Meat and Potato Casserole

A tidy way of using up Sunday's roast: a baked shell of mashed potato filled with minced meat in gravy. Most of the difficulty lies in the last step, unmoulding the case without breaking it.

• The potato quantityThe original reads "1/2 Pounds Mashed Potatoes," which is almost certainly a typesetting slip for 1 1/2 pounds. Half a pound will not line a dish; work to about 1 1/2 lb of stiff mashed potato, roughly what 2 lb of raw potatoes yields.
• Hot oven"Hot oven" in period cookery is usually read as somewhere around 400-450F. Twenty minutes at that heat should be enough to set and brown the egg-glazed surface.
• The hinge: turning it outEverything depends on the potato case releasing whole. Grease generously, coat with cornmeal so it forms a dry crust, and let the baked case stand two or three minutes before inverting it onto the serving plate. If the mash is loose or wet, it will collapse; dry the potatoes over low heat before mashing and use a floury variety.
• CasseroleHere "casserole" means the vessel, not the style of dish. A shallow round baking dish or a wide pie dish works better than a deep one, since a squat case is far more likely to survive being turned out.
• FatTwo tablespoons of "fat" would most likely have meant beef dripping, bacon fat or lard; butter is the usual modern substitute.
• Thick brown sauceA well-reduced meat gravy or a flour-thickened brown sauce, stiff enough to mound on a spoon. Thin gravy will run straight out of the case at the table. About a cup, heated with the meat until steaming.
• The meatCooked meat, minced or chopped small, not raw mince. Leftover roast is the obvious candidate, though the recipe does not name a kind. Since it is already cooked, heat it only until hot through, or it will turn dry and stringy.
• YieldServes three to four as a main course. Season the meat mixture firmly; leftover roast and plain potato both need more salt and pepper than seems reasonable.