Partridge Pie
INGREDIENTS for and salt to taste, 1 teaspoonful of minced parsley (when obtainable, a few mushrooms), lb. of veal cutlet, a slice of ham, pint of stock, puff-paste. AVERAGE COST, 78. INGREDIENTS for pie for 7 or 8 persons.—3 partridges, pepper and salt to taste, 1 teaspoonful of minced parsley (when obtainable, a few mushrooms), 3/4 lb. of veal cutlet, a slice of ham, 1/2 pint of stock, puff-paste. AVERAGE COST, 7s.
Line a pie-dish with a veal cutlet; over that place a slice of ham and a seasoning of pepper and salt. Pluck, draw and wipe the partridges; cut them in half, and cut off the legs at the first joint, and season inside with pepper, salt, minced parsley and a small piece of butter ; place them inside with pepper, salt, minced them in the dish, and pour over the stock; line the edges of the dish with puff-paste, it over with the yolk of an egg, and bake cover with the same, decorate, and brush for to 1 hour.
TIME.- to 1 hour. the beginning of February.
SEASONABLE from the 1st of September to
A raised game pie of the old English kind, in which the birds sit on a bed of veal and ham that does the work of keeping them moist. Several quantities have dropped out of the ingredient list, so treat the amounts below as a working reconstruction rather than the author's own.
- Quantities are incompleteThe ingredient list has lost the number of partridges and the fractions before the veal and the stock. A dish of this size takes two birds, about half a pound of veal cutlet, one slice of ham and half a pint of stock.
- Oven heatBeeton gives no oven temperature, only 'bake'. A moderate oven, around 350-375F, suits a covered pie of this kind. The recipe allows three-quarters of an hour to an hour; cover the pastry loosely with foil if it colours before the time is up.
- The birdsGrey and red-legged partridge are sold oven-ready by game dealers in season; farmed birds are available frozen year-round. Buying them drawn removes the plucking and drawing step entirely. Check the breasts for shot before jointing.
- Veal cutletHere this means a thin flat slice of veal from the leg or loin, beaten out to line the base of the dish - not a breaded escalope. Pork loin or a slice of well-flavoured chicken breast substitutes acceptably.
- JointingThe recipe halves the birds and cuts the legs off at the first joint. Partridge leg tendons are wiry and unwelcome in a pie, though Beeton gives no reason for the instruction.
- Stock and pastryUse a strong game or brown chicken stock; the pie has no thickening, so it should be gelatinous enough to set when cool. Fill the dish only to just below the rim or the stock will lift the lid and boil out.
- DonenessPartridge is lean and dries quickly. An hour at moderate heat is enough for halved birds; the thickest part of the breast should reach 165F and no more.
- YieldTwo birds with the veal and ham feed four as a main course, served hot with the pastry cut into portions, or cold the next day once the stock has jellied.
Partridge pie belongs to the long English tradition of game pies built on a foundation of veal and ham, ingredients chosen less for their own flavour than for the fat and gelatine they contribute to birds that have almost none. The seasonable note - 1 September to the beginning of February - is the English partridge season, and Victorian household books of this kind, of which the recipe's format is characteristic, were organised around exactly this kind of calendar, since before reliable cold storage a cook's menu was dictated by what the game laws and the markets allowed in any given month. Partridge was a common enough bird in Victorian kitchens to appear in modest households as well as grand ones, often as a gift from a shooting acquaintance rather than a purchase, which is why the average cost given in the original would have struck contemporary readers as a notional figure.