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To Dress Turtle

A old method for preparing a turtle by boiling its shell, guts and flesh, then seasoning the meat with wine, spices and pickles.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Mary Randolph · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

To Dress Turtle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the turtle

  1. Kill the turtle at night in winter, or in the morning in summer.

  2. Hang the turtle up by the hind fins, cut off the head and let it bleed well.

  3. Separate the bottom shell from the top with great care, so the gall bladder is not broken.

  4. Cautiously take out the gall bladder and throw it away.

  5. Put the liver in a bowl of water.

  6. Empty the guts and lay them in water; if there are eggs, put them in water too.

  7. Use a separate bowl of water for each article.

  8. Cut all the flesh from the bottom shell and lay it in water.

  9. Break the bottom shell in two, wash it clean and put it in a pot.

  10. Wash the top shell nicely after taking out the flesh, cover it and set it by.

  11. Parboil the fins, clean them nicely, taking off all the black skin, and put them in water.

  12. Cut the flesh taken from the bottom and top shell into small pieces.

  13. Cut the fins in two, lay them with the flesh in a dish, sprinkle some salt over and cover them up.

Make the soup base

  1. Pour on enough water to cover it entirely, add one pound of middling or flitch of bacon and four chopped onions, and set it on the fire to boil.

  2. Open the guts, cleanse them perfectly, take off the inside skin and put them in the pot with the shell.

  3. Let them boil steadily for three hours, adding more water if it boils away too much.

  4. When the shell is done, take out the bacon, scrape the shell clean and strain the liquor.

  5. Put about one quart of the liquor back in the pot and reserve the rest for soup.

  6. Pick out the guts and cut them into small pieces.

  7. Take all the nice bits that were strained out and put them with the guts into the gravy.

Season and finish

  1. Lay in the fins cut in pieces, and as much of the flesh as will fill the upper shell.

  2. If a large turtle, add one bottle of white wine, cayenne pepper and salt to taste, one gill of mushroom catsup and one gill of lemon pickle.

  3. Add mace, nutmegs and cloves, pounded, to season it high.

  4. Mix two large spoonsful of flour in one pound and a quarter of butter and put it in with thyme and parsley.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

575Calories
18 gProtein
2 gFat
117 gCarbs

Counts 11 of 12 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 11 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Wine2 tbsp cooking wine (30ml)25
Mushroom1/2 cup sliced (35g)15
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Clove1 tsp ground (2g)7
Cayenne1 tsp (1.8g)6
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Thyme1 tsp dried (1.4g)4
Parsley1 tbsp chopped fresh (3.8g)1
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Macenot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Mary Randolph. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures. See the original page.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Mushroom + white winetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,765 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity).

  4. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Lemon + clovetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Turtle flesh (in the method)
Forms the main body of the dish, giving it its substance and bulk.
Middling or bacon
Adds fat and savoury flavour to the stock as it simmers.
Onions
Add aromatic sweetness and depth to the broth as it cooks.
Flour
Thickens the gravy, giving it body when mixed with butter.
Butter (in the method)
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour and smoothing the thickened gravy.
White wine
Adds acidity and aroma, brightening the rich gravy.

The step that matters

Simmering the shell for three hours. Long, steady boiling is needed to draw gelatin and flavour from the shell and guts. Adding water as it boils away keeps the pot from drying and scorching.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, lemon, onion, white wine, flour, pepper, clove):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, lemon, onion, white wine, flour, pepper, clove. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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