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WOODCOCK, TERRINE OF (M. Dubois' recipe)
Bone two woodcocks, divide each of them in two, which pieces put into a pie-dish (terrine) with five or six peeled truffles cut into quarters, the same volume of cooked ham-fat, or fat bacon, in large dice. Season the meat and truffles lightly, and baste with the third part of a glass of Madeira. Take off the flesh from a leg of hare, cut it in pieces, fry them in a stewpan, with double its volume of liver of poultry or game. When well set, add the trails of the woodcocks, then let the whole cool, to be chopped afterwards with a third its volume of lean pork. Season the forcemeat, put it into a mortar, pound, and add to it the same quantity of fresh, fat bacon, previously chopped, and pounded with the trimmings of truffles. Season the forcemeat with a pinch of pounded aromatics; five minutes after remove it into a kitchen basin, and mix with it the Madeira the woodcocks have been soaking in. Mask the bottom and sides of a pie-dish with some of the prepared forcemeat, arrange the pieces of woodcock, the truffles, and the ham in the centre, alternating with forcemeat. The pie-dish must then be completely full; smooth the top with the blade of a knife, and mask it with slices of bacon. Cover the preparation, and set the pie-dish in a saute-pan with a glassful of hot water and push it into a moderate oven, to bake for an hour and a half. When done, take it out; and when half cold, put a light weight on the top of the preparation. When completely cold, take it off the pie, cut the latter in oblong squares, which dish in a circular order into the terrine.
A classic French game terrine written for a kitchen with a game larder and a marble mortar. Nothing here is difficult, but the recipe assumes you know what a woodcock's trail is and how a bain-marie behaves.
- The hinge: the trailThe "trails" are the woodcock's intestines, traditionally left in the bird and prized for their flavour. They are fried with the livers and pounded into the forcemeat, which is where most of the terrine's character comes from. If you are working from birds that have already been drawn, the dish loses its point and you may as well use extra game livers.
- Sourcing the birdsWoodcock cannot legally be bought or sold in the United States, and in Britain it is a seasonal shot bird sold by game dealers rather than supermarkets. Two snipe, a brace of quail plus extra game liver, or a wild pigeon will stand in for the flesh, though not for the trail.
- A glass of MadeiraA glass -- A Victorian wineglassful is usually reckoned at about 2 fl oz, so "the third part of a glass" is a scant tablespoon of Madeira for the marinade, and "a glassful of hot water" in the saute-pan about the same 2 fl oz. Use a dry or medium-dry Madeira such as Sercial or Verdelho.
- Moderate oven350F/175C. The pie-dish sits in a pan of hot water, so the terrine cooks gently; top up the water if it boils away during the hour and a half.
- Pounded aromaticsMost likely a mixed spice of the sort the French call epices composees; quatre epices (white pepper with nutmeg, clove and ginger or cinnamon, ground fine) is the usual modern stand-in. About half a teaspoon for this quantity of forcemeat, plus salt at roughly 1.5 percent of the total weight of meat and fat.
- Fat bacon and ham-fatUse unsmoked fatback or green streaky bacon, not modern cured smoked bacon, whose sugar and smoke will bully the game. The barding slices over the top are there to stop the surface drying and are usually lifted off before serving.
- Check the temperatureAn hour and a half suits a deep dish, but dish shapes vary. A terrine of mixed game and pork is done at 160F/71C in the centre; a probe thermometer removes the guesswork the original expects you to have in your hands.
- Weighting and restingThe "light weight" is a board or a second dish with a can or two on top, applied when the terrine is half cold so the forcemeat compacts without squeezing out the juices. Chill at least overnight, and preferably two or three days, before slicing.
- Yield and serviceTwo woodcocks with the hare, pork and fat make about 2 lb of terrine, enough for eight to ten as a first course. The last line describes the period presentation: turn the set block out, cut it into oblong pieces, and arrange them in a ring inside a clean earthenware terrine.
The M. Dubois credited here is Urbain Dubois, who cooked for Russian and Prussian nobility and, with Emile Bernard, wrote La Cuisine Classique in the 1850s; the pair are usually given much of the credit for pushing service a la russe, dishes brought in courses rather than massed on the table, into French professional practice. Cassell's borrowed freely from such chefs, and a signed recipe like this one was a mark of authority for a British readership that took its haute cuisine on French terms. Woodcock held a particular place in that cuisine: a bird cooked and served undrawn, its trail spread on toast or worked into forcemeat, on the traditional reasoning that a woodcock feeding on worms in soft ground keeps a clean gut. The terrine itself is named for its vessel, the glazed earthenware dish it was baked and stored in, and the technique, meat sealed under fat and pressed cold, belongs to the older business of preserving game through the weeks after a shoot.