Veal Pates
3 1/2 pounds leg of veal. 1/4 pound salt pork. 6 soda crackers rolled and sifted. 1 tablespoonful salt. 1 tablespoonful black pepper. 1 nutmeg. 2 eggs well beaten. Butter the size of an egg.
Hash veal and pork together, cutting very fine Then mix seasoning very thoroughly and form into oval shapes. Put a small piece of butter and bread crumbs over the top, while in the baking dish; half a teacup water, and baste frequently while baking. In moulding it and when mixing it keep wetting the hands in cold water, also wet the dish when you begin moulding it in shape.--Mrs. J. P. H.
This is a veal forcemeat baked in individual ovals rather than a single loaf, and it behaves like a very lean meatloaf. The seasoning quantities are the thing to look at hardest before you start.
- Seasoning is written for a larger ageA full tablespoon of black pepper and an entire grated nutmeg in under four pounds of meat will overwhelm most modern palates. A teaspoon of pepper and a quarter of a nutmeg give the same character; taste a small fried patty of the mixture and adjust before shaping the rest.
- Salt and the porkThe tablespoon of salt is on top of a quarter pound of salt pork. Rinse the pork, and cut the added salt to about two teaspoons unless the pork is very mild.
- Butter the size of an eggAbout two ounces, or four tablespoons. The recipe does not say where it goes; it reads as though it is worked into the mixture, with the "small piece" dotted on top at the end being separate.
- Soda crackersThe ancestor of the modern saltine, and saltines will do. Six rolled and sifted give only a modest amount of fine crumbs, perhaps a quarter cup from modern crackers, and that is what binds the mixture along with the eggs.
- Half a teacup waterTeacup measures varied, but six fluid ounces is a common reckoning, which would make this about three fluid ounces poured into the dish rather than over the meat. It keeps the bottom from scorching and gives you something to baste with.
- OvenThe recipe names none. A moderate oven, 350F, is right for this; the ovals want about 45 minutes to an hour depending on size.
- Hash very fineChopping by hand, as written, gives a better texture than a food processor, which turns lean veal to paste. If you use a grinder, one pass through a coarse plate is enough.
- DonenessGround veal mixed with pork should reach 160F at the centre. Veal is lean and dries out quickly past that, so start checking early and baste as directed.
- YieldAbout three and three-quarter pounds of mixture, which shapes into eight to ten ovals and serves eight generously, hot or cold in slices.
"Pâté" here is often taken to carry an older, looser English sense of a seasoned forcemeat shaped and baked, rather than the smooth potted terrine the word suggests now; in period American books the word can equally mean small pies or patties. Veal was a natural candidate because it is lean, mild and cheap when a dairy calf is sold young, and salt pork supplies the fat it lacks — the same logic behind larding a veal roast. Housekeeping in Old Virginia, compiled by Marion Cabell Tyree and published in 1878, gathered contributions from named and initialled Virginia housekeepers, which is why this one closes with "Mrs. J. P. H." rather than a full name. The instruction to keep wetting the hands and the dish is practical: a wet surface keeps a sticky egg-and-cracker forcemeat from tearing as you shape it.