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Artichokes Stewed in Gravy
Strip off the leaves from the artichokes, remove the chokes, and soak them in lukewarm water for three hours, changing the water three or four times. Place them in a saucepan with enough gravy to cover them, a tablespoonful of mushroom catsup, the juice of a lemon, and a piece of butter the size of a walnut, rolled in flour. Let them stew gently until tender, then serve with the sauce poured over them, and as hot as possible. Time to stew, half an hour. Allow one for each person.
This is a recipe for artichoke bottoms, not whole artichokes: the leaves and choke are discarded before cooking, leaving the fleshy base to braise in meat gravy. Everything hinges on trimming them well and keeping them from browning.
- What you are left withAfter the leaves and choke are stripped away, a large globe artichoke yields one fleshy bottom perhaps three inches across. Trim the stem and pare the dark green from the base down to pale flesh, or it will stay fibrous however long it stews.
- Acidulate the soaking waterCut artichoke flesh blackens within minutes. Add a squeeze of lemon or a spoonful of vinegar to the lukewarm soaking water. The recipe does not say why it calls for three hours and three or four changes of water; in practice about an hour is usually enough.
- "Gravy" here means stockIn nineteenth-century usage this is a well-flavoured brown meat gravy or reduced beef stock, not a thickened pan sauce. Around 1 to 1 1/2 cups will cover four trimmed bottoms in a small saucepan.
- Mushroom catsupA thin, dark, salty mushroom-and-spice liquor, widely sold in the period. Mushroom ketchup is still made; failing that, a teaspoon of soy sauce plus a little Worcestershire gives a comparable savoury depth. It is a seasoning, not a thickener.
- Butter the size of a walnutAbout 1 ounce, or 2 tablespoons. Rolled in flour it becomes a small beurre manié that lightly binds the gravy as it stews; work in roughly a tablespoon of flour.
- TimingHalf an hour is right for young, tender bottoms simmered gently. Larger or older ones can want 40 to 45 minutes; test with a knife tip, which should meet no resistance at the thickest part.
- Heat and yieldThe recipe allows one artichoke per person but does not state how many it serves; scale the gravy accordingly. Artichoke bottoms cool very quickly in a shallow dish, so take the instruction to serve them as hot as possible seriously, and warm the plates.