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diff --git a/29982.txt b/29982.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7945a60 --- /dev/null +++ b/29982.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4340 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Culture and Cooking, by Catherine Owen + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Culture and Cooking + Art in the Kitchen + +Author: Catherine Owen + +Release Date: September 14, 2009 [EBook #29982] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CULTURE AND COOKING *** + + + + +Produced by Turgut Dincer and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + + + + + + +-----------------------------------------------+ + | Transcriber's note: | + | | + | In the text [oe] represents an "oe" ligature. | + | | + | Discrepancies between chapter names in | + | CONTENTS and in chapter headings have been | + | retained as shown in the original book. | + +-----------------------------------------------+ + + + + + CULTURE AND COOKING; + + OR, + + ART IN THE KITCHEN. + + BY + + CATHERINE OWEN + + + "Le Createur, en obligeant l'homme a manger pour vivre, l'y invite + par l'appetit et l'en recompense par le plaisir." + + --BRILLAT SAVARIN. + + + CASSELL, PETTER, GALPIN & CO., + NEW YORK, LONDON, AND PARIS. + 1881 + + + COPYRIGHT, + 1881, + BY O. M. DUNHAM. + + + + PRESS OF J. J. LITTLE & CO., + NOS. 10 TO 20 ASTOR PLACE, NEW YORK. + + + + +PREFACE. + + +THIS is not a cookery book. It makes no attempt to replace a good one; +it is rather an effort to fill up the gap between you and your household +oracle, whether she be one of those exasperating old friends who +maddened our mother with their vagueness, or the newer and better lights +of our own generation, the latest and best of all being a lady as well +known for her novels as for her works on domestic economy--one more +proof, if proof were needed, of the truth I endeavor to set forth--if +somewhat tediously forgive me--in this little book: that cooking and +cultivation are by no means antagonistic. Who does not remember with +affectionate admiration Charlotte Bronte taking the eyes out of the +potatoes stealthily, for fear of hurting the feelings of her purblind +old servant; or Margaret Fuller shelling peas? + +The chief difficulty, I fancy, with women trying recipes is, that they +fail and know not why they fail, and so become discouraged, and this is +where I hope to step in. But although this is not a cookery book, +insomuch as it does not deal chiefly with recipes, I shall yet give a +few; but only when they are, or I believe them to be, better than those +in general use, or good things little known, or supposed to belong to +the domain of a French _chef_, of which I have introduced a good many. +Should I succeed in making things that were obscure before clear to a +few women, I shall be as proud as was Mme. de Genlis when she boasts in +her Memoirs that she has taught six new dishes to a German housewife. +Six new dishes! When Brillat-Savarin says: "He who has invented _one_ +new dish has done more for the pleasure of mankind than he who has +discovered a star." + + + + + CONTENTS. + + + CHAPTER I. + + PAGE + + PRELIMINARY REMARKS 1 + + + CHAPTER II. + + ON BREAD. + + Sponge for bread.--One cause of failure.--Why home-made + bread often has a hard crust.--On baking.--Ovens.--More + reasons why bread may fail to be good.--Light + rolls.--Rusks.--Kreuznach horns.--Kringles.--Brioche + (Paris Jockey Club recipe).--Soufflee bread.--A novelty 12 + + + CHAPTER III. + + PASTRY. + + Why you fail in making good puff paste.--How to + succeed.--How to handle it.--To put fruit pies together so + that the syrup does not boil out.--Ornamenting fruit + pies.--Rissolettes.--Pastry tablets.--Frangipane + tartlets.--Rules for ascertaining the heat of your oven 22 + + + CHAPTER IV. + + WHAT TO HAVE IN YOUR STORE-ROOM. + + Mushroom powder (recipe).--Stock to keep, or glaze + (recipe).--Uses of glaze.--Glazing meats, hams, tongues, + etc.--Maitre d'hotel butter (recipe).--Uses of + it.--Ravigotte or Montpellier butter (recipe).--Uses of + it.--Roux.--Blanc (recipes).--Uses of both.--Brown flour, + its uses 28 + + + CHAPTER V. + + LUNCHEONS. + + Remarks on what to have for luncheons.--English meat + pies.--Windsor pie.--Veal and ham pie.--Chicken + pie.--Raised pork pie.--(Recipes).--Ornamenting meat + pies.--Galantine (recipe).--Fish in jelly.--Jellied + oysters.--A new mayonnaise luncheon for small + families.--Potted meats (recipes).--Anchovy butter.--A new + omelet.--Potato snow.--Lyonnaise potatoes 35 + + + CHAPTER VI. + + A CHAPTER ON GENERAL MANAGEMENT IN VERY SMALL FAMILIES. + + How to have little dinners.--Hints for bills of fare, + etc.--Filet de b[oe]uf Chateaubriand (recipe).--What to do + with the odds and ends.--Various recipes.--Salads.--Recipes 47 + + + CHAPTER VII. + + FRYING. + + Why you fail.--Panure or bread-crumbs, to prepare.--How to + prepare flounders as filets de sole.--Fried oysters.--To + clarify dripping for frying.--Remarks.--Pate a frire a la + Careme.--Same, a la Provencale.--Broiling 55 + + + CHAPTER VIII. + + ROASTING 62 + + + CHAPTER IX. + + BOILING AND SOUPS. + + Boiling meat.--Rules for knowing exactly the degrees of + boiling.--Vegetables.--Remarks on making soup.--To clear + soup.--Why it is not clear.--Coloring + pot-au-feu.--Consomme.--_Creme de celeri_, a little known + soup.--Recipes 65 + + + CHAPTER X. + + SAUCES. + + Remarks on making and flavoring sauces.--Espagnole or + brown sauce as it should be.--How to make fine white sauce 70 + + + CHAPTER XI. + + WARMING OVER. + + Remarks.--Salmi of cold meats.--B[oe]uf a la + jardiniere.--B[oe]uf au gratin.--Pseudo-beefsteak. + --Cutlets a la jardiniere.--Cromesquis of lamb.--Sauce + piquant.--Miroton of beef.--Simple way of warming a + joint.--Breakfast dish.--Stuffed beef.--Beef olives.--Chops + a la poulette.--Devils.--Mephistophelian sauce.--Fritadella, + twenty recipes in one 72 + + + CHAPTER XII. + + ON FRIANDISES. + + Biscuit glacee at home (recipes).--Iced souffles + (recipes).