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Stuffed Pigeons
Pluck, draw, and clean the required quantity of pigeons, and make an incision in the center of each breast without cutting the flesh. Put the crumb of a stale roll in as much milk as it will absorb, and when soft squeeze it well and mix with it two or three finely-chopped button mushrooms, a moderate quantity each of chopped shallot and parsley, one-half ounce of butter, and salt and pepper to taste. When these ingredients are well mixed, lift the skin on each side of the incision made in the breast of the bird, and stuff them with it. Sew up openings and put a small onion in each bird. Place them in a stewpan, with a few trimmings of ham or lean bacon, a bunch of sweet herbs, and salt to taste. Moisten to height with stock, and cook them over a slow fire. When the pigeons are tender, strain off some of their liquor into a smaller stewpan, thicken it with a little flour and butter that have been rolled together, and add a wineglassful of white wine. Stir it over the fire till boiling, then move it to the side. Toast some slices of bread, lay them on a hot dish, and place the pigeons on them; pour a small quantity of gravy round, and serve with the remainder in a sauceboat.
A late-Victorian braise that survives intact if you can source squab. The whole point of the dish is the forcemeat slipped under the breast skin, which bastes the lean meat from the inside as it stews.
- The hinge: stuff under the skin, not into the cavityThe incision is made in the skin only, and the stuffing is worked between skin and flesh on each side of the keel. Cut into the muscle and the panade leaks out and the breast dries.
- Birds to buy"Pigeons" here means young domestic squab, roughly 12-16 oz each, sold frozen by game butchers and some Asian markets. Wild doves are licensed migratory game and pigeon shooting is regulated in many jurisdictions, so check local rules; older birds are also far tougher than this gentle braise allows.
- The panade"The crumb of a stale roll" is the soft interior only, crust discarded; the recipe gives one roll's worth without saying how many birds it serves. Soak in milk, wring out hard, then work in the mushroom, shallot, parsley and butter. It should hold together like a paste, not a slurry.
- MeasuresHalf an ounce of butter is one tablespoon. A wineglassful in a book of this date is usually reckoned at about 2 fl oz, though the term was never standardised; a quarter cup is a fair reading here.
- "Moisten to height" and "slow fire"Add stock until it comes level with the tops of the birds, not over them, then hold it at a bare shiver -- about 180-190F, never a rolling boil, which would toughen the legs and burst the seams.
- TimingSquab are tender in about 45 minutes to an hour; test the thigh, which should give easily at the joint. The original gives no time at all.
- The sauceThe flour-and-butter rolled together is a beurre manie, worked cold into the strained cooking liquor, with the wine added, then stirred over the fire till boiling as the recipe directs so the flour cooks out.
- The onion and the aromaticsThe small onion inside each bird and the ham trimmings and herb bundle in the pan are flavouring for the braise, not for the plate. Discard the onions when you cut the trussing thread.
- YieldOne bird per person, on its toast, with the extra sauce passed separately. Anything more is a first course rather than a main.
Oscar Tschirky was never a chef -- he was the Waldorf's maître d'hôtel -- but his 1896 Cook Book collected the repertoire of the hotel's kitchens, and this is a French bourgeois preparation set down in plain English: pigeonneaux farcis, braised in stock rather than roasted, served on toast to catch the sauce. Pigeon was still ordinary food in nineteenth-century America. Squab was raised commercially into the twentieth century as a quick-growing meat, so a dish that now reads as luxurious appeared in this book alongside the everyday. The technique of stuffing beneath the skin is older than the recipe: a milk-soaked bread panade served the same purpose as barding fat, keeping the breast moist through a long, wet cook.