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Stuffing for the Pig
For stuffing, take a cupful of bread crumbs, half a chopped onion, two teaspoonfuls powdered sage, three tablespoonfuls melted butter, a saltspoonful of white pepper, half a teaspoonful of salt, two well beaten eggs; mix all these ingredients, except the egg, together, incorporating them well; moisten with half a cupful of warm milk, or water, beat in the eggs, and stuff the pig into his natural size and shape. Sew him up and bend his forefeet backward, his hindfeet forward, under, and close to the body, and skewering them into the proper position. Dry it well, and dredge with flour. Put it to roast with a little hot water, slightly salted in the dripping-pan. Baste with butter and water three times, as the pig gradually warms, afterward with the dripping. When it begins to smoke or steam, rub it once every seven minutes or so, with a cloth dipped in melted butter. Do not omit this precaution if you would have the skin tender and soft after it begins to brown. A month-old pig will require two or three hours to roast, if the fire is brisk and steady.
Should you or your guests dislike onion, prepare your stuffing without it. The following is a good receipt for stuffing:
One cupful of bread crumbs, an ounce of suet, a bunch of parsley minced fine, teaspoonful of powdered sage, pepper, salt and very little nutmeg, a little thyme, half a glass Madeira or sherry, juice of a lemon, two teaspoonfuls melted butter, a cupful of oyster liquor, which has been boiled and strained, and two well beaten eggs. Skim your gravy well, add a little hot water, thicken with brown flour, boil up once, strain and, when you have added half a glass of wine and half the juice of a lemon, serve.
Serve the pig on a deep bed of parsley, a garland of the same around his neck, and a nice red apple in his mouth, or a lemon may be used.
Two stuffings and a gravy for a whole suckling pig, with the roasting method attached. Most of the work is in the basting, and that is the part worth following exactly.
- The buttered cloth is the pointOnce the skin starts to steam, the recipe has you wipe it every seven minutes with a cloth dipped in melted butter; its stated aim is skin that stays tender and soft rather than hard as it browns. A brush does the same job as a cloth.
- Saltspoonful and glassA saltspoon is about 1/4 teaspoon. A "glass" of wine here means a small wine glass, roughly 2 fluid ounces, so half a glass is about 2 tablespoons.
- Scale the stuffing upOne cup of crumbs will not fill a whole pig. A suckling pig of the age described runs somewhere in the region of 10 to 20 lb dressed and will want several times this quantity; multiply the list to suit the bird you actually have, and keep the mixture loose and barely moist, since it swells.
- Oven, since none is givenRoast at 325-350F. The recipe's two to three hours suits a small pig at a brisk heat, but go by temperature: 160-165F in the thickest part of the shoulder, away from bone. If you want harder crackling, raise the heat to 450F for the last 15 minutes and stop basting.
- Stuffed cavity means a second readingBread stuffing packed inside a whole animal heats slowly. Take the stuffing to 165F on a thermometer pushed through the seam, not just the meat, or bake the stuffing separately in a dish and use the pig unstuffed.
- Suet and oyster liquorBeef suet is available from butchers; cold grated butter or bacon fat stands in. Oyster liquor is the strained juice from shucked oysters, sold in tubs with the oysters or available from a fish counter; bottled clam juice is the nearest substitute.
- Brown flourFlour toasted dry in a pan until nut-coloured. It thickens less than raw flour, so allow about half again as much, and add it as a paste with cold water to avoid lumps.
- Ordering the pigA whole suckling pig is a special order in most places and needs a day or two's notice, plus an oven that will take it diagonally on a large sheet pan. Ask the butcher to remove the eyes and scrape the skin.
- YieldA 15 lb pig serves 10 to 12 generously, with the loin and shoulder the best eating.
Roast suckling pig was a long-standing set piece of the English and American festive table, and this entry preserves its full ceremony: the feet skewered under the body, the parsley bed, the apple or lemon in the mouth. The first stuffing is the plain sage-and-onion mixture long associated with pork in British cookery, where sage was traditionally held to cut the meat's richness; the second, with suet, Madeira, nutmeg, lemon and oyster liquor, belongs to an older and grander tradition, from a time when oysters were cheap enough to season a joint rather than crown it. That the author pauses to note some guests dislike onion says a good deal about who these books were written for.