Patties are small cases, made of puff-paste, filled with various kinds of forcemeat, which forcemeat gives its name to the patty.

Cooks generally seem to exhibit considerable difficulty in making patties, which are often ordered from the "pastrycook's." These patties consist of the maximum amount of paste with the minimum amount of inside; the so-called forcemeat being sometimes a wafer of some sticky substance, in which the only flavour to be detected is that of anchovy sauce.

Owing to the inferiority of "home ovens," it is often a good plan to order the patty cases, which cost lid. or 2d. each, from the pastrycook's, and to make the inside at home. When this is done, fortunate are those who live within a reasonable distance of a French pastrycook's, like those to be found in the neighbourhood of Soho Square. I will, however, give a few directions for making patty cases. (See Patty Cases).

Patties, Chicken, Turkey, Or Savoury

Make some rich mince of fowl or turkey (see Fowl, Minced), using cream, and, if possible, chopped mushrooms, truffles, and ham, as directed in Mince. Make this hot. Fill some patty cases (see Patty Cases), and make hot, and serve. Patties look best when served in a silver dish, with plenty of dark-green fried parsley (see Parsley, Fried) round the base. Four small crayfish can be placed one in each corner of the dish. Any kind of rich forcemeat, such as liver forcemeat (see Liver Forcemeat), mixed with game or duck, will make nice savoury patties.

Lobster Patties

Remove all the white meat from the tail and claws, break up the bones, and stew them, especially the inside part by the head, in a little boiled milk, or, still better, Bechamel sauce. (See Bechamel.) Dissolve in this sauce 2 oz. of butter to every half-pint of sauce. Strain off this sauce, and add sufficient lobster butter (see Lobster Butter) to make it a bright red colour. Thicken it with white roux (see No. 12), till it is rather thicker than double cream. Season with a little cayenne pepper, a few drops of lemon-juice, and a teaspoonful of anchovy sauce. Mix in the meat of the lobster, cut up into small pieces. Make the mixture hot, and fill the patty cases with the hot mixture, and make the patties hot in the oven.

Serve in a silver dish, ornament the base with dark-green fried parsley and small red crayfish.