--Baba and syrups for it (recipe).--Savarin and + syrup (recipes).--Bouchees de dames.--How to make + Curacoa.--Maraschino.--Noyeau 84 + + + CHAPTER XIII. + + FRENCH CANDIES AT HOME. + + How to make them.--Fondants.--Vanilla.--Almond + cream.--Walnut cream.--Tutti frutti.--Various candies + dipped in cream.--Chocolate creams.--Fondant + panache.--Punch drops 91 + + + CHAPTER XIV. + + FOR PEOPLE OF VERY SMALL MEANS. + + Remarks.--What may be made of a soup bone.--Several very + economical dishes.--Pot roasts.--Dishes requiring no meat 96 + + + CHAPTER XV. + + A FEW THINGS IT IS WELL TO REMEMBER 105 + + + CHAPTER XVI. + + ON SOME TABLE PREJUDICES 108 + + + CHAPTER XVII. + + A CHAPTER OF ODDS AND ENDS. + + Altering recipes.--How to have tarragon, burnet, + etc.--Remarks on obtaining ingredients not in common + use.--An impromptu salamander.--Larding needle.--How to + have parsley fresh all winter without expense.--On having + kitchen conveniences.--Anecdote related by Jules + Gouffee.--On servants in America.--A little + advice by way of valedictory 111 + + + INDEX 119 + + + + +CULTURE AND COOKING. + + +CHAPTER I. + +A FEW PRELIMINARY REMARKS. + + +ALEXANDRE DUMAS, _pere_, after writing five hundred novels, says, "I +wish to close my literary career with a book on cooking." + +And in the hundred pages or so of preface--or perhaps overture would be +the better word, since in it a group of literary men, while contributing +recondite recipes, flourish trumpets in every key--to his huge volume he +says, "I wish to be read by people of the world, and practiced by people +of the art" (_gens de l'art_); and although _I_ wish, like every one who +writes, to be read by all the world, I wish to aid the practice, not of +the professors of the culinary art, but those whose aspirations point to +an enjoyment of the good things of life, but whose means of attaining +them are limited. + +There is a great deal of talk just now about cooking; in a lesser degree +it takes its place as a popular topic with ceramics, modern antiques, +and household art. The fact of it being in a mild way fashionable may do +a little good to the eating world in general. And it may make it more +easy to convince young women of refined proclivities that the art of +cooking is not beneath their attention, to know that the Queen of +England's daughters--and of course the cream of the London fair--have +attended the lectures on the subject delivered at South Kensington, and +that a young lady of rank, Sir James Coles's daughter, has been +recording angel to the association, is in fact the R. C. C. who edits +the "Official Handbook of Cookery." + +But, notwithstanding all that has been done by South Kensington lectures +in London and Miss Corson's Cooking School in New York to popularize the +culinary art, one may go into a dozen houses, and find the ladies of the +family with sticky fingers, scissors, and gum pot, busily porcelainizing +clay jars, and not find one where they are as zealously trying to work +out the problems of the "Official Handbook of Cookery." + +I have nothing to say against the artistic distractions of the day. +Anything that will induce love of the beautiful, and remove from us the +possibility of a return to the horrors of hair-cloth and brocatel and +crochet tidies, will be a stride in the right direction. But what I do +protest against, is the fact, that the same refined girls and matrons, +who so love to adorn their houses that they will spend hours improving a +pickle jar, mediaevalizing their furniture, or decorating the dinner +service, will shirk everything that pertains to the preparation of food +as dirty, disagreeable drudgery, and sit down to a commonplace, +ill-prepared meal, served on those artistic plates, as complacently as +if dainty food were not a refinement; as if heavy rolls and poor bread, +burnt or greasy steak, and wilted potatoes did not smack of the shanty, +just as loudly as coarse crockery or rag carpet--indeed far more so; the +carpet and crockery may be due to poverty, but a dainty meal or its +reverse will speak volumes for innate refinement or its lack in the +woman who serves it. You see by my speaking of rag carpets and dainty +meals in one breath, that I do not consider good things to be the +privilege of the rich alone. + +There are a great many dainty things the household of small or moderate +means can have just as easily as the most wealthy. Beautiful +bread--light, white, crisp--costs no more than the tough, thick-crusted +boulder, with cavities like eye-sockets, that one so frequently meets +with as _home-made bread_. As Hood says: + + "Who has not met with home-made bread, + A heavy compound of putty and lead?" + +Delicious coffee is only a matter of care, not expense--and indeed in +America the cause of poor food, even in a boarding-house, is seldom in +the quality of the articles so much as in the preparation and selection +of them--yet an epicure can breakfast well with fine bread and butter +and good coffee. And this leads me to another thing: many people think +that to give too much attention to food shows gluttony. I have heard a +lady say with a tone of virtuous rebuke, when the conversation turned +from fashions to cooking, "I give very little time to cooking, we eat to +live only"--which is exactly what an animal does. Eating to live is mere +feeding. Brillat-Savarin, an abstemious eater himself, among other witty +things on the same topic says, "_L'animal se repait, l'homme mange, +l'homme d'esprit seul sait manger._" + +Nine people out of ten, when they call a man an epicure, mean it as a +sort of reproach, a man who is averse to every-day food, one whom plain +fare would fail to satisfy; but Grimod de la Reyniere, the most +celebrated gourmet of his day, author of "_Almanach des Gourmands_," +and authority on all matters culinary of the last century, said, "A true +epicure can dine well on one dish, provided it is excellent of its +kind." Excellent, that is it. A little care will generally secure to us +the refinement of having only on the table what