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Mushroom Rissoles
Place a teaspoon of creamed mushrooms in the center of a round of pastry; proceed as for Chicken Rissoles or instead of frying bake in a quick oven.
A two-line entry that assumes you have already read the chicken rissole recipe a few pages earlier. The essentials are all in the filling and the seal.
- Chill the filling firstCreamed mushrooms straight from the pan will steam inside the pastry, blow the seam and empty themselves into the fat. Cook the mixture down until it holds its shape on a spoon, spread it on a plate and refrigerate until firm before filling.
- "Creamed mushrooms"Sliced or chopped mushrooms cooked in butter, then bound with a thick white sauce — roughly a tablespoon each of butter and flour to a half cup of milk or cream for every cup of cooked mushrooms. Much stiffer than what you would serve on toast.
- A quick ovenRoughly 400-450F. Bake the sealed rounds on a lined sheet until the pastry is browned, perhaps 15-20 minutes; brush with beaten egg or milk for colour, since baked rissoles do not brown as evenly as fried ones.
- If you fry insteadRissoles of this type are usually egg-and-crumbed and fried in deep fat at about 375-385F for two to three minutes until golden; follow whatever the chicken rissole recipe directs. A crumb coat helps protect the pastry seam in the fat.
- Size and shapeA round of about 3 inches suits a teaspoon of filling, folded to a half-moon and pressed with a fork or damp fingers. Larger rounds tempt you to overfill, which is the usual cause of failure.
- PastryOrdinary short pie pastry, kept cold. Puff pastry works for the baked version but is unreliable in deep fat, where it can unlayer and absorb grease.
- YieldAbout sixteen to eighteen small rissoles from a single-crust batch of pastry, needing well under half a cup of creamed mushrooms at a teaspoon apiece -- an entree course for six, or hot finger food for a larger group.
Rissoles came into English cookery from the French rissole, a small fried pastry turnover, and by the late nineteenth century they had become one of the standard ways for a well-run American kitchen to turn yesterday's cooked meat into today's entrée course. That is why this book gives the full method under chicken: the technique was assumed knowledge and only the filling changed. The mushroom version stands slightly apart in being made from an ingredient bought on purpose rather than salvaged. Baking rather than deep frying is offered as an alternative.