I had to drive into work today (normally I take the train), and on NPR I heard a man interviewed about how to cook a turkey for Thanksgiving. He mentioned the word spatchcock, which the interviewer (and I!) had not known. The common, and older, meaning is a chicken, split down the middle with the backbone removed, and then being dressed and roasted or grilled. Apparently there is another use of the word, though chiefly British, and that is to stuff things together inappropriately. An example from Quinion is, "But far from being some grand, thoughtful programme, it was only a spatchcock of improvisation and platitude."
1785 F. Grose Classical Dict. Vulgar Tongue at Spatch cock, Abbreviation of a dispatch cock, an Irish dish upon any sudden occasion.
1834 West Ind. Sketch-bk. I. 299 These..dispatch cocks..are simply fowls cut down the back and expanded to the purposes of a grill..they afford an agreeable relief to an appetite that demands haste to be gratified—whence the name.
spatch-cock | spatchcock, n. Etymology: See quot. 1785 at sense 1 and dispatch n. Compounds 1.
1.A fowl split open and grilled after being killed, plucked, and dressed in a summary fashion. Also attrib. Orig. in Irish use, later chiefly Anglo-Indian.
1785 F. Grose Classical Dict. Vulgar Tongue, Spatch cock, abbreviation of a dispatch cock, an Irish dish upon any sudden occasion. It is a hen just killed from the roost, or yard, and immediately skinned, split, and broiled.
1819 T. Moore Mem. (1853) II. 317 We had a good deal of laughing at an Irishman who was of our party, on account of a bull he had made at breakfast, and which we called ‘half a nightingale’—a sort of ‘spatch-cock nightingale’.
1823 T. Moore Fables Holy Alliance i. 86 Proud Prussia's double bird of prey, Tame as a spatch-cock, slunk away.
1851 R. F. Burton Goa 258 Presently the ‘butler’ informs you that your breakfast, a spatchcock, or a curry with eggs,..is awaiting you.
1875 I. L. Bird Six Months in Sandwich Islands (1880) 99 Supper was ready for us;..the spatchcock and salmon reminded me of home.
2. (See quot. 1901.)
1901 A. G. Bradley Highways & Byways Lake District 62 Any official..would have run a grave risk of being made a spatchcock of, or in other words, of his head being stuck in a rabbit~hole, and his legs staked to the ground.
spatchcock, v. Etymology: < spatch-cock n.
1.trans. To cook as, or in the manner of, a spatchcock.
1879 Mrs. A. G. F. E. James Indian Househ. Managem. 34 You sit down..to your fowl—spatch-cocked of course, that being the natives' favourite way of dressing the tempting dish.
1890 Queen 11 Jan. 68/3 To split a fowl in two and serve one half à la Marengo, and the other half the next day either spatchcocked with mushrooms, or in any other approved fashion.
2. a. To insert, interpolate, or sandwich (a phrase, sentence, etc.). Const. in or into.
1901 Gen. Buller in Times 11 Oct. 10/2, I therefore spatchcocked into the middle of that telegram a sentence in which [etc.].
1901 Daily Chron. 18 Oct. 3/4 Such indifferent performances as ‘Catriona’—indifferent in spite of the fine short story ‘spatchcock'd’ into it.
1903 Mahaffy in Cal. State Papers Ireland Introd. 12 We read phrases of apparent sincere religious fervour spatchcocked in between these bloodthirsty expressions.
b. To add to, or modify, by interpolation.
1901 Daily Chron. 24 Oct. 5/6 They knew of the spatch~cocked telegram then.
Proof, to your comment: "Captain Francis Grose described it like that in his 1785 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue: “Spatch cock, abbreviation of a dispatch cock, an Irish dish upon any sudden occasion. It is a hen just killed from the roost, or yard, and immediately skinned, split, and broiled.” (from Quinion above)
What a cool word! I watched my culinary brother do this to a turkey one Thanksgiving, pulling the ribs right out with the backbone. Then he severed the legs, & stuffed & rolled the breasts for roasting. The 'spatchcocking' part of the operation was amazingly swift despite the size of the fowl.
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