is excellent of its +kind. If it is but potatoes and salt, let the salt be ground fine, and +the potatoes white and mealy. Thackeray says, an epicure is one who +never tires of brown bread and fresh butter, and in this sense every New +Yorker who has his rolls from the Brevoort House, and uses Darlington +butter, is an epicure. There seems to me, more mere animalism in wading +through a long bill of fare, eating three or four indifferently cooked +vegetables, fish, meat, poultry, each second-rate in quality, or made so +by bad cooking, and declaring that you have dined well, and are easy to +please, than there is in taking pains to have a perfectly broiled chop, +a fine potato, and a salad, on which any true epicure could dine well, +while on the former fare he would leave the table hungry. + +Spenser points a moral for me when he says, speaking of the Irish in +1580, "That wherever they found a plot of shamrocks or water-cresses +they had a feast;" but there were gourmets even among them, for "some +gobbled the green food as it came, and some picked the faultless stalks, +and looked for the bloom on the leaf." + +Thus it is, when I speak of "good living," I do not mean expensive +living or high living, but living so that the table may be as elegant as +the dishes on which it is served. + +I believe there exists a feeling, not often expressed perhaps, but +prevalent among young people, that for a lady to cook with her own +hands is vulgar; to love to do it shows that she is of low intellectual +caliber, a sort of drawing-room Bridget. When or how this idea arose it +would be difficult to say, for in the middle ages cooks were often +noble; a Montmorency was _chef de cuisine_ to Philip of Valois; +Montesquieu descended, and was not ashamed of his descent, from the +second cook of the Connetable de Bourbon, who ennobled him. And from +Lord Bacon, "brightest, greatest, meanest of mankind," who took, it is +said, great interest in cooking, to Talleyrand, the Machiavelli of +France, who spent an hour every day with his cook, we find great men +delighting in the art as a recreation. + +It is surprising that such an essentially artistic people as Americans +should so neglect an art which a great French writer calls the "_science +mignonne_ of all distinguished men of the world." Napoleon the Great so +fully recognized the social value of keeping a good table that, although +no gourmet himself, he wished all his chief functionaries to be so. +"Keep a good table," he told them; "if you get into debt for it I will +pay." And later, one of his most devoted adherents, the Marquis de +Cussy, out of favor with Louis XVIII. on account of that very devotion, +found his reputation as a gourmet very serviceable to him. A friend +applied for a place at court for him, which Louis refused, till he heard +that M. de Cussy had invented the mixture of cream, strawberries, and +champagne, when he granted the petition at once. Nor is this a solitary +instance in history where culinary skill has been a passport to fortune +to its possessor. Savarin relates that the Chevalier d'Aubigny, exiled +from France, was in London, in utter poverty, notwithstanding which, by +chance, he was invited to dine at a tavern frequented by the young +bucks of that day. + +After he had finished his dinner, a party of young gentlemen, who had +been observing him from their table, sent one of their number with many +apologies and excuses to beg of him, as a son of a nation renowned for +their salads, to be kind enough to mix theirs for them. He complied, and +while occupied in making the salad, told them frankly his story, and did +not hide his poverty. One of the gentlemen, as they parted, slipped a +five-pound note into his hand, and his need of it was so great that he +did not obey the prompting of his pride, but accepted it. + +A few days later he was sent for to a great house, and learned on his +arrival that the young gentleman he had obliged at the tavern had spoken +so highly of his salad that they begged him to do the same thing again. +A very handsome sum was tendered him on his departure, and afterwards he +had frequent calls on his skill, until it became the fashion to have +salads prepared by d'Aubigny, who became a well-known character in +London, and was called "_the fashionable salad-maker_." In a few years +he amassed a large fortune by this means, and was in such request that +his carriage would drive from house to house, carrying him and his +various condiments--for he took with him everything that could give +variety to his concoctions--from one place, where his services were +needed, to another. + +The contempt for this art of cooking is confined to this country, and to +the lower middle classes in England. By the "lower middle classes" I +mean, what Carlyle terms the gigocracy--_i.e._, people sufficiently +well-to-do to keep a gig or phaeton--well-to-do tradesmen, small +professional men, the class whose womenkind would call themselves +"genteel," and many absurd stories are told of the determined ignorance +and pretense of these would-be ladies. But in no class above this is a +knowledge of cooking a thing to be ashamed of; in England, indeed, so +far from that being the case, indifference to the subject, or lack of +understanding and taste for certain dishes is looked upon as a sort of +proof of want of breeding. Not to like curry, macaroni, or parmesan, +_pate de foie gras_, mushrooms, and such like, is a sign that you have +not been all your life accustomed to good living. Mr. Hardy, in his +"Pair of Blue Eyes," cleverly hits this prejudice when he makes Mr. +Swancourt say, "I knew the fellow wasn't a gentleman; he had no acquired +tastes, never took Worcestershire sauce." + +Abroad many women of high rank and culture devote a good deal of time to +a thorough understanding of the subject. We have a lady of the "lordly +line of proud St. Clair" writing for us "Dainty Dishes," and doing it +with a zest that shows she enjoys her work, although she does once in a +while forget something she ought to have