Sweetbreads, Baked
INGREDIENTS for a good-sized entrée. -3 sweetbreads, gs and bread-crumbs, oiled butter, 3 slices of toast, brown gravy. AVERAGE COST, 3s. 6d. INGREDIENTS for a good-sized entrée.—3 sweetbreads, eggs and bread-crumbs, oiled butter, 3 slices of toast, brown gravy. AVERAGE COST, 3s. 6d.
Choose large white sweetbreads; put them into warm water to draw out the blood, and to improve their colour; let them SWEETBREADS. remain for rather more than 1 hour; then put them into boiling water, and allow them to simmer for about 10 minutes, which renders them firm. Take them up, drain them, brush over with egg, sprinkle with bread-crumbs; dip them in egg again, and then into more bread-crumbs. Drop on them a little oiled butter, and put the sweetbreads into a moderately-heated oven, SWEETBREADS, FRIED. and let them bake for nearly hour. Make 3 pieces of toast; place the sweetbreads on the toast; and pour round, but not over them, a good brown gravy.
TIME. To soak 1 hour, to be boiled 10 minutes, baked 40 minutes.
SEASONABLE. -In full season from May to August.
A straightforward Victorian entrée: veal sweetbreads soaked, blanched, double-crumbed and baked, then served on toast in a moat of gravy. Little of the method needs changing, but the shopping and the soaking do.
- What to buySweetbreads are the thymus and pancreas glands of a calf or lamb; the plump, rounded pancreas or "heart" sweetbread is the sort usually wanted for a dish like this, though the recipe asks only for large white ones. Order them from a butcher, and count on about 1 lb (450 g) of veal sweetbreads for three servings; lamb sweetbreads are much smaller, so allow several per person.
- The soak is not optionalThe hour in warm water draws out blood and improves the colour; it is the blanching that follows which firms them enough for the membrane to be peeled. Modern practice is to soak in several changes of cold water in the refrigerator, 2 to 4 hours or overnight, rather than at room temperature. After blanching, cool them, peel off the outer membrane and any gristle, then press between two plates under a weight for an hour if you want neat slices.
- BlanchingTen minutes at a bare simmer is right for veal sweetbreads; lamb sweetbreads need 3 to 5 minutes. A hard boil toughens them and can make them break up.
- Oven temperatureA "moderately-heated oven" is usually read as roughly 350-375F (180-190C), though Victorian ovens were not calibrated and the reading is approximate. The crumbs should colour to a deep gold.
- Baking timeThe instruction line has lost its fraction, but the TIME note settles it at 40 minutes. Already blanched, the sweetbreads only need heating through and crisping, so check at 25-30 minutes if they are small or sliced.
- Egg and crumbs"Egg and bread-crumbs" means beaten whole egg; the recipe crumbs twice for a thicker crust. Dry, fine white crumbs give the closest result to the original. Chill the coated sweetbreads for 20 minutes before baking so the coating sets.
- Oiled butterButter melted until it runs clear; clarified butter, or melted butter with the milk solids left behind, is the nearest modern equivalent, drizzled over the crumbs so they brown as they would in a pan. Around 2 oz (55 g) is ample.
- ServingThree sweetbreads on three rounds of toast serve three as a first course, or two as a light main. Pour the gravy round the toast, not over it, or the crumb coating softens at once.
- "In full season from May to August"A reflection of the calving and veal year of the period. Sweetbreads are available frozen or to order year-round now; buy them very fresh and use within a day, as they spoil quickly.
Sweetbreads occupied an odd rank in the Victorian kitchen: cheap offal by origin, expensive delicacy by demand, which is why Mrs Beeton can list three of them at 3s. 6d., a serious sum for an entrée. The name is often said to have nothing to do with bread or sugar; one proposed derivation, of uncertain standing, traces it to the Old English brǣd, meaning flesh, with "sweet" distinguishing the mild glands from stronger organ meats. The soak-blanch-press-crumb sequence set out here is essentially the treatment still taught in classical French kitchens as ris de veau, and the double coating with a drizzle of clarified butter is a very Victorian way of getting fried texture from an oven, sparing the cook a pan of spitting fat. Serving on toast with gravy poured around rather than over is the standard nineteenth-century entrée presentation, meant to keep the crust intact until it reaches the table.