This section is from the book "The White House Cook Book", by Hugo Ziemann, F. L Gillette. Also available from Amazon: The White House Cook Book.
Cut into dice three ounces of salt pork; divide six wild squabs into pieces at the joints; remove the skin. Cut up four potatoes into small squares, and prepare a dozen small dough balls.
Put into a yellow, deep baking dish the pork, potatoes and squabs, and then the balls of dough, season with salt, white pepper, a dash of mace or nutmeg; add hot water enough to cover the ingredients, cover with a "short" pie-crust and bake in a moderate oven three-quarters of an hour.
Palmer House, Chicago.
Skin the head and neck of the bird, pluck the feathers, and truss it by bringing the beak of the bird under the wing, and fastening the pinion to the thigh; twist the legs at the knuckles and press the feet upon the thigh. Put a piece of bread under each bird to catch the drippings, baste with butter, dredge with flour, and roast fifteen or twenty minutes with a sharp fire. When done, cut the bread in diamond shape, each piece large enough to stand one bird upon, place them aslant on your dish, and serve with gravy enough to moisten the bread; serve some in the dish and some in the tureen; garnish with slices of lemon. Roast from twenty to twenty-five minutes.
Snipe are similar to woodcock, and may be served in the same manner; they will require less time to roast.
Pick and draw them very carefully, salt and dredge with flour, and roast with a quick fire ten or fifteen minutes. Serve on toast with butter and pepper. You can put in each one an oyster dipped in butter and then in bread crumbs before roasting. They are also very nice broiled.
Rinse well and steam over boiling water until tender, then dredge with flour, and smother in butter; season with salt and pepper and roast inside the stove; thicken the gravy; serve with green grape jelly, and garnish with parsley.
Carefully cut out all the shot, wash thoroughly but quickly, using soda in the water; rinse again, and dry with a clean cloth. Stuff them and sew them up. Skewer the legs and wings to the body, larder the breast with very thin slices of fat salt pork, place them in the oven, and baste with butter and water before taking up, having seasoned them with salt and pepper; or you can leave out the pork and use only butter, or cook them without stuffing. Make a gravy of the drippings thickened with browned flour. Boil up and serve in a boat.
These are all very fine broiled, first splitting down the back, placing on the gridiron the inside down, cover with a baking tin, and broil slowly at first. Serve with cream gravy.
Clean well, inside and out, a dozen small birds, quail, snipe, woodcock, etc., and split them in half; put them in a saucepan with about two quarts of water; when it boils, skim off all scum that rises; then add salt and pepper, a bunch of minced parsley, one onion chopped fine, and three whole cloves. Cut up half a pound of salt pork into dice, and let all boil until tender, using care that there be enough water to cover the birds. Thicken this with two tablespoonfuls of browned flour and let it boil up. Stir in a piece of butter as large as an egg; remove from the fire and let it cool. Have ready a pint of potatoes cut as small as dice, and a rich crust made. Line the sides of a buttered pudding dish with the crust; lay in the birds, then some of the potatoes, then birds and so on, until the dish is full. Pour over the gravy, put on the top crust, with a slit cut in the centre, and bake. The top can be ornamented with pastry leaves in a wreath about the edge, with any fancy design placed in the centre across the slit.
Rockawqy Beach,
One dozen thoroughly cleaned birds; stuff each with an oyster, put them into a yellow dish, and add two ounces of boiled salt pork and three raw potatoes cut into slices; add a pint of oyster liquor, an ounce of butter; salt and pepper; cover the dish with a crust and bake in moderate oven.
They are cooked similar to rabbits, are excellent when broiled or made into a stew, and, in fact, are very good in all the different styles of cooking similar to rabbit.
There are many species common to this country; among them the black, red, gray and fox. Gophers and chipmunks may also be classed as another but smaller variety.
This is a nice mode of serving the remains of roasted game, but when a superlative salmi is desired, the birds must be scarcely more than half roasted for it. In either case, carve them very neatly, and strip every particle of skin and fat from the legs, wings and breasts; bruise the bodies well, and put them with the skin and other trimmings into a very clean stewpan. If for a simple and inexpensive dinner, merely add to them two sliced onions, a bay-leaf, a small blade of mace and a few peppercorns; then pour in a pint or more of good veal gravy, or strong broth, and boil it briskly until reduced nearly half; strain the gravy, pressing the bones well to obtain all the flavor; skim off the fat, add a little cayenne and lemon juice, heat the game very gradually in it, but do not on any account allow it to boil; place pieces of fried bread around a dish, arrange the birds in good form in the centre, give the sauce a boil, and pour it on them.
 
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