Mock turtle soup


Mock turtle soup is an English soup that was created in the mid-18th century as a cheaper imitation of green turtle soup. It often uses brains and organ meats such as calf's head or a calf's foot to duplicate the texture and flavour of the original's turtle meat.

Mrs. Fowle's Mock Turtle Soup:
Take a large calf's head. Scald off the hair. Boil it until the horn is tender, then cut it into slices about the size of your finger, with as little lean as possible. Have ready three pints of good mutton or veal broth, put in it half a pint of Madeira wine, half a teaspoonful of thyme, pepper, a large onion, and the peel of a lemon chop't very small. A ¼ of a pint of oysters chop't very small, and their liquor; a little salt, the juice of two large onions, some sweet herbs, and the brains chop't. Stand all these together for about an hour, and send it up to the table with the forcemeat balls made small and the yolks of hard eggs.

Germany

In the Oldenburg and Ammerland regions of Germany, Mockturtlesuppe—the English designation "mock turtle" retained—is a traditional meal, dating from the time of the personal union between the Kingdom of Hanover and the Kingdom of Great Britain.

United States

While green sea turtle was popular for soup making in many countries, U.S. recipes included many other local species. Soup made from snapping turtles is still available in certain parts of the country. Similarly, mock turtle soup recipes have a variety of substitute meats. Besides organ meats like the British recipes, recipes in the U.S. often use stewing beef or ground beef, but may call for alligator.
The Campbell Soup Company once produced canned mock turtle soup made of calf's head. In a 1962 interview with David Bourdon, Andy Warhol, commenting on Campbell's discontinued soups, said that Mock Turtle had once been his favorite. An American version of the soup is popular in Cincinnati and canned under the name Worthmore's Mock Turtle Soup.