Split Pea and Ham Soup

The original recipe is from Vesta’s column in Melbourne’s Argus, in July 1922, but the recipe for Split Pea and Ham Soup, made with the leftover Christmas ham, doesn’t really change much. Both recipes called for the dried peas to be soaked overnight, but split died green peas don’t seem to require soaking. The main difference between Vesta’s recipe and the one in the Women’s Weekly Original Cookbook from 1970 is that the Weekly’s has less water or stock and isn’t thickened with a white roux.

I’m going with the Weekly, but Vesta’s alternative recipe is here, too.

Unlike both recipes, I make the stock first, strain, allow to cool and skim off the fat.

Stock
1 ham bone, skin and fat removed
8 cups water
Onion
Bay leaf

Bring ham bone, water, onion and bay leaf to the boil. Reduce heat, simmer, skimming well, until meat is falling off the bone, approx 60 to 90 mins. Cool. Remove meat from bone, and dice. Discard ham bone, onion and bay leaf. Set stock and diced ham aside.


Split Pea and Ham Soup

250g green split peas
1 large onion, peeled and diced
1 medium carrot, peeled and diced
1 potato or small sweet potato, peeled and diced (optional)
1.5 litres stock
Reserved ham
Fresh or dried mint

Wash split peas well, drain. Put peas in a saucepan with diced vegetables. Bring slowly to the boil, skim well. Reduce heat, cover and simmer about an hour, or until peas are tender. Stir in diced ham. Season with salt and pepper. A little finely-chopped fresh mint can be added before serving.

Alternatively, Vesta’s recipe calls for the onion, carrot and split peas to be sautéed in one rounded tablespoon of dripping (or butter) for 5 minutes. Add 8 cups (2 litres) of water or stock and simmer until the peas are tender. Pass the soup through a sieve, return to the pot and heat, then stir through one level tablespoon of flour dissolved in cold water. Cook, stirring, for a few minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

Both recipes suggest topping the soup with small sippets of cubed bread, sautéed in butter, dripping or oil. Vesta suggests adding some dried powdered mint as well.

Christmas Special - The 1920s Canape

Canapes have been around for a while, but reached a peak of popularity in the 1920s and 30s when the cocktail party was in its prime. Parties could be short, a couple of hours from 5 til 7, or longer from 6.30 til about 9, or segue into dinner by another name with more substantial fare.

For the 5 til 7 cocktail party, the Adelaide News suggested savoury snacks such as potato chips, pickled onions, salted almonds, olives, anchovies and cream cheese on tiny biscuits, celery boats stuffed with cream cheese, tiny sausages grilled and served on sticks. A longer cocktail party called for oysters, freshly opened and set out on plates with bowls of sauces of different kinds to go with them; slices of brown bread and butter for an accompaniment for the oysters; prawns, lobster, whitebait, and crab mayonnaise in pastry cases and all kinds of canapes.

Canapes are simply pieces of bread cut into rounds, ovals, squares, rectangles or triangles, fried and topped with savoury mixtures of seafood, nuts, eggs, sauces and garnishes. They ranged from lobster slices on creamy lobster butter to tomato sauce spread on bread, baked and then topped with a slice of tomato and cucumber, a dollop of mayonnaise and an olive.

Anchovy or sardine canapes were economical, and exoticised with names likes Canapes Lucia and Canapes Julia.


Tomato Canapes

3-4 slices bread, stamped into rounds with a pastry cutter (or shot glass) or cut into fingers
tomato ketchup
fresh tomato
cucumber
mayonnaise
cream
stuffed olives

Spread bread thickly with tomato ketchup, place on a baking sheet and bake in a hot oven for five minutes. On each piece of bread place a slice of tomato and a slice of cucumber. Top with a spoonful of mayonnaise thinned with whipped cream and a small stuffed olive. 

(Anchovy) Canapes Lucia

3-4 slices stale white bread
12 anchovy fillets
1 - 2 eggs, hard-boiled, peeled and finely chopped
butter
watercress

Cut the bread into slices 1/3 inch thick, stamp out into 12 rounds, fry in butter, then top each round with a curl of anchovy, fill the centre with chopped egg and garnish with a sprig of watercress.


