Potted meat

“ For this reason cured meats, such as beef and pork, are often preferred for making potted and deviled meats because of the agreeable flavor and aroma which they impart thereto. These meats are therefore used in potting, although they cost more than corresponding quantities of fresh meat. In a character of goods so variegated as these it is impossible to lay down any rule which may guide the consumer in his choice. The widest latitude is left to the manufacturer, and the only real protection is in a strict inspection of the factory or factories where such goods are made. ”

“ POTTED CHICKEN, PARTRIDGE, OR PHEASANT. Roast the birds as for table, but let them be thoroughly done, for if the gravy be left in, the meat will not keep half so well. Raise the flesh of the breast, wings, and merrythought, quite clear from the bones, take off the skin, mince, and then pound it very smoothly with about one third of its weight of fresh butter, or something less, if the meat should appear of a proper consistence without the full quantity; season it with salt, mace, and cayenne only, and add these in small portions until the meat is rather highly flavoured with both the last ”

“ Let the fat be entirely melted; and when it has cooled a little, strain it through a sieve into the pot, and tie it down. Turn the pot upside down, that no rats or mice may get at it, and it will keep a long time, and make good puff paste, or crust for puddings.
POTTED HARE. An old hare will do well for this purpose, likewise for soup and pie. After seasoning it, bake it with butter. When cold, take the meat from the bones, and beat it in a mortar. If not high enough, add salt, mace, pepper, and a piece of fresh butter melted in a spoonful or two of gravy that came from the hare. ”

“ What is home without Plumtree’s potted meat? Incomplete. ”

“ The broth should cover the meat while it is stewing, and keep the slices of fat as much over it as you can; the seldomer you uncover the pot the better. When you think it sufficiently tender, which try with your finger, take it off, and, though it may appear tender enough to fall to pieces, it will harden sufficiently when it grows cold. It should remain in the pot just as it is taken off the fire till it is very nearly if not quite cold. It will eat much better for being so left, and you will also not run the risk of breaking the beef in pieces, as you would by removing it whilst hot. ”

“ Any kind of meat can be used to make a meat-and-potato hash; but, of course, nothing is so good as corned beef. Cold roast, boiled, or broiled beef, mutton, lamb, veal, or tongue can be freed from skin, fat, and bones, seasoned highly with salt and pepper, and cooked like corned beef hash. Even two or three kinds of meat can be used. If it happens that you have a bit of steak, a part of a chop, and perhaps a slice of tongue, use them all. ”

“ The process of potting consists in reducing cooked animal substances to a pulp, by beating the meat in a mortar, and incorporating the mass with a portion of salt and spices. The pulp is then put into a jar, and covered with a thick coat of melted butter or lard, to prevent the contact of air; and the surface is further protected with a bladder-skin tied over the mouth of the jar. The muscular part of meat is best suited for potting, and the quantity of salt and spices ought to be rather liberal. ”

“ They take an earthen pot, nearly fill it with water, put it on the fire, and allow it to boil. They then cut up their meat into lumps as large as a man’s fist, throw them into the pot, and permit them to remain there until they are wanted. Sometimes, when the feasters are asleep themselves, they allow the meat to remain in the pot for half a day or so, during which time the women are obliged to keep the water continually boiling, and it may be imagined the ultimate result of their cooking is not particularly palatable. ”

“ Add carrot, turnip, and onion, with salt and pepper the last hour of cooking. Parboil potatoes five minutes, and add to stew fifteen minutes before taking from fire. Remove bones, large pieces of fat, and then skim. Thicken with one-fourth cup flour, diluted with enough cold water to pour easily. Pour in deep hot platter, and surround with dumplings. Remnants of roast beef are usually made into a beef stew; the meat having been once cooked, there is no necessity of browning it. If gravy is left, it should be added to the stew. ”