mentioned, and later still we +have Miss Rose Coles writing the "Official Handbook of Cookery." + +But it is in graceful, refined France that cookery is and has been, a +pet art. Any bill of fare or French cookery book will betray to a +thoughtful reader the attention given to the subject by the wittiest, +gayest, and most beautiful women, and the greatest men. The +high-sounding names attached to French standard dishes are no mere +caprice or homage of a French cook to the great in the land, but +actually point out their inventor. Thus _Bechamel_ was invented by the +Marquis de Bechamel, as a sauce for codfish; while _Filets de Lapereau a +la Berry_ were invented by the Duchess de Berry, daughter of the regent +Orleans, who himself invented _Pain a la d'Orleans_, while to Richelieu +we are indebted for hundreds of dishes besides the renowned mayonnaise. + +_Cailles a la Mirepois_, _Chartreuse a la Mauconseil_, _Poulets a la +Villeroy_, betray the tastes of the three great ladies whose name they +bear. + +But not in courts alone has the art had its devotees. Almost every great +name in French literature brings to mind something its owner said or did +about cooking. Dumas, who was a prince of cooks, and of whom it is +related that in 1860, when living at Varennes, St. Maur, dividing his +time, as usual, between cooking and literature (_Lorsqu'il ne faisait +pas sauter un roman, il faisait sauter des petits oignons_), on +Mountjoye, a young artist friend and neighbor, going to see him, he +cooked dinner for him. Going into the poultry yard, after donning a +white apron, he wrung the neck of a chicken; then to the kitchen garden +for vegetables, which he peeled and washed himself; lit the fire, got +butter and flour ready, put on his saucepans, then cooked, stirred, +tasted, seasoned until dinner time. Then he entered in triumph, and +announced, "_Le diner est servi_." For six months he passed three or +four days a week cooking for Mountjoye. This novelist's book says, in +connection with the fact that great cooks in France have been men of +literary culture, and literary men often fine cooks, "It is not +surprising that literary men have always formed the _entourage_ of a +great chef, for, to appreciate thoroughly all there is in the culinary +art, none are so well able as men of letters; accustomed as they are to +all refinements, they can appreciate better than others those of the +table," thus paying himself and confreres a delicate little compliment +at the expense of the non-literary world; but, notwithstanding the naive +self-glorification, he states a fact that helps to point my moral, that +indifference to cooking does not indicate refinement, intellect, or +social pre-eminence. + +Brillat-Savarin, grave judge as he was, and abstemious eater, yet has +written the book of books on the art of eating. It was he who said, +"Tell me what you eat, I will tell you what you are," as pregnant with +truth as the better-known proverb it paraphrases. + +Malherbe loved to watch his cook at work. I think it was he who said, "A +coarse-minded man could never be a cook," and Charles Baudelaire, the +Poe of France, takes a poet's view of our daily wants, when he says, +"that an ideal cook must have a great deal of the poet's nature, +combining something of the voluptuary with the man of science learned in +the chemical principles of matter;" although he goes further than we +care to follow when he says, that the question of sauces and seasoning +requires "a chapter as grave as a _feuilleton de science_." + +It has been said by foreigners that Americans care nothing for the +refinements of the table, but I think they do care. I have known many a +woman in comfortable circumstances long to have a good table, many a man +aspire to better things, and if he could only get them at home would pay +any money. But the getting them at home is the difficulty; on a table +covered with exquisite linen, glass, and silver, whose presiding queen +is more likely than not a type of the American lady--graceful, refined, +and witty--on such a table, with such surroundings, will come the +plentiful, coarse, commonplace dinner. + +The chief reason for this is lack of knowledge on the part of our +ladies: know how to do a thing yourself, and you will get it well done +by others. But how are many of them to know? The daughters of the +wealthy in this country often marry struggling men, and they know less +about domestic economy than ladies of the higher ranks abroad; not +because English or French ladies take more part in housekeeping, but +because they are at home all their lives. Ladies of the highest rank +never go to a boarding or any other school, and these are the women who, +with some few exceptions, know best how things should be done. They are +at home listening to criticisms from papa, who is an epicure perhaps, on +the shortcomings of his own table, or his neighbors'; from mamma, as to +what the soup lacks, why cook is not a "_cordon bleu_," etc., while our +girls are at school, far away from domestic comments, deep in the +agonies of algebra perhaps; and directly they leave school, in many +cases they marry. As a preparation for the state of matrimony most of +them learn how to make cake and preserves, and the very excellence of +their attainments in that way proves how easy it would be for them, with +their dainty fingers and good taste, to far excel their European cousins +in that art which a French writer says is based on "reason, health, +common sense, and sound taste." + +Here let me say, I do not by any means advocate a woman, who can afford +to pay a first-rate cook, avoiding the expense by cooking herself; on +the contrary, I think no woman is justified in doing work herself that +she has the means given her to get done by employing others. I have no +praise for the economical woman, who, from a desire to save, does her +own work _without necessity for economy_. It is _not_ her work; the +moment she can afford to employ others it is the work of some less +fortunate person. But in this country, it often