve the hash very hot. Time, about an hour to simmer the meat. Probable cost, 4d., exclusive of the cold meat and bacon. Sufficient for three or four persons.
A Victorian remains dish: yesterday's roast veal reheated in a gravy built from its own bones and trimmings. Everything hangs on how long the sliced meat spends in the pan.
- Do not simmer the meat an hourThe original does say "Time, about an hour to simmer the meat", but already-roasted veal needs only 8-12 minutes in the hot gravy to warm through; longer and thin slices of lean veal turn dry and stringy.
- Never let it boilThe instruction to keep it below a boil is the real hinge. Boiling squeezes the last moisture out of cooked veal and clouds the gravy, and the flour dredge will catch on the pan base if the liquid moves hard.
- The gravy is the workBones, skin and trimmings plus one onion, covered with stock or water and simmered an hour, gives a light broth; the recipe does not specify how much liquid. Strain it and, if it tastes thin, reduce it before the meat goes in.
- "Flavouring ingredients that may be chosen"The book leaves the choice open. A blade of mace, a few peppercorns, a bay leaf, a strip of lemon peel, a sprig of parsley or thyme would all be at home here; veal broth is mild and takes seasoning well.
- SippetsTriangles or small fingers of bread, toasted or fried, arranged point-out around the dish. Cut them from a firm white loaf and add them at the table, or they soften in the gravy.
- Veal todayA cold roast veal joint is no longer a standard household leftover. Cold roast pork loin or turkey breast behaves the same way in this gravy, though neither will give the gelatinous bones that make the veal version worth doing.
- QuantitiesA tablespoon of flour on a pound of meat gives a lightly bound gravy rather than a thick sauce. The teaspoon of vinegar or lemon juice goes in at the end and is not optional — it lifts an otherwise flat dish.
- YieldThree to four as written, as the original states, and best served on hot plates: veal gravy sets and dulls the moment it cools.
Cold meat cookery was a distinct department of the Victorian kitchen, and Cassell's, like Mrs Beeton before it, devotes long stretches to it. Large joints were roasted for Sunday and the household ate down the remains through the week, and it was often said that a good cook could make Tuesday's hash taste like a dish in its own right rather than a reappearance. The technique here — extracting a fresh gravy from the bones and trimmings of the same joint, then warming the sliced lean in it — is the standard English answer, and it is a genuinely economical one, the "probable cost, 4d., exclusive of the cold meat" covering the few store-cupboard additions and the fuel. Veal was a more ordinary meat in British towns then than now, dairy herds producing calves that were slaughtered young, and its mild flavour and gelatine-rich bones made it particularly well suited to this kind of second cooking.