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Mrs Bailey’s Devilled Kidneys with Mushrooms
The Empire was built on offal, I am just sayin’…
There may be no dish more quintessentially imperial-British than a plate of devilled kidneys. This is not in fact a common sight on the Crater School breakfast-table; indeed, it has never been seen there. The silver chafing-dishes of the country-house morning do not offer a healthy diet for growing girls, as far as Mrs Bailey is concerned.
For herself and a friend, though, she will cheerfully throw this together as a speedy and delicious lunch. Women of her calibre believe whole-heartedly in the healthy benefits of the internal organs, and have no time for squeamishness or waste.
[For the record, I should add that she cooks and serves her kidneys whole. Honestly, I only cut them up so that I can eat one-handed with a book in the other, though there is also the bonus that a quartered piece of kidney can look remarkably like a halved mushroom-cap when it’s coated with sauce, so you don’t always know quite what you’ve got on the end of your fork. It’s the little things.]
Two lamb’s kidneys
250g mushrooms, preferably cremini, halved (or quartered if large)
Cream
Dijon mustard