“ It is an improvement to put on slices of pork as in cooking the leg. Allow two hours for roasting; more, if it is large.
Veal Pot Pie.
Take the neck, the shank, and almost any pieces you have. Boil them long enough to skim off all the froth. Make a paste and roll it about half an inch thick. Butter the pot and lay in the crust, cutting out a piece on each side of the circle in such a way as to prevent its having thick folds. Put in a layer of meat, then flour, salt and pepper it, and add a little butter or a slice or two of salt pork, as you choose. Do this until you have laid in all your meat ”

“ Spread the bottom of the pot with butter, or marrow. Pack in pieces of meat, bone, gristle, the carcases of birds, two or three vegetables cut up in small pieces, two cloves, and a bouquet of herbs.
Cover the meat, etc., with cold water. Put on the lid. Heat slowly, and when it boils set back to simmer for four or five hours.
In preparing meat for this stock, look it over carefully; reject any piece which is not perfectly good, also all stuffing, skin, smoked or burnt pieces. A little beef fat can always be retained, but mutton fat should not be used as it is rank in flavour. ”

“ When the pot has been well scummed, and no more scum to be seen, set in such a situation on, or by, the fire, that it may continue to boil gently and regularly, for the time required; and see that it do not stop boiling altogether at one time, and then be hurried to a wallop at another time, for this dries up the juices, hardens the meat, and tears it. A kettle of boiling water should be at hand, in order to replenish the pot, as the quantity diminishes, taking heed not to exceed the original quantity, namely, enough to cover the meat, for the less water, the better the broth will be. ”

“ Very large joints if slightly underdone, will make the better hash or broil. Lamb, pork, and veal are uneatable if not thoroughly boiled—but these meats should not be overdone. A trivet, a fish-drainer, or an American contrivance called a "spider"—which is nothing more than a wire dish raised on three or four short legs—put on the bottom of the boiling-pot, raising the contents about an inch and a half from the bottom, will prevent that side of the meat which comes next the bottom being done too much ”

“ If the proper attention is given to the preparation of such a roast, usually called a pot roast, it will prove a very appetizing dish. Potatoes may also be cooked in the pot with the meat. This is a good plan to follow for it saves fuel and at the same time offers variety in the cooking of potatoes.
When a piece of beef is to be roasted in a pot, try out in the pot a little of the beef fat. Then wipe the meat carefully and brown it on all sides in the fat. Add salt, pepper, and 1/2 cupful of boiling water and cover the pot tightly. ”

“ You can remove the bone or not, it improves the flavor if left. Put the joint into a saucepan and over it pour some boiling water. Boil about fifteen or sixteen minutes, and then remove it to one side of the fire. This process secures all the juices in the meat. Now put the bacon, onion, carrots (cut in lengths) , turnips (sliced) , spice, cloves, pepper corns, celery, parsley and salt into a braizing pan. Put in the meat and pour the stock over it, and, if you have it, add some sherry or wine. ”

“ Take six pounds of the lean of fresh beef, cut from the bone. Stick it over with four dozen cloves. Season it with a tea-spoonful of salt, a tea-spoonful of pepper, a tea-spoonful of mace, and a beaten nutmeg. Slice half a dozen onions; fry them in butter; chop them, and spread them over the meat after you have put it into the soup-pot. Pour in five quarts of water, and stew it slowly for five or six hours; skimming it well. When the meat has dissolved into shreds, strain it, and return the liquid to the pot. Then add a tumbler and a half, or six wine glasses of claret or port wine. ”

“ Tender, well-fatted meat holds its juices, cooks perfectly in an open pan if moderate heat is used.
Tough meat, on the other hand, requires long, slow cooking in a covered pan with water or steam. So turn the less tender cuts into pot roast, stew, or some other braised dish. Or, grind them and cook the same as tender meat. Meat cooked in water or steamed is juicier if cooled in the broth for an hour or longer.
Regardless of cut, add fat to very lean beef, lamb, and most veal for richness and good flavor. Then cook as braised steaks and chops, oven-braised meat, pot roast, or stew. ”

