Mutton Pie
INGREDIENTS for dish for 4 or 5 persons.-2 lbs. of the neck or loin of mutton, weighed after being boned; 2 kidneys, pepper and salt to taste, 2 teacuиpfuls of gravy or water, 2 tablespoonfuls of minced parsley; when liked, a little minced onion or shalot; puff crust. AVERAGE COST, 2s . 6d.
Bone the mutton and cut the meat into steaks all of the same thickness, and leave but very little fat. Cut up the kidneys, and arrange these with the meat neatly in a pie-dish; sprinkle over them the minced parsley and a seasoning of pepper and salt; pour in the gravy, and cover with a tolerably good puff crust. Bake for 1½ hour, or rather MUTTON PUDDING. longer should the pie be very large, and let the oven be rather brisk. A well-made suet crust may be used instead of puff crust, and will be found exceedingly good.
TIME.-1 hour, or rather longer.
SEASONABLE at any time.
A plain Victorian meat pie: raw mutton and kidney under pastry, baked long enough to cook the filling and the crust together. A few of Mrs Beeton's measures and temperatures need translating.
- Oven temperature"Rather brisk" means about 400-425F (200-220C). Start there for the first 20 minutes to set and lift the pastry, then drop to 350F (180C) for the remainder so the meat cooks through without the crust burning.
- Conflicting timesThe method says 1½ hours, the TIME line says 1 hour. Take the longer figure: 2 lb of raw mutton in a deep dish needs at least 1½ hours, and the pastry will need covering with foil once it has browned.
- A teacupfulRoughly 5-6 fl oz, so two teacupfuls is about 1¼ cups (300 ml). Do not fill higher than the meat or the gravy will boil up into the pastry.
- Neck or loin, bonedBoned mutton neck is now sold as lamb neck fillet; shoulder works equally well. True mutton (sheep over two years) is rare outside halal butchers and specialist suppliers, and it wants the full time and then some.
- KidneysTwo lamb's kidneys, halved, cored and the white gristle cut out. Soak them 20 minutes in cold water or milk if you dislike the strong note; they season the whole gravy.
- ShalotBeeton's spelling of shallot. One, finely minced, is plenty for 2 lb of meat.
- The crustPuff pastry over a wet filling for 1½ hours will go soggy underneath. Beeton's alternative, suet crust, is the more reliable choice here; a pie funnel or a slit in the lid lets steam escape either way.
- YieldServes 4 to 5, as stated, in a deep pie dish with no bottom crust; the crust is a lid only.
Mutton pie of this kind is the everyday English meat pie in its simplest form: raw meat, seasoning, a little liquid and a lid, baked in the dish it is served from. The kidneys are not garnish but function, giving depth to a gravy that starts as plain water. Beeton's 2s 6d costing places it as a modest family dinner rather than a company dish, and the note "seasonable at any time" reflects the fact that mutton, unlike lamb or game, was available year-round in Victorian Britain. The accompanying suggestion of suet crust points to the pie's kinship with the boiled mutton pudding that follows it in the book — the same filling, differently enclosed. Mutton itself has largely disappeared from British and American butchers over the last century in favour of younger lamb, which is why the dish now tastes milder than Beeton's readers would have known it.