(Sardine) Canapes Julia

3-4 slices toasted bread
cream cheese
cayenne pepper
sardines, boned and skinned

Cut the bread into 12 ovals or fingers, spread thickly with cream cheese mixed with a little cayenne, top each with a sardine.


Lobster Canapes

3-4 slices bread, stamped into 12 rounds
butter
lobster
oil and vinegar
capers
endive or lettuce

Fry rounds of bread, drain them and let them cool. Cut small slices of lobster; soak these in oil and vinegar for a few moments. Spread the croutons with lobster butter; lay on each a slice of lobster and over it sprinkle a few capers. Serve cold on a bed of very finely cut light-green endive or lettuce.

 

Lobster butter is made from the coral of a lobster, fresh butter, salt and cayenne. Rub the coral smooth in a mortar, adding butter till it is of creamy consistency and of a deep red color. Add cayenne to taste and a little salt.

Christmas Special - The Cocktail Party

The cocktail party was pretty much invented in 1928 - in London, Paris and Washington - but Sydney and Melbourne were soon in the swing; Kerry Greenwood's Phryne Fisher novels are set in 1928; ergo the Christmas Special that rounds off Series 2 of Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries will have a cocktail party theme. Here's an article from September 1928:

Cocktail Parties

The Vogue in London

"The cocktail party seems to be firmly established with the smart set in London. Where women's committee meetings once assembled and imbibed weak tea afterwards, they are now mediums of the cocktail party, even when held in the morning.

"Certain "art-shows" and mannequin parades are not complete without it. At a recent show of paintings by a Russian with futuristic tendencies, arranged by the famous Sitwell family, green and gold cocktails were handed round.

"For a day the topic in London newspapers was the production of a blue cocktail. Every other color is  possible, and the result of the discussion was the discovery that the only two colouring agents possible were the juice of the gentian (a blue flower which grows on the high Alps) and a French sirop known during the last century but not made now. 

"Some of the newest designs for houses include a cocktail bar in one corner of the lounge. It is usually done in artistically panelled wood, luxuriously fitted with crystal bottles, glasses and shakers. Already a few hostesses have created their own recipes, the details of which are jealously guarded. Salt almonds, potato chips and caviare sandwiches are often served with them.

"A famous dress designer invites one to a dress parade and a cocktail party in the same reach - or an elaborately engraved invitation is sent, entitling you to spend an hour or so in a parchment and gold drawing-room, sipping from gold filigreed glasses, while mannequins parade in lovely clothes.

"At one of these combined functions given recently by Madame Luander and her sister, Lady Glenmorris, mannequins displayed a novelty - the cocktail party frock - designed specially so that it is suitable for both late afternoon and dinner wear. Made in colored lace, the ensemble was particularly charming. In most cases the frock was sleeveless, and had an accompanying short coat of the same material, which could be slipped off to reveal the evening outfit."

To get in the mood, here's a recipe for a Minnehaha Cocktail from Melbourne's Argus in September 1928:

The juice of one-quarter of an orange
1 fluid ounce Dry Gin
1 fluid ounce French Vermouth
1 fluid ounce Italian Vermouth
1 dash of Absinthe

Half fill the cocktail shaker with broken ice; add all ingredients except the Absinthe. Shake well and strain into cocktail glasses – then add the Absinthe.

Note: The original recipe calls for 1/6 of a gill of each spirit. An imperial gill is 5 fluid ounces.

Agneau Roti Provençal, or Roast Lamb Provençal

This is another one of Boulestin's recipes. The lamb is roasted with a clove of garlic inserted near the bone and the flesh larded with a dozen or so anchovies. (If you don't have a larding needle, stab the lamb with a small narrow knife and push the anchovy pieces in.) The quantity of sauce is not huge, but it is very piquant. The lamb should be rare, and rested for 20 minutes. At this stage the pan juices can be poured into a glass and placed in the freezer for a few minutes so the fat can be easily removed. Any juices that run out while resting or carving the lamb can be added to the sauce at the end.

Roast Lamb Provençal

1 leg of lamb
1 clove garlic 
anchovies
30-40g butter
1 small onion, finely chopped 
2 shallots, finely chopped
plain flour
2-3 gherkins, chopped 
1 dessertspoon tomato puree 
1 cup water, stock or white wine
salt, pepper 

Take a leg of lamb. Insert a small clove of garlic near the bone, and lard with small pieces of anchovy about 3cm long, about a dozen in all. Roast in the ordinary way, basting often. When cooked, remove it, keep it hot and skim the fat from the pan juices.

