Clean and stew the birds for half-an-hour in weak stock. Let them get perfectly cold in this gravy; take out, put an oyster in the body of each. Arrange around the inside of your bake-dish, the necks all against the rim, the tails pointing toward the center. Put a bit of butter upon each breast and sprinkle very finely minced salt pork over all. Thicken the gravy with browned flour, season well and pour upon the birds. Cover with a good crust, cut a slit in the middle, and bake, covered, half-an-hour. Then brown.
Quail pie
Joint as you would a chicken for fricassee, cover the baking-dish bottom with thin slices of streaky bacon, first partially boiled to extract the salt; cover with a good white sauce, a few mushrooms, or a little mushroom catsup, and some chopped parsley, then with puff-paste. Cut a slit in the middle; bake, covered, and slowly, one hour. Uncover and brown.
A combination game pie
Wild pigeons and quails, ricebirds, snipe, woodcock—in fact, any small edible birds—may be blended in this. Clean the birds and, if tough, stew them in weak stock. If they are large—that is, too large for a whole bird to be served for one portion—cut them in halves through the breastbone. If the birds are young and tender they may be browned in hot butter; first dredging them with flour, instead of parboiling. Arrange them in a deep, round baking-dish with the breasts up and the feet all pointing toward the center.
Make a gravy of the stock in which they were parboiled, season well with salt, pepper, onion juice and the juice of half a lemon; thicken with a roux of butter and browned flour. Fill in the central space left by the feet of the game with mushrooms, a cupful of small drained oysters, two kidneys, cut into quarters, half a cupful of pimolas, or with plain olives, stoned, and three hard-boiled eggs minced fine with one dozen button onions, parboiled. Pour the rich gravy over all. Cover with a good puff-paste; make a slit in the middle and bake, covered, half-an-hour, then brown.
Pigeon pie
Clean and joint the pigeons and wipe each piece with a damp cloth. Sprinkle with pepper and salt, and sauté in shallow dripping in which an onion has first been fried. Grease a pudding dish and put a layer of the fried pigeons in the bottom; cover this with minced salt pork, sliced hard-boiled eggs, and the minced pigeon giblets. Each piece of pigeon should have been rolled in browned flour before going into the dish. Arrange the layers as directed, until the dish is full—having the top layer of the minced salt pork. Pour a cupful of good stock over all; cover the pie with puff-paste; cut a slit in this to allow the steam to escape, and bake in a steady oven for an hour.
Venison pie
Stew gently until tender some small pieces of fresh venison, and some slices of sweet potato; season with salt and pepper. Put into a baking-dish and cover with a paste made from the drippings from a roast of venison, allowing one-half pound of fat to one pound of flour.