RedHeadedGirl’s Historical Kitchen: Michaelmas

For the past several years, my friend Ailish has invited over our Found Family for Michaelmas dinner. Tradition goes that if you eat goose on Michaelmas, you’ll not want for money for the next year. And I will say, that while I have wanted for money, I have always had enough to get by.

The Feast of St. Michael is on Sept 29th, and it’s one of the Quarter Days where rents are paid and accounts are settled in Britain. It’s also considered the last day it is acceptable to pick blackberries, because St. Michael and the Devil got into it, and Michael threw the Devil into a blackberry bush (harsh) and the Devil cursed the berries, burned them with his fiery breath, and generally threw a big old temper tantrum and made the berries unfit for consumption.

This year, Ailish wasn’t able to host, and I said that I would host this year and cook the goose, as long as other people brought sides.

Sides- roasted potatoes, green beans, and the greatest dressing/stuffing in the world
Sides- roasted potatoes, green beans, and the greatest dressing/stuffing in the world
DINNER- with potatoes, goose, the sauce, green beans, stuffing, and applesauce.
DINNER- with potatoes, goose, the sauce, green beans, stuffing, and applesauce.

Reader, I have never cooked a goose.  Nor have I found any specific historic instruction in my English cookbooks about roasting a goose (which is fine- I’m reluctant to try something brand new with a bird that cost the earth and with guests expecting the eat delicious goose). Ailish sent me a couple recipes that she uses bits of and said “use your judgement” and thank god it worked. (I’ll not be modest in parentheticals – it was a DAMN GOOD GOOSE.)

What I have found is that Markham (You remember Markham, he of the “betony and colesworts will totes prevent drunkenness”) has a sauce for a stubble goose, which is the type of goose one would slaughter for Michaelmas.It’s a goose that has fattened up on the stubble in the fields after harvest. He admits that there are differences in thought in the proper sauce for a stubble goose, but the best, in his VERY HUMBLE (it’s not humble) opinion is to:

…take the pap of roasted apples, and mixing it with vinegar, boil them together with the some of the gravy of the goose and a few barbarries and breadcrumbs, and when it is boiled to a good thickness, season it with sugar and little cinnamon and so serve it up.

Barberries are a berry with a citrus and acid flavor – it’s currently common in Iranian cooking, but not so much in American or European cooking now. The internet suggested that cranberries would be an acceptable substitution, and given that we are in New England, that seemed reasonable to me.

So we’ve been doing this long enough that you all should know that if I’m not baking, I don’t really measure. “That looks good.” “That tastes like a thing I’ll eat.” “This is the amount of breadcrumbs I have that didn’t get infested, so that’s how many I’ll use.” “Eeehhhhhhh.” Sorry. It’s a super freeing way of cooking, though.

So I took two apples and tucked them around the goose to roast, and once they were squashy, I pulled them out and cut them up and then, once they were cool enough, mashed them up (after burning myself twice). (I’m not always smart.)

Roasted apples! Theyre sort of dark red and brown and in a white bowl.
Roasted apples!

Then I put them in a pot with some goose grease (and browned bits from the roasting pan) and white wine vinegar and a handful of dried cranberries, and brought it up to a boil, and then tossed in the breadcrumbs (commercially bought. I roasted a goose today; I didn’t have time to dry bread, too).

Then, once things had thickened properly, in went a bit of sugar and cinnamon. I did kind of wish I had my own immersion blender, but I bought boots instead, so no blender for me right now.

boiling the apples, vinegar, and cranberries in a medium saucepan
boiling the apples, vinegar, and cranberries

IT’S REALLY GOOD. It’s appley and tart but not too tart and with the goose it was DELIGHTFUL. I would TOTALLY suggest this for the modern Michaelmas feast, and it would be good with duck or chicken, or PORK. Oh my god, it would be AMAZING with a pork tenderloin. Basically anything.

The finished sauce, which is orange and dark red from the cranberries on the table with a red cloth behind it.
The finished sauce

Happy Michaelmas, y’all! May you never want for money this year.

 

 

Comments are Closed

  1. Kareni says:

    That all looks and sounds delicious, Redheadedgirl; now I’m salivating. A very happy Michaelmas to you, too.

  2. Laurel says:

    We tried a goose for Christmas dinner once. It was not a success. Your dinner looks so much better. And now I am craving pork and applesauce!

  3. kkw says:

    Happy Michaelmas! And happy new year.
    I have never roasted a goose (or a duck) entirely to my satisfaction. On the other hand, I love goose (and duck) so much that I’m alway very pleased. I wish I could afford to cook them frequently enough to really perfect a technique.
    But the next time I do I am totally making that sauce! If anyone wants barberries (although cranberries seems an excellent substitute) I’m pretty sure Sahadi’s ships, although idk if outside the US.

