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Mutton Hash, En Bordure
Prepare the same way the same quantity of potatoes puree as for potatoes brioche. Slide a small dentilated tube at the bottom of a pastry bag; drop the mashed potatoes into the bag, then carefully press down the puree all around the border of a flat baking dish large enough to hold the hash. Cut into small dice-shaped pieces the left-over mutton from yesterday. Cut into same size two medium, cold, peeled, boiled potatoes. Brown to a light-brown colour one medium, chopped onion with one tablespoon butter, then add the mutton and potatoes. Season with one teaspoon salt, half teaspoon white pepper and a saltspoon grated nutmeg. Moisten with two gills hot broth or hot water and one gill tomato sauce. Stir well with a wooden spoon and gently cook for fifteen minutes, mixing occasionally meanwhile. Drop the hash into the centre of the dish with the border. Sprinkle one tablespoon grated Parmesan cheese over the hash. Set in a brisk oven for twelve minutes. See that it obtains a good golden colour. Remove and serve in the same dish.
A leftover-meat dish dressed up with a piped potato border, in the French service style the book calls en bordure. Nothing here is difficult, but two things decide the result: the mash must be stiff enough to hold a piped edge, and the meat must not be cooked a second time into shreds.
- The potato borderThe cross-reference to "potatoes brioche" points to a stiff, dry puree of the duchesse type, probably riced potato beaten with butter and egg yolk, rather than a loose creamy mash. Milky mashed potato will slump in the bag and will not take colour in the oven. A "dentilated tube" is a toothed or star tip; a wide one gives a border sturdy enough to survive the browning.
- Gills and saltspoonsA gill is half a cup, so two gills of broth is 1 cup and one gill of tomato sauce is 1/2 cup. A saltspoon is about 1/4 teaspoon.
- Brisk ovenRoughly 400-425F. The dish goes in only to set the border and colour the cheese, so twelve minutes at that heat is about right; judge by the colour of the potato ridges rather than the clock.
- MuttonMutton means sheep over a year old, stronger and firmer than lamb, and it is rarely sold in American supermarkets. Leftover roast leg or shoulder of lamb behaves the same way in the pan; expect a milder flavour, which the nutmeg and tomato will carry.
- The fifteen-minute simmerThis is meant to bind the hash, not to cook the meat, which is already roasted. Keep it at a bare simmer and stop when the liquid has reduced to a coating; boiled hard, cooked lamb turns dry and stringy.
- Seasoning scaleA full teaspoon of salt assumes unsalted broth and unseasoned leftovers. Taste before adding it all, particularly if the roast was well seasoned or the broth is commercial stock.
- YieldThe recipe does not say how much mutton to use; a pound or so of cooked meat with the two potatoes would serve about four as a lunch or supper dish. Use a shallow gratin dish or metal pie plate rather than a deep casserole so the border sits proud of the filling.
En bordure was a standard trick of the professional kitchen at the turn of the twentieth century: a ring of stiff duchesse potato piped round a dish turned reheated scraps into something that could be sent to table in its own vessel, which is why the recipe insists on serving it in the same dish. The book's phrasing, "the left-over mutton from yesterday," places it in the household economy of the trade tradition rather than the banquet menu, and mutton is the giveaway of period: sheep meat older than a year was ordinary in English and American kitchens well into the 1900s and only slipped out of the market later, as lamb came to dominate. The Parmesan and tomato sauce, and the use of white pepper, are the marks of a French-trained hand writing for American cooks.