Immediately surrounding Mrs. Musgrove were the little Harvilles, whom she was sedulously guarding from the tyranny of the two children from the Cottage, expressly arrived to amuse them. On one side was a table occupied by some chattering girls, cutting up silk and gold paper; and on the other were tressels and trays, bending under the weight of brawn and cold pies, where riotous boys were holding high revel; the whole completed by a roaring Christmas fire, which seemed determined to he heard in spite of all the noise of the others… It was a fine family-piece.
(Persuasion, Chapter 14)
What sort of cold pies would Mrs Musgrove be serving to all and sundry as they come to pay their Christmas visits to the Mansion House at Uppercross? Most certainly she would have and a large Yorkshire Christmas Pie sitting on that trestle table.
This Yorkshire Pie was made by Ivan Day of Historic Foods and I thank him for his permission to use his photograph here.
From Yorkshire originally, where there was a thriving trade at Christmas sending the pies around the country as gifts in the festive season, they were great pies filled with many different kinds of meat, intended to feed many people over many days. The concept was to cut off the crust lid, chop up the cooked meat within,serve everyone to some of each of he different the meats,then recover the remaining meat with clarified butter and re- seal the crust lid, to serve more people another day.
They were traditionally served on the Fest of Stephen- the 26th December-and afterwards.
And whilst some were made in the North of England, recipes were published for them so that people living all over the country, if they could afford the ingredients, could make them in their own kitchens. It took a skilled cook to make them prior to the days of pie moulds, for these pies had to be raised by hand.
The picture above shows an early 19th century Christmas Pie , on the right behind the jug, raised by hand, as recorded by the amateur artist, Mary Ellen Best. She was a Yorkshire woman, so we can therefore assume that this pie was authentically decorated and recorded. This was the template for Ivan’s example of the Yorkshire pie, above. This picture is her still life of Christmas food, which shows us not only great examples of the Yorkshire Christmas Pie but also of Yorkshire ‘s unique version of Mince Pies (the smaller pies in the picture on the plate in front of the Yorkshire Pie),which were always made with puff pastry. More on them tomorrow…
Back to Christmas Pies. Here is Richard Briggs’s version. Briggs was a real Tavern cook of the Temple Tavern, London
and his book was published in 1794, perfect for our period.
As you can see the pie is expensive and complicated to prepare because of the sheer amount of meat it contains. The size can be calculated by the fact that a whole bushel of flour ( over 50 lbs!) is recommended to be used in this recipe for the pie’s pastry. Let’s see how we made our version in the summer on Ivan Day’s Christmas of the Past cookery course (note our version was slightly later than Jane Austen’s era, the form inspired by Mrs Marshall’s Cookery Book of 1880
..but the filling and the crust were similar to the Richard Briggs recipe).
So, here is the step by step way to make an authentic Yorkshire Christmas Pie…
Make a forcemeat with minced veal, minced pork, breadcrumbs, parsley, mace and nutmeg.
Make your paste ( pastry) ..a communal activity……
Knead the paste, roll it and line a tin that has been previously coated in melted lard.
Line the pastry with the forcemeat mixture…
Begin to add the boned meats….goose, chicken
..duck, grouse….
..turkey…..
Add a final layer of the forcemeat mixture….
Cover the pie with your paste….
And begin to decorate it….
We emulated Mrs Marshall’s example and added leaf upon leaf…..
Don’t forget to make holes for the steam to escape during the long cooking period….
Decorate with a pastry rose….
And get ready to put it in the oven for , in this case, 4 hours.
And the next day here is the cooked Christmas Yorkshire Pie
Carefully remove the rose and add liquid gelatine to help preserve the meats…
Et voila! All done…
For curiosity’s sake we cut the pie in half to see what it looked like. Spectacular, frankly. As I have explained above this would not have happened in Mrs Musgrove’s house :the lid would have been carefully removed and re-sealed every time a serving-to many people- was made.
18 comments
December 16, 2009 at 11:11 am
A Grand Christmas Sallett « My English Country Garden Blog
[…] is an act of construction!) one of these fine culinary triumphs,then please do visit my AustenOnly blog for all the details […]
December 16, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Lizzy
Does the tin open up, like a modern springfoam pan? It looks spectacular!
December 16, 2009 at 4:42 pm
myenglishcountrygarden
Yes, it as hinged on end and closed with a metal pin the other. we made some Cheshire Pork Pies on the Georgian course using a similar mould:I’ll write about this in the spring/summer ;-)
December 16, 2009 at 12:14 pm
Elizabeth K
Very interesting, especially as I am a northerner and live in Yorkshire!:-) I think they made one of these on the programme “Victorian Farm” which I have enjoyed watching.
As I am vegetarian, the pie does not, to be frank, look very appetising to me but I do make a veggie version for Christmas Eve each year, with chestnuts and sprouts.
December 16, 2009 at 4:46 pm
myenglishcountrygarden
As a vegetarian you would of course have had a hard time of it in Georgian England ;-) Meat was a very luxurious foodstuff- the diet of the poor included it rarely. This pie was filled with different meats as a definite celebratory custom and as it was expensive was not for everyone. But it was for mass celebrations and the Musgrove’s old fashioned open- house style celebratison-held by the local Squire for all his family friends and tenants- would not have ben complete without one.
December 17, 2009 at 10:16 am
Elizabeth K
Oh, yes, I dare say it would not have been easy, but there were some veggies and IIRC, Mary Wollstonecraft was a vegetarian. :-)
December 17, 2009 at 10:26 am
myenglishcountrygarden
But they -vegetarians-were very much oddities: the mainstay of late 18th century /early 19th century cookery in the English kitchen was the high standard of our roast meats(unparalleled anywhere else in the world,and a skill much envied) With respect, we are not talking about oddities or indeed your 21st century experience of food here:we are talking about what would have been served as Christmas food in Jane Austen’s novels,and that as primarily meat, expensively spiced food(savoury and sweet) and alcohol ;-).
