Skip to content

Widgeons, Roasted

From Mrs. Beeton's household management (1907).

No ratings yet

A historical recipe

Mrs. Beeton's household management, by Mrs. (Isabella Mary) Beeton (1907).

United Kingdom

Known as a British recipe, with similar versions prepared across other nations.

From an old book: a historical recipe, not current advice. Its methods, additives and storage may be unsafe by today's standards. Printed in United Kingdom: that says where the book was made, not where the dish comes from.

Ingredients 1 ingredient

  1. a pinch of sugar

Cook safely

Keep children and pets away from the hob and the oven, and keep oven gloves and a lid within reach.

  • Oven and hot trays. Use dry oven gloves for trays and dishes: a hot tray looks just like a cold one. Open the oven door away from your face and let the first rush of heat out.
  • Boiling water and steam. Turn pan handles inward, away from the edge of the hob. Lift lids away from you, and pour hot water away from your body: steam burns too.

Method

  1. Ingredients.
  2. — Widgeons, butter for basting, watercress, lemons.
  3. For the sauce : £ a pint of brown sauce (see Sauces), i glass of port wine or claret, the juice of i lemon and i orange, salt and pepper, castor sugar.
  4. Method.
  5. — Truss the birds for roasting.
  6. Baste well with hot butter, and roast in front of a clear fire for about 20 minutes, or bake in a moderately hot oven for the same length of time.
  7. Keep them well basted with hot butter, and shortly before serving sprinkle lightly with flour, to give the birds a nice appearance.
  8. Meanwhile make the brown sauce as directed, add to it the wine, orange and lemon-juices, a pinch of sugar, salt, and pepper to taste, simmer for 15 minutes, then strain, skim, and serve with the birds on a hot dish, garnished with watercress and quarters of lemon, and hand the sauce separately.
  9. Time.
  10. — About 20 minutes.
  11. Average Cost, from is.
  12. 6d.
  13. each.
  14. Seasonable from August i to March 15.

Plating

Cookware for this recipe

  • Saucepan
  • Slotted spoon
  • Sieve
  • Pastry brush
Source public domain per archive.org metadata; unverified
Credit

From Mrs. Beeton's household management (1907), printed page 757, digitised by the Internet Archive: https://archive.org/details/mrsbeetonshouse00beetuoft

What was changed: Read by machine from the book's scanned text into ingredients and method. The title's capitals were tidied; spelling and scanning errors are left as they are.