Important: Safety Warning

This page describes collecting wild birds' eggs, shooting birds for specimens, or similar practices. These activities are now illegal under wildlife-protection laws, including the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, and they contributed to the decline of the very species described.

This information has been left in for historical purposes but should not be acted upon.

No. 2166

Thrushes and Robins, Roasted and Broiled

Grives ou Rouges Gorges Rotis ou Grilles

Pick, draw, and singe six thrushes or robins; stuff them with forcemeat made of four ounces of lean cooked ham cut in dice, and as much finely chopped sausage meat; put this into a sautoir on a bright fire to cook, when cool add four ounces of truffles, and the same of foies-gras, cut in three-sixteenths of an inch squares; mix in six ounces of thick and well-reduced allemande sauce (No. 407). Truss the bird as for an entree (No. 178), cover the breast with a grape leaf, and on this place a thin layer of fat pork; cook on the spit or in a quick oven, untruss and dress on canapés with the following gravy poured around: Fry two bay leaves in butter with one chopped shallot, salt, pepper, and fine herbs, add half a pint of white wine, and a little stock (No. 194a); let boil and simmer, then put in some game glaze (No. 398), and minced mushrooms; when ready the bay leaves should be removed.

For Broiling.—Prepare and broil the thrushes the same as quails (No. 2128), only not allowing them to cook quite as long; dress and serve the same.

← No. 2165 Thrushes in the Saucepan Quail, Snipe, Woodcock & Small Birds No. 2167 Venison. Antelope. Deer →

For the Modern Kitchen Do not make this as written.

Ranhofer's small-bird cookery belongs to a period when songbirds were sold by the dozen in American markets. The dish cannot lawfully be reproduced in the United States or in most of Europe, and the notes below explain the legal barrier first and the vocabulary second.

The birds are protectedAmerican robins (Turdus migratorius) and the native thrushes are migratory birds protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918; taking, killing, possessing or selling them is a federal offence, and state law generally adds its own penalties. There is no permit that covers cooking them for dinner.
European thrushes tooThe grives of the French title — song thrush, redwing, fieldfare — fall under the EU Birds Directive. Several member states still permit them to be hunted under Annex II, but a number of the traditional trapping methods that once supplied the market have been struck down in the courts, and commercial sale is prohibited; they do not reach a retail counter.
No substitution is offered hereFarmed quail, squab and poussin are the birds a modern kitchen would reach for, and a current recipe written for them should be used. Scaling this one down onto a legal bird is not something we will set out, because the timings, the trussing and the fat-pork barding all assume a carcass of a few ounces.
What a sautoir isA straight-sided shallow pan with a lid — a modern sauté pan or a wide skillet. Ranhofer uses it here only to render and cook the ham and sausage forcemeat before the truffle and foie gras are folded in cold.
Allemande sauceA velouté thickened with egg yolk, usually sharpened with lemon and often enriched with cream, and here reduced until stiff enough to bind a stuffing. It is no longer a standard preparation; Escoffier reclassified it as a derivative of velouté rather than a leading sauce.
"A quick oven"A hot oven; in modern terms roughly 400–450°F, though Ranhofer gives no figure. He expects the birds either turned on a spit before a fire or roasted hot and fast, with the grape leaf and pork fat protecting the breast for the few minutes involved.
The measuresHalf a pint is a US cup for the wine. "Three-sixteenths of an inch squares" for the truffle and foie gras is Ranhofer's habitual precision — he specified brunoise dimensions in fractions throughout The Epicurean.
Game glaze and stock numbersThe cross-references (Nos. 194a, 398, 407) point back to the book's earlier stock and sauce sections; the recipe assumes a kitchen with stock, reduced game glaze and velouté already standing, which is why so little seasoning is specified in the gravy itself.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer ran the Delmonico's kitchens for over thirty years, and The Epicurean (1894) is the record of a restaurant cooking for New Yorkers who wanted to eat as Parisians did. Small birds were part of that vocabulary: thrushes, larks, ortolans and reed birds appear across the game chapters, spitted, barded and served on fried bread canapés to catch the juices. In Europe the autumn thrush had long been a peasant and hunter's bird — the grape leaf in this recipe is a nod to the vineyard thrushes fattened on ripe fruit. In America the supply came from market hunting, the same commerce that emptied the skies of passenger pigeons, and it was market hunting that the Lacey Act of 1900 and then the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 were written to stop. Recipes like this one are the reason those laws exist, which makes the page a useful piece of evidence and a dead letter as a set of instructions.