First prepare the following forcemeat:—Heat three oz. of fat bacon, cut into small dice, and three oz. of butter in a frying-pan. Throw six fine ducks’ livers (seasoned with salt and pepper, and sprinkled with a pinch of powdered thyme, bay-leaf, and half an onion chopped) into this fat. Toss them over a fierce fire, just long enough to heat them; leave them to cool, and rub them through a sieve.
Bone the breast of a Rouen duckling and its back as far as the region of the legs, and suppress the tail. Stuff it with the preparation given above; truss as for an entrée, and put [563] ]it in a terrine just large enough to hold it. Sprinkle it with a glassful of brandy; cover with a slice of bacon, and cook it in the [bain-marie], in the oven, and under cover for forty minutes.
With the carcass and some strong veal stock, prepare two-thirds pint of excellent aspic, and, when withdrawing the duckling from the oven, cover it with this aspic, and let it cool. When about to serve, remove all grease, first by means of a spoon, and then by means of boiling water, and set the [terrine] on a napkin lying on a long dish.
[1773—TIMBALE DE CANETON A LA VOISIN]
Roast a Rouen duckling, and keep it underdone; let it cool, and raise its fillets. With the carcass prepare a Salmis sauce, and thicken it with aspic as for a chaud-froid sauce.
Cut the fillets into slices, coat them with Salmis sauce, and leave this to set. Let a thickness of sauce set on the bottom of a timbale.
Upon this sauce lay some of the coated slices, alternating them with slices of truffle, and cover with a thin layer of aspic jelly. Lay another row of slices of fillet and of truffles, followed as before by a layer of aspic, and continue thus in the same order. Complete with a somewhat thick layer of aspic, and keep in the cool until ready for serving.
N.B.—This old and excellent cold entrée is really only a cold salmis. The procedure may be applied to all game suited to the salmis method of preparation. It is the simplest and certainly the best way of serving them cold.
[1774—PINTADES (GUINEA FOWL)]
The guinea-fowl is not equal to the pheasant from the gastronomical standpoint, though it often takes the place of the latter among the roasts after the shooting season. But, though it has neither the fine flavour nor the delicate meat of the pheasant, it does good service notwithstanding. The majority of pheasant recipes may be applied to it, especially à la Bohémienne, à la crème