For the sauce, saute the onion and shallots in butter until they are more melted than fried. Sprinkle with a little flour, cook for one minute more; then add two anchovy fillets, the gherkins, tomato puree, the pan juices and a little water or stock. Cook for two minutes more. The sauce should be highly seasoned and can be strained before serving (though Boulestin doesn't).

Celeriac and Oyster Soup

This is my own recipe. I've made it with homemade fish stock and with vegetable stock but not with just plain water. The homemade fish stock worked best. This makes a thick soup that serves 2-3. For more, just use a larger celeriac (mine was organic and therefore small) and more liquid.

St John Restaurant in Smithfield serves a similar soup garnished with snails.

Celeriac and Oyster Soup

1 small bulb celeriac, peeled and thinly sliced
1 medium potato, peeled and sliced
1 small onion, peeled and finely sliced 
50g butter
3 cups fish or vegetable stock or water
2 sprigs thyme
2 sprigs parsley
100ml cream or to taste
salt and pepper
6 oysters

On a low heat, saute the onion in butter until soft. Stir in the sliced celeriac and potato; add the fresh herbs; toss until coated; pour in the stock. Bring to the boil, reduce to a simmer and cook until the celeriac and potato are soft - about 10 or 15 minutes. Remove the herbs and blend until smooth.

Re-heat the soup, stir in cream, season with salt and pepper.

To serve, ladle soup into bowls, top each bowl with 2-3 oysters (squeezing a bit of lemon over the oysters first, if desired). Some finely chopped dill would have added to the visual appeal.

Boeuf Provençal

This is Boulestin's recipe for Braised Beef with White Wine and Olives from around 1910, so it's a fair bet that up-market gentlemen's clubs would have had something like it on the menu. I'm using King Island Beef from Coles which is allegedly pasture-grazed and hormone-free but not, it seems, from King Island. Kangaroo steak would possibly be better, and cheaper. I used French picholine olives which are easier to stone than green Sicilian olives. 

Boulestin does not give precise quantities, so these are my own.

Boeuf Provençal

750g beef, cut into medium-size squares
2 rashers bacon
2 onions, peeled and finely diced
1/2 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons plain flour
bouquet (a few thyme springs, parsley, a few bay leaves)
salt and pepper
1 cup white wine
2-3 ripe tomatoes
12 green olives

In a large saucepan, heat the oil until fairly hot; add the beef; stirring all the while, season with salt and freshly ground pepper, add the onions, sprinkle with flour. After a few minutes put in the bouquet and a cup of white wine and a cup of water. Bring to the boil, reduce to a simmer, cover and cook on a low heat for an hour or two until almost tender.

Meanwhile, peel and quarter the tomatoes; cut the bacon into small pieces and boil for a few minutes; stone the olives. 

When the beef is almost tender, remove the pieces and place them in another saucepan with the tomatoes, bacon and olives. Pass the liquid in which the beef has cooked through a fine strainer (removing the thyme, parsley and bay leaves), pour this over the beef and simmer for a further 30 minutes on a low heat, shaking the pan occasionally. 

Serve with steamed potatoes and a green vegetable. 

Series 2 Episode 1 - Murder Most Scandalous

The first episode of Series 2 screens on Friday 6 September, so it's time to restock the 1920s pantry shelf and find suitable recipes for a three-course 1920's dinner, ideally from the Melbourne's Argus newspaper.

Like two episodes in Series 1, Murder Most Scandalous does not seem to be based on any of Kerry Greenwood's novels. The Australian Television Information Archive gives this plot outline:

"When Jack's ex-father-in-law, Deputy Commissioner George Sanders, is implicated in the brutal murder of a prostitute, Jack is determined to clear his name. Despite strict instructions from Jack not to meddle in his case, Phryne decides to perfect her 'fan dance' in order to go undercover at the gentleman's club of the notorious Madam Lyon."

With no novel for inspiration, I'll assume that Madam Lyon is French, her establishment up-market and her clientele upper class. Oyster soup will feature, followed by a beef dish and an old-fashioned strawberry dessert.