happens that a good +cook is not to be found for money, although the raw material of which +one might be made is much oftener at hand. And if ladies would only +practice the culinary art with as much, nay, half as much assiduity as +they give to a new pattern in crochet; devote as much time to attaining +perfection in one dish or article of food, be it perfect bread, or some +French dish which father, brother, or husband goes to Delmonico's to +enjoy, as they do to the crochet tidies or embroidered rugs with which +they decorate their drawing-rooms, they could then take the material, in +the shape of any ambitious girl they may meet with, and make her a fine +cook. In the time they take to make a dozen tidies, they would have a +dozen dishes at their fingers' ends; and let me tell you, the woman who +can cook a dozen things, outside of preserves, in a _perfect_ manner is +a rarity here, and a good cook anywhere, for, by the time the dozen are +accomplished, she will have learned so much of the art of cooking that +all else will come easy. One good soup, bouillon, and you have the +foundation of all others; two good sauces, white sauce and brown, "_les +sauces meres_" as the French call them (mothers of all other sauces), +and all others are matters of detail. Learn to make one kind of roll +perfectly, as light, plump, and crisp as Delmonico's, and all varieties +are at your fingers' ends; you can have kringles, Vienna rolls, +Kreuznach horns, Yorkshire tea cakes, English Sally Lunns and Bath buns; +all are then as easy to make as common soda biscuit. In fact, in +cooking, as in many other things, "_ce n'est que le premier pas que +coute_;" failures are almost certain at the beginning, but a failure is +often a step toward success--if we only know the reason of the failure. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + +ON BREAD. + + +OF all articles of food, bread is perhaps the one about which most has +been written, most instruction given, and most failures made. Yet what +adds more to the elegance of a table than exquisite bread or breads, +and--unless you live in a large city and depend on the baker--what so +rare? A lady who is very proud of her table, and justly so, said to me +quite lately, "I cannot understand how it is we never have really fine +home-made bread. I have tried many recipes, following them closely, and +I can't achieve anything but a commonplace loaf with a thick, hard +crust; and as for rolls, they are my despair. I have wasted eggs, +butter, and patience so often that I have determined to give them up, +but a fine loaf I will try for." + +"And when you achieve the fine loaf, you may revel in home-made rolls," +I answered. + +And so I advise every one first to make perfect bread, light, white, +crisp, and _thin-crusted_, that rarest thing in home-made bread. + +I have read over many recipes for bread, and am convinced that when the +time allowed for rising is specified, it is invariably too short. One +standard book directs you to leave your sponge two hours, and the bread +when made up a _quarter of an hour_. This recipe strictly followed must +result in heavy, tough bread. As bread is so important, and so many +fail, I will give my own method from beginning to end; not that there +are not numberless good recipes, but simply because they frequently need +adapting to circumstances, and altering a recipe is one of the things a +tyro fears to do. + +I make a sponge over night, using a dried yeast-cake soaked in a pint of +warm water, to which I add a spoonful of salt, and, if the weather is +warm, as much soda as will lie on a dime; make this into a stiff batter +with flour--it may take a quart or less, flour varies so much, to give a +rule is impossible; but if, after standing, the sponge has a watery +appearance, make it thicker by sprinkling in more flour, beat hard a few +minutes, and cover with a cloth--in winter keep a piece of thick flannel +for the purpose, as a chill is fatal to your sponge--and set in a warm +place free from draughts. + +The next morning, when the sponge is quite light--that is to say, at +least twice the bulk it was, and like a honeycomb--take two quarts of +flour, more or less, as you require, but I recommend at first a small +baking, and this will make three small loaves; in winter, flour should +be dried and warmed; put it in your mixing bowl, and turn the sponge +into a hole in the center. Have ready some water, rather more than +lukewarm, but not _hot_. Add it gradually, stirring your flour into the +sponge at the same time. The great fault in making bread is getting the +dough too stiff; it should be as soft as possible, without being at all +sticky or wet. Now knead it with both hands from all sides into the +center; keep this motion, occasionally dipping your hands into the flour +if the dough sticks, but do not add more flour unless the paste sticks +very much; if you have the right consistency it will be a smooth mass, +very soft to the touch, _yet not sticky_, but this may not be attained +at a first mixing without adding flour by degrees. When you have kneaded +the dough until it leaves the bowl all round, set it in a warm place to +rise. When it is well risen, feels very soft and warm to the touch, and +is twice its bulk, knead it once more thoroughly, then put it in tins +either floured, and the flour not adhering shaken out, or buttered, +putting in each a piece of dough half the size you intend your loaf to +be. Now everything depends on your oven. Many people bake their bread +slowly, leaving it in the oven a long time, and this causes a thick, +hard crust. When baked in the modern iron oven, quick baking is +necessary. Let the oven be quite hot, then put a little ball of paste +in, and if it browns palely in seven to ten minutes it is about right; +if it burns, it is too hot; open the damper ten minutes. Your bread, +after it is in the tins, will rise much more quickly than the first +time. Let it get light, but not too light--_twice its bulk_ is a good +rule; but if it is light before your oven is ready, and