Turkey, Hashed
INGREDIENTS. -The remains of cold roast turkey, 1 onion pepper and salt to taste, rather more than 1 pint of water, 1 carrot, 1 turnip, 1 blade of mace, a bunch of savoury herbs, 1 tablespoonful of mushroom ketchup, 1 tablespoonful of port wine, thickening of butter and flour.
Cut the turkey into neat joints; the best pieces reserve for the hash, the inferior joints and trimmings put into a stewpan with an onion cut in slices, pepper and salt, a carrot, turnip, mace, herbs and water in the above proportion; simmer these for an hour, then strain the gravy, thicken it with butter and flour, flavour with ketchup and port wine and lay in the pieces of turkey to warm through; if there is any stuffing left, put that in also, as it so much improves the flavour of the gravy. When it boils, serve, and garnish the dish with sippets of toasted bread.
TIME.-1 hour to make the gravy.
SEASONABLE from December to February.
A Victorian second-day dish built on the principle that the carcass makes the sauce and the good meat is only warmed in it. The whole thing hinges on that division of labour.
- The hinge: never boil the meatThe hinge: the meat is only warmed through -- The inferior joints and trimmings simmer an hour to make the gravy; the best pieces go in only at the end, to heat through. Beeton says to serve when it boils, but already-roasted turkey held at a boil turns dry and stringy, so keep the sauce at a bare simmer and give the meat only long enough to be piping hot at the centre.
- Quantities and yield"Rather more than 1 pint" is about 600 ml. The recipe gives no yield and no target volume for the finished gravy; scale the water to the amount of bone you have, with the bones just covered.
- Thickening of butter and flourThis is beurre manié: equal weights of soft butter and plain flour mashed to a paste, whisked into the strained gravy in small pieces. About 15 g of each will thicken 400 ml. It must simmer a minute or two afterwards to cook out the raw flour.
- MaceA blade of mace is the dried lacy covering of a nutmeg, sold whole in some spice shops. A generous pinch of ground mace, or half that of grated nutmeg, added to the strained gravy rather than the stock, does the same job.
- Mushroom ketchupNot tomato ketchup but a thin, dark, salty mushroom extract, still made by a few British firms. A tablespoon of light soy sauce plus a few drops of Worcestershire sauce is the closest common substitute; season the gravy only after adding it, as both are salty.
- The leftover stuffingBeeton says it improves the gravy, and the fat and seasonings dissolving into it will give body; the recipe does not say what the stuffing was made of. Use it only if it has been refrigerated promptly and is going into liquid hot enough to bring it thoroughly back to temperature.
- SippetsSmall pieces of toasted bread, usually cut into triangles, arranged around the dish. They soak up gravy and go soft quickly, so arrange them as the dish leaves the kitchen.
- Seasonable December to FebruaryBeeton's seasonable line follows the season for turkey rather than the vegetables. Of no practical use now; ignore it.
Hashed turkey belongs to the large Victorian literature of "re-dressed" meat — the second and third appearances of a joint that a household of any size was expected to make. Beeton's book gives dozens of such receipts, and they follow a consistent logic: the parts nobody wants to see on a plate are boiled down into stock, and the good meat is spared any second cooking. The port and mushroom ketchup are the standard Victorian pair for darkening and deepening a made gravy, ketchup at that date most often meaning a thin savoury liquor — walnut, mushroom, oyster — though tomato ketchup was also known in Britain by the mid-nineteenth century. The "seasonable December to February" line tracks the season for turkey itself, an era when a whole roast turkey was an occasion rather than a weeknight.