December 16, 2009 at 1:58 pm
Liz
Wow, Julie… That’s some amazing pie!!!
Not too sure I’d want some myself, but it certainly looks interesting… It does beg the question how it went out of fashion? Cost?
December 17, 2009 at 8:36 am
myenglishcountrygarden
I think the First World war probably did for it,as it did a lot of things. There are recipes up till the Edwardian era,then it faded out.Cost and labour and the sheer size of these great pies provably did for them:ours weighed over 30lbs!. You could make a smaller version using only breasts of different meats I suppose. I have to say it was one of the best pies I’ve eaten , hot or cold.Puts a humble pork pie into perspective ;-)
December 17, 2009 at 3:49 am
Cathy Allen
Holey-moley Julie, that’s INSANE!
When I consider how long it must have taken to make such a thing in those days, without any modern conveniences, as I assume is the case, likewise, at Ivan Day’s class…my mind boggles. I’d guess that the class was an all-day affair? And that you did not have to prepare the meats in any way (I noticed the plastic wrapped items next to the dish)? Even still the time it would take, not including the 4 hours in the oven; Oh my goodness! It’s a good thing it was saved for the Feast of Stephen, as what cook would have the time to do it on Christmas? Hmmm…it boggles the mind!
I was amused to see the basket hanging in the Mary Ellen Best painting. I can’t recall where I’ve seen one, but it seems to me it was called an EGG basket, ostensibly for gathering eggs, I think? I used a vaguely similar one (it had been given to my Mother by her friend, but I got it somehow), when I was in college, but I kept my basket-making and weaving tools in it. It jumped out of the picture at me. Interesting how different things draw different people’s eyes.
Thanks Julie; looking forward to tomorrow’s post,
CEA
December 17, 2009 at 8:30 am
myenglishcountrygarden
Oh there are lots of things to talk bout in Mary Ellen Best’s picture- the blue sugar paper on the preserve cover for one! Perhap we’ll come back to it one day.
The Christmas pie took us nearly two days to make. The decoration was labour intensive 6 of us worked away at it for most of one afternoon. The meats were already boned, praise be( Ivan’s courses run for 2 days and they are VERY intensive and full days,but great fun)….But you see it was large so that it could feed lots of people over the 12 days,and that was the important thing, especially for the Musgroves ;-)
December 17, 2009 at 9:22 am
Jane Austen and Christmas: Mrs Musgrove’s Pies(2) « austenonly
[…] Jane Austen and Food, Persuasion | by myenglishcountrygarden Yesterday we considered the Yorkshire Christmas Pie which would most certainly have been among the cold pies weighing down Mrs Musgrove’s festive […]
December 17, 2009 at 3:10 pm
Jessica Cogan
INCREDIBLE! My Goodness, the sheer amount of meat in it made me laugh. And FOURTEEN pounds of butter all told- LOLOL!! But, Yum!
What was more expensive in those days, veal/pork or the fowl? I am guessing the veal/pork was b/c there is less used? Would all of the meat like ingredients be purchased? I am guessing the the wildfowl would be acquired by shooting whatever they could get? And about how long would one expect to eat and re-eat one of these? A few days? A week?
And alcohol – more please! :-)
December 17, 2009 at 3:23 pm
myenglishcountrygarden
Well remember you could only have game if you had shooting rights-the liberty of a manor;-) (unless you were made a gift of legally shot game)Not a problem for Charles and Mr Musgrove admittedly,but it implied a certain status. I could go on about having the necessary standing and rights to shoot here but Ill refrian for another day! Chickens were raised at home,as would have been pork and veal.
Thats why they were such sumptuous gifts-the amount and variety of meat within.in 1764 Lord Fairfax’s housekeeper paid £1 16 shillings for one. Not an inconsiderable sum ;-)
The pie could be resealed covering the meat that was left with clarified butter,the meat was chopped up so everyone would have a piece of every type of meat. This process could go on for some period of item.The house even, with a blazing Christmas fire, would not be that hot in the depths of winter(and certainly not in the mini ice age that occurred at the beginning of the 19th century).
December 22, 2009 at 12:02 pm
imogen88
Well, this is amazing. I can well imagine the idea worked so well in the times, with people coming, it’s ingenious, really.
December 22, 2009 at 2:16 pm
myenglishcountrygarden
It is- in a cold house it would have survived , health wise, pretty well, I think.A lot of work and expesnse but an amazing sight.I think its the most spectacular item I’ve ever had the opportunity to make at Ivan’s home.
January 18, 2010 at 12:17 am
Gloria Glasgow
This recipe and history are outstanding. I was watching on PBS, at 5 AM, the story of William Wilberforce. The history and biography of his life were so engrossing that I could not tear myself away. Mention was made the Mr Wilberforce served Yorkshire pie to his friends. Naturally, since most of my maternal ancerstors were from Yorkshire, I was determined to discover the recipe for Yorkshire pie! Even today, I doubt that I could afford to make such a magnificent pie, not to mention not having the cookware for such a thing. I congratulate all of you for your recipe, and the history. I am a history, and recipe, fanatic! Thank you.
January 18, 2010 at 2:26 pm
jfwakefield
Thank you Gloria! As a recipe and history fanatic myself Im so glad you enjoyed it and hope you will visit ( and comment!) again soon.