  4. SeventhWave says:

    That sauce looks and sounds amazing, and I’m totally trying it on pork.
    But inquiring minds want to know – HOW did you cook the goose? Are they hard to fit in a modern oven? Where do you even get one?
    Signed, She Who Can Barely Reheat A Rotisserie Chicken

  5. chacha1 says:

    yes plz that “I cooked a goose” part was woefully incomplete. Ahem. LOL

  6. Morwenna says:

    I am so sorry I missed this! Next year, for sure, with blackberry dessert.

    Luke found me barberries once — I can’t remember where — maybe Watertown, maybe Christina’s in Inman. Before that I used sour cherries as a substitute.

  7. Ren Benton says:

    “If I’m not baking, I don’t really measure.”

    THIS. I dread feeding people dinner because of the inevitable “This is delicious. Can I get the recipe?” Enough of this, the right amount of that, and cook it until it’s done. Comes out perfectly every time. :p

  8. Melissa says:

    This sounds yummy. Cooking goose seems intimidating to me. I actually do a sauce like this with pork loin only I used cider vinegar most of the time. It was one of my dad’s favorites.

    I’ve got one of those blenders(love it)
    It came with a mini chopping attachment thingy. All I really ever use it (the attachment) for is turning a slices of bread or toast into crumbs when I need a little.

  9. LauraL says:

    Looks delicious! One of the hints I was given by a neighbor in West Virginia for roasting goose or duck was to baste it with ice water near the end of cooking to crisp the skin. This is making me think I need a goose to roast for Christmas….

  10. I got the goose as a local butcher shop- we have a number in the area in Boston. Some years, finding a goose isn’t easy (I’m told), and Ailish did suggest that you can sometimes find one on clearance after Christmas, if you have the freezer space.

    As for how, the key is to provide avenues for the fat to leave- I pricked the skin all over with a fork, pulled HANDFULS of fat out before doing anything, and then you dunk it in boiling water for a minute, rub it all over with salt, then let it sit in the fridge (uncovered) for 12-24 hours to dry out the skin.

    THEN you rub it all over with a lemon cut in half, shove the lemon, a quartered orange, and some onions up it’s butt, and roast it for 1.5 hours on 325, pull it out, pour off the fat, put it back in for another 1.5 hours, pour off the fat, raise the temp to 400, put it back in for 15 minutes to crisp everything up, then let it rest for 30 minutes before carving.

  11. Joy says:

    RHG–I hope you saved that goose fat! Its highly prized for cooking. Potatoes roasted in goose fat is a specialty of some high end restaurants. Schmaltz, I’m told, of either duck or goose fat is highly prized for making chopped liver, matzo balls,noodle or potato kugel,pie crust, etc.

  12. Cristiane says:

    OMG, that looks fabulous! When my parents were first married (circa 1950), they were stationed in Bonn in Germany, and they decided to have a half-dozen orphans over for Christmas dinner. So my mother, a novice cook, decided to roast a goose. It looked gorgeous, but when my father tried to carve it, he couldn’t find any meat on it. So he carved off all that he could and, of course, they gave it all to the kids. The next morning, my mother looked at the goose again, and realized that she had served it upside down.

  13. Melanie says:

    This looks delicious! When I was growing up, my family often had goose for Christmas dinner; my dad’s ancestors were English, so it was traditional. We fell out of the habit, at least partly because, as you noted, it can be difficult to find a goose. I think the small butcher shop that supplied my parents closed.

  14. Mary O'Keefe Kellogg says:

    This looks like a successful and happy feast.
    The first goose I cooked was by accident. We’d just moved to Hamburg (where everything except, perhaps, turnips was much more expensive than it had been in new England – and definitely a stretch for a post-doc’s budget), and we’d invited the professors of my husband’s group for Thanksgiving. I went looking for a bird (thinking turkey) large enough to feed seven, but small enough for my oven, and with my very imperfect German, didn’t realise until I was home and had looked it up that I had a goose. “Joy of Cooking” saved me, the day, and the goose.
    Many more happy Michaelmas goose feasts!

  15. chacha1 says:

    RHG – thank you! I won’t try it in my crappy apartment oven, but come the revolution when I have one that WORKS there may be a goose. 🙂

  16. Jazzlet says:

    Even my mother, who did not swear except under extreeme duress, said the Devil pisses on blackberries on Michaelmas which is why you should never eat them later than that!

Comments are closed.

By posting a comment, you consent to have your personally identifiable information collected and used in accordance with our privacy policy.

↑ Back to Top