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Walnut Pie
1/2 pint shelled walnuts 1/2 pint milk Onion juice 1/2 pint bread crumbs 1 teaspoon salt 1 saltspoon pepper 1 tablespoon flour Run the bread crumbs and walnuts through a nut mill, then mix them with one tablespoon of butter, onion juice, the flour made into a paste with the milk and seasoning. Bring to a boil in a saucepan and mix thoroughly, then pour into a shallow baking dish and bake a rich brown.
A nut panada baked in a dish — despite the name there is no pastry, and the crumbs stand in for a crust. The proportions are simple, but the original omits the oven temperature and the butter appears only in the method, so read it through before starting.
- Half a pintOn the American measure a half pint is one cup, which would give 1 cup shelled walnuts, 1 cup milk and 1 cup breadcrumbs, all measured by volume rather than weight. (A British half-pint would be somewhat larger.)
- SaltspoonA saltspoon is a quarter teaspoon. One saltspoon of pepper against a full teaspoon of salt is the intended balance; grind it fresh.
- Nut millA hand-cranked nut mill grated nuts to a dry meal rather than a paste. A food processor pulsed in short bursts does the same, but keep it brief — walnuts turn oily and pasty within seconds of overworking, and the pie will bake heavy.
- The butterOne tablespoon of butter is called for in the method but missing from the ingredient list. Add it with the crumbs and nuts; it is the only fat besides what the walnuts give up.
- Onion juiceGrate half a small onion on a fine grater and use the liquid that collects, about a teaspoon or two. Grated onion pulp works, though it makes the texture coarser than intended.
- Boil the mixture firstThe flour-and-milk paste has to come to a boil in the pan so the starch thickens and binds the crumbs. Skip it and the pie will not hold together when cut. Stir constantly — the nut meal catches easily.
- OvenNo temperature is given. A moderate oven of around 350F for roughly 30 to 40 minutes in a shallow dish is a reasonable modern reading for the rich brown top the recipe asks for; watch it, as ground walnuts brown and can catch quickly.
- YieldLikely three or four servings. The recipe gives no accompaniment; a gravy or sharp sauce would suit it, as it is dry on its own.
Nut loaves and nut "pies" of this kind belong to the vegetarian cookery that spread through Britain and America from the 1890s onward, and such dishes became more prominent during the First World War, when meat was scarce and government food campaigns pushed households toward substitutes. Walnuts were widely used: high in fat and protein, and — once ground in a hand-cranked nut mill — capable of giving a savoury dish the richness and brown crust that cooks associated with roast meat. "Pie" here appears to mean simply a thing baked in a dish, a looser usage than ours, with the breadcrumbs doing the work that pastry would otherwise do, and the seasoning of onion juice, salt and pepper leans savoury rather than flattering the walnut.