“ If not wanted for immediate use, cut it in pieces, and put it up in a jar well covered. Use it (instead of water) for stews and hashes; and if well seasoned the meat will be found nearly as good (for a breakfast dish,) as if not previously cooked. Whenever it is possible, make your hashes without any water; and if you have saved no gravy, substitute lard, or fresh butter. But gravy or drippings of the same meat is best. A hash of cold meat, stewed merely in water, and with no seasoning but salt and pepper, is a poor thing. Cold potatos, when re-cooked, always remain hard and indigestible. ”

“ The lean of good fresh beef is of a bright red color, a fine close grain, and feels tender to the touch on pinching it between your thumb and finger. The fat is firm and very nearly white. The suet about the kidney, firm and quite white. If, on the contrary, the lean is coarse, tough, and of a dull color, and the fat scanty, yellow, and moist, do not buy that meat for any purpose. The same rules will apply to mutton. If the weather is so cold that the meat is frozen, thaw it by lying it all night or early in the morning in a tub of cold water. ”

“ When your meat, of whatever kind, has been down some time, but before it begins to look brown, cover it with paper and baste on it; when it is nearly done, take off the peper, dredge it with flour, turn the spit for some minutes very quick, and baste all the time to raise a froth—after which, serve it up. When mutton is roasted, after you take off the paper, loosen the skin and peel it off carefully, then dredge and froth it up. Beef and mutton must not be roasted as much as veal, lamb, or pork ”

“ Certainly meat cooked in a pot requires very little attention and too frequently receives none at all, as is evidence by the ragged mutton and hard-flavourless beef to which the term BOILED meat may be correctly applied. Although meat loses less weight when boiled than when roasted or baked, there is more loss of nutritive constituents, unless both the meat and the liquor in which it is cooked be consumed, for certain mineral salts, soluble substances, and a considerable quantity of gelatin, are abstracted during the process of cooking, and remain dissolved in the liquor. ”

“ In choice and well-fed beef, the lean will be found intergrained with fat: very lean meat is generally of an inferior quality.
The ribs, the sirloin, and the rump, are the proper joints for roasting. The round, or buttock, the edgebone, the second round, or mouse-buttock, the shin, the brisket, the shoulder or leg of mutton piece, and the clod, may be boiled or stewed. The neck is generally used for soup or gravy; and the thin flank for collaring. The best steaks are cut from the middle of the rump ”

“ Pork, veal, and lamb, should always be well roasted; but many eaters prefer mutton and beef rather underdressed, though some persons have a strong objection to the sight even of any meat that is not thoroughly cooked.
Joints which are thin in proportion to their weight, require less of the fire than thick and solid ones. Ribs of beef, for example, will be sooner ready to serve than an equal weight of the rump, round, or sirloin ”

“ If a proper “buck” pot cannot be obtained, a round earthenware one is a fair substitute.
(b) Take a good-sized jar (jam-pot shape if possible) , into it put any cold cooked meat you have, viz. ham, bacon, fowl, rabbit, game, beef, or mutton, &c.; mix them together, flavour with shallot, cayenne pepper, and salt; pour in some good stock, and plenty of cassareep sauce; this last ingredient is difficult to obtain out of the West Indies. It is by far the best; but if unobtainable, add soy or Harvey’s sauce to taste. ”

“ Have the head split down the face, remove the skin, ears, eyes and brains, and cut off the snout; wash thoroughly and soak all day in cold salted water; [Pg 118] change the water and soak over night, then put on to cook in cold water to cover. Skim carefully and when done so the bones will slip out, remove to a hot pan, take out every bone and bit of gristle, and chop the meat with a sharp knife as quickly as possible, to keep the fat from settling in it. For 6 lbs. meat allow 2 tablespoons salt, 1 teaspoon black pepper, a little cayenne, 1⁄4 teaspoon clove and 2 tablespoons sage. ”

“ But, from the onset we don't roast it with meat at all. And [to cook it] in a pot without meat, our custom is that it is forbidden from the onset. And so too is the law by frying it, even with meat and even if the udder was dried out. And if one transgressed and cooked it in a pot alone, after the fact it is permitted if it was torn lengthwise and widthwise and pressed against a wall. However, if it was dried out, which is after thirty days, if one transgressed and cooked it, even with meat, it is permitted after the fact. ”