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20. Potted Hare.
Gut up the hare into joints or pieces,
and set them aside
on a plate; next, cut up two pounds of. streaky
bacon into
square pieces about the size of walnuts, and
fry these in a
stew-pan ; add the pieces of hare, and fry them
with the
bacon; and also a handful of mushrooms, two bay-leaves,
some
thyme, basil, and winter savoury, two cloves
of garlic, twenty
cloves, three blades of mace, a teaspoonful of
black pepper-
corns, a tablespoonful of salt, a pint of sherry
(strict abstainers
may leave out the wine), and a pinch of Nepaul
; put on the lid,
and set all to simmer very gently in the oven
for an hour and a
half. The hare must then be strained from its
liquor ; all the
meat removed from the bones, chopped, and pounded
; all the
grease and bacon added and the whole pounded
into a smooth
pulp, then rubbed through a wire-sieve on to
a dish, and
afterwards put into a large kitchen pan to be
mixed up with
the liquor from the hare. If the liquor or stock
from the
hare measures more than a pint, it should be
boiled down to
that quantity, and about four ounces of good
glaze added.
Fill some ordinary preserving pie pans with the
preparation,
cover them over with common flour and water paste
; set the
pans in deep sauté-pans, or baking-sheets,
with a little water
at the bottom, and put them to bake in an oven
of moderate
heat for about an hour. They must now be taken
out, the
meat pressed down level with a spoon, and some
clarified butter
or lard poured over the top in sufficient quantity
to cover the
meat. As soon as they become cold, let the pans
be covered
with strong white paper, moistened on one side
with white
of egg ; and when perfectly dry, oil the surface
of the paper
over with a brush and put the potted hare in
a very cool
place, to be kept for use as occasion requires.
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