Parsnip Soup
INGREDIENTS for soup for 4 or 5 persons.-1 lb. of sliced parsnips, 2 oz. of butter, salt and cayenne to taste, 1 quart of stock. AVERAGE COST, 6d.
Put the parsnips into the stewpan with the butter, which has been previously melted, and simmer them till quite tender.
Then add nearly a pint of stock, and boil together for an hour. Pass all through a fine strainer, and put to it the remainder of the stock. Season, boil, and serve immediately.
TIME.-2 hours.
SEASONABLE from October to April.
Parsnips, Boiled. INGREDIENTS. -Parsnips to each 1/24 gallon of water allow 1 heaped tablespoonful of salt. AVERAGE Cost, 1d. each.
Wash the parsnips, scrape them thoroughly, and with the point of the knife remove any black specks about them, and, should they be very large, cut the thick part into quarters. Put them into a saucepan of boiling water salted in the above proportion; boil them rapidly until tender, which may be ascertained by thrusting a fork in them; take them up, drain them, and serve in a vegetable-dish. This THE PARSNIP. vegetable is usually served with salt fish, boiled pork, or boiled beef; when sent to table with the latter, a few should be placed alternately with carrots round the dish as a garnish.
TIME. Large parsnips, 1 to 1½ hour; small ones, to 1 hour.
SEASONABLE from October to May.
PARTRIDGE, POTTED.
Breakfast, or Supper Dish.) - INGREDIENTS Partridge, Broiled. (A Luncheon, for dish for 6 persons. -3 partridges, salt and cayenne to taste, a small piece of butter, brown gravy or mushroom sauce. AVERAGE COST, 5s. half, and wipe the inside thoroughly with Pluck, draw and cut the partridges in a damp cloth. Season them with salt and cayenne, broil them over a very clear fire, and dish them on a hot dish; rub a small piece of butter over each half, and send room sauce. them to table with brown gravy or mush- TIME.-About hour. the beginning of February, SEASONABLE from the 1st of September to pie for 7 or 8 persons.-3 partridges, pepper
A plain vegetable purée soup of the type Victorian households made from cheap winter roots. The method is sound, though the timings belong to an era before blenders.
- Quantities1 lb sliced parsnips, 2 oz butter and 1 quart of stock (an imperial quart, about 1.1 litres), serving four or five. The stock is added in two stages: not quite a pint at first, the rest after straining.
- The hinge: sweat, do not colourThe parsnips go into melted butter and simmer until completely tender before any liquid is added. The recipe specifies neither a lid nor a heat level, but keeping the heat gentle draws out their sweetness; if they take on colour the soup turns muddy and slightly bitter.
- An hour is too longOnce the stock goes in, the parsnips are already soft. Fifteen to twenty minutes at a bare simmer is enough to marry the flavours. The full hour may have been insurance against fibrous roots and the uneven heat of a coal range.
- Straining, then and now"Pass all through a fine strainer" meant working the pulp through a sieve with a wooden spoon. A blender does the same in seconds; pass through a sieve afterwards only if you want the very smooth texture the original intends.
- Woody coresLarge old parsnips have a tough central core that will not break down and tastes woody. Quarter them lengthways and cut it out before slicing.
- StockThe recipe does not specify which stock; Beeton's stocks are meat-based, so a light meat or veal broth is the likely intention. A mild chicken stock works; a strongly reduced or heavily seasoned commercial stock will bury the parsnip entirely.
- SeasoningCayenne rather than black pepper, as in a great many of the book's savoury recipes; its clean heat does suit the sweetness of the root. Add it at the end, a pinch at a time.
- ConsistencyThe purée thickens as it stands and again on reheating. Hold back some of the final stock and adjust just before serving.
Parsnips were a staple English winter vegetable long before the potato displaced them, sweetened by frost in the ground and available, as the entry says, from October to April. Mrs Beeton's costing of sixpence for a soup serving five marks this as thrift cookery. The stated pairings elsewhere in the parsnip entries, with salt fish and boiled pork or beef, reflect the vegetable's older role as an accompaniment to salted provisions, a habit often said to derive from Lenten and fast-day eating when parsnips and salt fish went together on English tables, though this is a traditional explanation rather than documented practice.