thus in danger +of getting too porous, work it down with your hand, it will not harm it, +although it is better so to manage that the oven waits for the bread +rather than the bread for the oven. A small loaf--and by all means make +them small until you have gained experience--will not take more than +three quarters of an hour to bake; when a nice yellow brown, take it +out, turn it out of the tin into a cloth, and tap the bottom; if it is +crisp and smells cooked, the loaf is done. Once the bottom is brown it +need remain no longer. Should that, however, from fault of your oven, be +not brown, but soft and white, you must put it back in the oven, the +bottom upwards. An oven that does not bake at the bottom will, however, +be likely to spoil your bread. It is sometimes caused by a careless +servant leaving a collection of ashes underneath it; satisfy yourself +that all the flues are perfectly clean and clear before beginning to +bake, and if it still refuses to do its duty, change it, for you will +have nothing but loss and vexation of spirit while you have it in use. I +think you will find this bread white, evenly porous (not with small +holes in one part and caverns in another; if it is so you have made your +dough too stiff, and it is not sufficiently kneaded), and with a thin, +crisp crust. Bread will surely fail to rise at all if you have scalded +the yeast; the water must never be too hot. In winter, if it gets +chilled, it will only rise slowly, or not at all, and in using baker's +or German yeast take care that it is not stale, which will cause heavy, +irregular bread. + +In making bread with compressed yeast proceed in exactly the same way, +excepting that the sponge will not need to be set over night, unless you +want to bake very early. + +If you have once produced bread to your satisfaction you will find no +difficulty in making rolls. Proceed as follows: + +Take a piece of the dough from your baking after it has risen once. To a +piece as large as a man's fist take a large tablespoonful of butter and +a little powdered sugar; work them into the dough, put it in a bowl, +cover it, and set it in a warm place to rise--a shelf behind the stove +is best; if you make this at the same time as your bread, you will find +it takes longer to rise; the butter causes that difference; when very +light, much lighter than your bread should be, take your hand and push +it down till it is not larger than when you put it in the bowl; let it +rise again, and again push it down, but not so thoroughly; do this once +or twice more, and you have the secret of light rolls. You will find +them rise very quickly, after once or twice pushing down. When they have +risen the third or fourth time, take a little butter on your hands, and +break off small pieces about the size of a walnut and roll them round. +Either put them on a tin close together, to be broken apart, or an inch +or two from each other, in which case work in a little more flour, and +cut a cleft on the top, and once more set to rise; half an hour will be +long enough generally, but in this case you must judge for yourself, +they sometimes take an hour; if they look swelled very much and smooth +they will be ready. Have a nice hot oven, and bake for twelve to fifteen +minutes. + +Add a little more sugar to your dough and an egg, go through the same +process, brush them over with sugar dissolved in milk, and you will have +delicious rusks. + +The above is my own method of making rolls, and the simplest I know of; +but there are numbers of other recipes given in cookery books which +would be just as good if the exact directions for letting them rise were +given. As a test--and every experiment you try will be so much gained in +your experience--follow the recipe given for rolls in any good cookery +book, take part of the dough and let it rise as therein directed, and +bake, set the other part to rise as _I_ direct, and notice the +difference. + +KREUZNACH HORNS.--Either take a third of the dough made for bread with +three quarts of flour, or set a sponge with a pint of flour and a +yeast-cake soaked in half a pint of warm water or milk, making it into a +stiffish dough with another pint of flour; then add four ounces of +butter, a _little_ sugar, and two eggs; work well. If you use the bread +dough, you will need to dredge in a little more flour on account of the +eggs, but not _very much_; then set to rise as for rolls, work it down +twice or thrice, then turn the dough out on the molding board lightly +floured, roll it as you would pie-crust into pieces six inches square, +and quarter of an inch thick, make two sharp, quick cuts across it from +corner to corner, and you will have from each square four three-cornered +pieces of paste; spread each _thinly_ with soft butter, flour lightly, +and roll up very lightly from the wide side, taking care that it is not +squeezed together in any way; lay them on a tin with the side on which +the point comes uppermost, and bend round in the form of a horseshoe; +these will take some time to rise; when they have swollen much and look +light, brush them over with white of egg (not beaten) or milk and +butter, and bake in a good oven. + +KRINGLES are made from the same recipe, but with another egg and two +ounces of sugar (powdered) added to the dough when first set to rise; +then, when well risen two or three times, instead of rolling with a pin +as for horns, break off pieces, roll between your hands as thick as your +finger, and form into figure eights, rings, fingers; or take three +strips, flour and roll them as thick as your finger, tapering at each +end; lay them on the board, fasten the three together at one end, and +then lay one over the other in a plait, fasten the other end, and set to +rise, bake; when done, brush over with sugar dissolved in milk, and +sprinkle with sugar. + +All these breads are delicious for breakfast, and may easily be had +without excessive early rising if the sponge is set in the _morning_, +dough made in the afternoon, and the rising and working done in the +evening; when, instead of making up into rolls, horns, or kringles, +push the dough down thoroughly, cover with a damp folded cloth, and put +in a _very_ cold place if in summer--not on ice of course--then next +morning, as soon as the fire is alight, mold, but do not push down any +more, put in a very warm spot, and when light, bake. + +In summer, as I have said, I think it safest, to prevent danger of +souring, to put a little soda in the sponge for bread; and for rolls, or +anything requiring to rise several times, it is an essential precaution. + +BRIOCHE.