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Veal Rissoles
Mince fine one pound of veal and one-fourth pound of suet. Soak two pounds of breadcrumbs in a small quantity of milk till soft, mix them with the veal and suet, season with a little pounded mace, pepper and salt, and bind with the beaten yolks of a couple of eggs. Mould the mixture into small balls, brush them over with clarified butter and cover them thickly with breadcrumbs. Put a lump of butter into a fryingpan and melt it; then put in the rissoles and fry them till well browned all over. Drain the rissoles, place them on a folded napkin or ornamental dish-paper on a hot dish, garnish with fried parsley, and serve with a sauceboatful of rich brown gravy.
A straightforward forcemeat ball, but the proportions as printed need a hard look before you start.
- The breadcrumb quantity is wrongThe breadcrumb quantity looks off -- two pounds of soaked crumbs to one pound of veal would swamp the meat and give something closer to a bread pudding than a rissole. It may well be a compositor's slip for two ounces, though the printed text gives no way to confirm it. Start with about 1 cup of fresh crumbs and add more only if the mixture will not hold a ball.
- SuetBeef suet is the shredded kidney fat, sold by butchers and some supermarkets; the boxed "vegetable suet" behaves differently and the packaged British type is often mixed with flour. Cold unsalted butter grated on the large holes of a box grater, or finely diced fatback, does the same job of keeping lean veal moist.
- Mince fineAsk for veal shoulder ground twice, or cube it and pulse it in a food processor with the suet while both are very cold. Warm fat smears and the rissoles turn dense.
- Pounded maceMace is the lacy outer covering of the nutmeg seed, milder and more floral than the nut itself. A quarter teaspoon of ground mace is enough for a pound of meat; grated nutmeg substitutes at about half the quantity.
- Clarified butter and the crumb coatButter brushed on and then crumbs pressed on thickly is the whole armour here — there is no egg wash. Chill the coated balls for 20 minutes before frying so the butter sets and the crust stays put.
- FryingShallow-fry in butter over medium heat, about 350F if you are measuring, turning to brown all sides; balls of roughly 1 1/2 inches need 8 to 10 minutes to reach 160F at the centre. Butter alone browns fast, so add a spoonful of neutral oil to raise its tolerance if the pan is running hot.
- Fried parsleyFlat-leaf or curly sprigs, bone dry, dropped into hot fat for 10 to 15 seconds until they stop sputtering and go brittle. Wet parsley will spit violently; dry it thoroughly on a towel first.
- Yield and serviceYield depends on how large you roll them -- a pound of veal will give somewhere between a dozen and two dozen rissoles; reckon on four servings as a main course with the brown gravy, or six as a first course. The folded napkin both dressed the dish and soaked up frying butter; a rack over a warm tray does the second job better and keeps the crust crisp.
Rissole comes from the Old French roissole, a fried pastry or ball, and by the nineteenth century English cookery had settled it on a small crumbed-and-fried croquette, often a way of turning cold or cheap meat into something that could be sent to the table on a napkin under a garnish. Veal suits the treatment because it is pale, mild and takes seasoning without argument -- which is why mace, a spice much used with white meats in this period, appears here rather than anything more assertive.