Roasting
Wipe meat with damp cloth. Trim and tie into shape if necessary. In bottom of pan put some pieces of fat from meat. Arrange meat on rack in pan; sprinkle with salt and pepper. Have oven very hot at first and when meat is half done reduce heat. Baste every 10 to 15 minutes. If there is danger of fat in pan being scorched add a few spoons boiling water. Roast from 10 to 15 minutes for each pound of meat, in proportion as it is desired rare or well done.
This is a master method rather than a single dish, written when ovens had no reliable thermostat and cooks judged heat by hand and habit. The bones of it are still sound; the timing is the part to treat as a starting point only.
- The hinge: cook to temperature, not to the clockMinutes per pound varies enormously with the cut's shape, its starting temperature and the accuracy of the oven. Use an instant-read thermometer in the thickest part away from bone: about 125-130F for rare beef, 135-140F medium, 145F for pork, 130-135F for lamb medium-rare.
- "Very hot at first"The book gives no numbers. In a modern oven the equivalent is a hot start, around 450-475F, dropping to 325-350F for the remainder; note that the recipe itself says to reduce the heat when the meat is half done, which is later than a modern short sear.
- Take the chill off firstNot stated here. Let a large roast stand at room temperature 45-60 minutes before it goes in, or the outside overcooks while the centre lags.
- The fat in the bottom of the panOlder joints came with generous trimmable fat that was rendered to keep the drippings from burning. Modern supermarket cuts are leaner; a tablespoon or two of beef dripping, lard or oil does the same job.
- BastingEvery 10 to 15 minutes is more often than necessary and lets a great deal of heat out. Twice or three times over the whole roast is plenty, and a dry surface browns better than a wet one.
- Boiling water in the panSound advice, and still the right fix if the drippings begin to smoke. Add it boiling, a few spoonfuls at a time, so the pan temperature does not crash and the fond does not seize.
- RestingThe original says nothing about it. Let a roast stand loosely covered 15-20 minutes before carving; the internal temperature will climb another 5-10 degrees, so pull it from the oven below your target.
- YieldThe original gives none. As a rough guide, allow about 1/2 lb boneless or 3/4 to 1 lb bone-in raw weight per person for a main course, with a little over for cold meat the next day.
Strictly speaking, this is not roasting at all but baking. Until well into the nineteenth century roasting meant meat turned on a spit before an open fire, with a dripping pan beneath, and English cooks were particular about the distinction; enclosed oven cookery was often disparaged as steaming the joint in its own vapour. As cast-iron ranges and then gas ovens took over domestic kitchens, the word migrated, and in books of this period "roasting" had come to mean what it means now. The instruction to start with a very hot oven and then reduce can be read as the oven cook's attempt to reproduce the fierce initial searing that a fire gave, and the rack in the pan lifts the meat clear of its own drippings.