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Meat
Mrs. S. McMaster, Toronto.
Pound some beef that is underdone with a little fat bacon or ham; season with pepper and salt, and a little shalot or garlic. Mix them well, and make into small cakes three inches long and half as wide and thick; fry them a light brown, and serve them in a good thick gravy.
This is a leftovers recipe in the Victorian mould: cold rare roast beef given a second life as fried cakes. The original assumes you have both a joint of underdone beef and a jug of gravy already on hand.
- "Underdone" beefThis means cold leftover roast beef still pink in the middle, not raw meat. Because the cakes are only fried "a light brown," start with beef that is already cooked and refrigerated, and fry until the cakes are hot right through.
- ProportionsNo quantities are given. About 1 lb of chopped cooked beef to 2-3 oz of fat bacon or ham, one small shallot, and a good pinch each of salt and pepper gives the texture the recipe is after. At the size the recipe specifies (three inches long, half as wide and thick) that makes about four or five cakes, enough for two or three people.
- PoundingThe likely 1877 tools are a mortar and pestle, or simply chopping and pounding the meat on a board. A food processor pulsed in short bursts does the same work, but stop while the mixture is still coarse and slightly stringy; puréed beef makes a pasty cake.
- ShalotShallot. Mince it very fine, or grate it, so it softens in the short frying time. The recipe calls for only "a little" shalot or garlic, so use it as a background seasoning.
- BindingThe recipe names no binder; the pounded meat and the fat bacon or ham are left to hold the cakes together. Chill the shaped cakes for 20-30 minutes before frying, or they may break up in the pan. A beaten egg or a spoonful of thick gravy worked into the mixture is a period-appropriate insurance policy.
- FryingFry in a shallow film of beef dripping, bacon fat or clarified butter over medium heat, about 3 minutes a side. High heat will crust them before the centre warms.
- "A good thick gravy"A thickened meat gravy rather than a thin pan juice. Leftover roast gravy, reduced and strained, would suit; the wording "serve them in" suggests the cakes sit in the gravy rather than being sauced over the top.
The Home Cook Book was compiled in Toronto in 1877 from contributions by "ladies of Toronto and other cities and towns," and is generally credited as the first Canadian fundraising cookbook, its proceeds going to the Hospital for Sick Children. Recipes like this one show why such books mattered: beef cakes, or rissoles, are pure thrift cookery, a way of turning the cold remains of Sunday's joint into a hot dish worth putting on the table. The technique — pound cooked meat with a fatty cured meat, season sharply with shallot, fry, and serve in gravy — belongs to the same family as the English rissole and the French croquette de bœuf.