--I suppose the very name of this delectable French dainty will +call up in the mind's eye of many who read this book that great "little" +shop, _Au Grand Brioche_, on the Boulevarde Poissoniere, where, on +Sunday afternoons, scores of boys from the Lycees form _en queue_ with +the general public, waiting the hour when the piles of golden brioche +shall be ready to exchange for their eager sous. But I venture to say, a +really fine brioche is rarely eaten on this side the Atlantic. They +being a luxury welcome to all, and especially aromatic of Paris, I tried +many times to make them, obtaining for that purpose recipes from French +friends, and from standard French books, but never succeeded in +producing the ideal brioche until I met with Gouffe's great book, the +"_Livre de Cuisine_," after reading which, I may here say, all secrets +of the French kitchen are laid bare; no effort is spared to make +everything plain, from the humble _pot-au-feu_ to the most gorgeous +monumental _plat_. And I would refer any one who wants to become +proficient in any French dish, to that book, feeling sure that, in +following strictly the directions, there will be no failure. It is the +one book I have met with on the subject in which no margin is left for +your own knowledge, if you have it, to fill up. But to the brioche. + + +PARIS JOCKEY-CLUB RECIPE FOR BRIOCHE. + +Sift one pound of flour, take one fourth of it, and add rather more than +half a cake of compressed yeast, dissolved in half a gill of warm water, +make into a sponge with a _very little_ more water, put it in a warm +place; when it is double its volume take the rest of the flour, make a +hole in the center, and put in it an equal quantity of salt and sugar, +about a teaspoonful, and two tablespoonfuls of water to dissolve them. +Three quarters of a pound of butter and four eggs, beat well, then add +another egg, beat again, and add another, and so on until seven have +been used; the paste must be soft, but not spread; if too firm, add +another egg. Now mix this paste with the sponge thoroughly, beating +until the paste leaves the sides of the bowl, then put it in a crock and +cover; let it stand four hours in a warm place, then turn it out on a +board, _spread it and double it four times_, return it to the crock, and +let it rise again two hours; repeat the former process of doubling and +spreading, and put it in a very cold place for two hours, or until you +want to use it. Mold in any form you like, but the true brioche is two +pieces, one as large again as the other; form the large one into a ball, +make a deep depression in the center, on which place the smaller ball, +pressing it gently in; cut two or three gashes round it with a sharp +knife, and bake a beautiful golden brown. These brioche are such a +luxury, and so sure to come out right, that the trouble of making them +is well worth the taking, and for another reason: every one knows the +great difficulty of making puff paste in summer, and a short paste is +never handsome; but take a piece of brioche paste, roll it out thin, +dredge with flour, fold and roll again, then use as you would puff +paste; if for sweet pastry, a little powdered sugar may be sprinkled +through it instead of dredging with flour. This makes a very handsome +and delicious crust. Or, another use to which it may be put is to roll +it out, cut it in rounds, lay on them mince-meat, orange marmalade, jam, +or merely sprinkle with currants, chopped citron, and spices, fold, +press the edges, and bake. + +Before quitting the subject of breads I must introduce a novelty which I +will call "soufflee bread." It is quickly made, possible even when the +fire is poor, and so delicious that I know you will thank me for making +you acquainted with it. + +Use two or three eggs according to size you wish, and to each egg a +tablespoonful of flour. Mix the yolks with the flour and with them a +dessert-spoonful of butter melted, and enough milk to make a very +_thick_ batter, work, add a pinch of salt and a teaspoonful of sugar, +work till quite smooth, then add the whites of the eggs in a firm froth, +stir them in gently, and add a _quarter_ teaspoonful of soda and half a +one of cream of tartar. Have ready an iron frying-pan (or an earthen one +that will stand heat is better), made hot with a tablespoonful of butter +in it, also hot, but not so hot as for frying. Pour the batter (which +should be of the consistency of sponge cake batter) into the pan, cover +it with a lid or tin plate, and set it back of the stove if the fire is +hot--if very slow it may be forward; when well risen and near done, put +it in the oven, or if the oven is cold you may turn it gently, not to +deaden it. Serve when done (try with a twig), the under side uppermost; +it should be of a fine golden brown and look like an omelet. This +soufflee bread is equally good _baked_ in a tin in which is rather more +butter than enough to grease it; the oven must be _very hot indeed_. +Cover it for the few minutes with a tin plate or lid, to prevent it +scorching before it has risen; when it has puffed up remove the lid, and +allow it to brown, ten to fifteen minutes should bake it; turn it out as +you would sponge cake--very carefully, not to deaden it. To succeed with +bread you must use the very best flour. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +PASTRY. + + +TO MAKE good puff paste is a thing many ladies are anxious to do, and in +which they generally fail, and this not so much because they do not make +it properly, as because they handle it badly. A lady who was very +anxious to excel in pastry once asked me to allow her to watch me make +paste. I did so, and explained that there was more in the manner of +using than in the making up. I then gave her a piece of my paste when +completed, and asked her to cover some patty pans while I covered +others, cautioning her as to the way she must cover them; yet, when +those covered by her came out of the oven they had not risen at all, +they were like rich short paste; while my own, made from the same paste, +were toppling over with lightness. I had, without saying anything, +pressed my thumb slightly on one spot of one of mine; in that spot the +paste had not risen at all, and I think this practical demonstration of +what I had tried to explain was more useful than an hour's talk would +have been. + +I will first give my method of making, which is the usual French way of +making "_feuilletonage_." Take one pound of butter, or half of it lard; +press all the water out by squeezing it in a cloth; this is important, +as the liquid in it would wet your paste; take a third of the butter, or +butter and lard, and rub it into one pound of _fine_ flour; add no salt +if your butter is salted; then take enough water (to which you may add +the well-beaten white of an egg, but it is not absolutely necessary) to +make the flour into a smooth, firm dough; it must not be too stiff, or +it will be hard to roll out, or too soft, or it will never make good +paste; it should roll easily, yet not stick; work it till it is very +smooth, then roll it out till it is half an inch thick; now lay the +whole of the butter in the center, fold one-third the paste over, then +the other third; it is now folded in three, with the butter completely +hidden; now turn the ends toward you, and roll it till it is half an +inch thick, taking care, by rolling very evenly, that the butter is not +pressed out at the other end; now you have a piece of paste about two +feet long, and not half that width; flour it lightly, and fold _over_ +one third and under one third, which will almost bring it to a square +again; turn it round so that what was the side is now the end, and roll. +Most likely now the butter will begin to break through, in which case +fold it, after flouring lightly, in three, as before, and put it on a +dish on the ice, covering it with a damp cloth. You may now either leave +it for an hour or two, or till next day. Paste made the day before it is +used is much better and easier to manage, and in winter it may be kept +for four or five days in a cold place, using from it as required. + +When ready to use your paste finish the making by rolling it out, +dredging a _little_ flour, and doubling it in three as before, and roll +it out thin; do this until from first to last it has been so doubled and +rolled seven times. + +Great cooks differ on one or two points in making pastry; for instance, +Soyer directs you to put the yolk of an egg instead of the white, and a +squeeze of lemon juice into the flour, and expressly forbids you to +work it before adding the mass of butter, while Jules Gouffe says, "work +it until smooth and shining." I cannot pretend to decide between these +differing doctors, but I pursue the method I have given and always have +light pastry. And now to the handling of it: It must only be touched by +the lightest fingers, every cut must be made with a sharp knife, and +done with one quick stroke so that the paste is not dragged at all; in +covering a pie dish or patty pan, you are commonly directed to mold the +paste over it as thin as possible, which conveys the idea that the paste +is to be pressed over and so made thin; this would destroy the finest +paste in the world; roll it thin, say for small tartlets, less than a +quarter of an inch thick, for a pie a trifle thicker, then lay the dish +or tin to be covered on the paste, and cut out with a knife, dipped in +_hot_ water or flour, a piece a little larger than the mold, then line +with the piece you have cut, touching it as little as possible; press +only enough to make the paste adhere to the bottom, but on no account +press the border; to test the necessity of avoiding this, gently press +one spot on a tart, before putting it in the oven, only so much as many +people always do in making pie, and watch the result. When your tartlets +or pies are made, take each up on your left hand, and with a sharp knife +dipped in flour trim it round quickly. To make the cover of a pie adhere +to the under crust, lay the forefinger of your right hand lengthwise +round the border, but as far from the edge as you can, thus forming a +groove for the syrups, and pressing the cover on at the same time. A +word here about fruit pies: Pile the fruit high in the center, leaving a +space all round the sides almost bare of fruit, when the cover is on +press gently the paste, as I have explained, into this groove, then +make two or three deep holes in the groove; the juice will boil out of +these holes and run round this groove, instead of boiling out through +the edges and wasting. + +This is the pastry-cook's way of making pies, and makes a much handsomer +one than the usual flat method, besides saving your syrup. To ornament +fruit pies or tartlets, whip the white of an egg, and stir in as much +powdered sugar as will make a thin meringue--a large tablespoonful is +usually enough--then when your pies or tartlets are baked, take them +from the oven, glaze with the egg and sugar, and return to the oven, +leaving the door open; when it has set into a frosty icing they are +ready to serve. + +It is worth while to accomplish puff paste, for so many dainty trifles +may be made with it, which, attempted with the ordinary short paste, +would be unsightly. Some of these that seem to me novel I will describe. + +Rissolettes are made with trimmings of puff paste; if you have about a +quarter of a pound left, roll it out very thin, about as thick as a +fifty-cent piece; put about half a spoonful of marmalade or jam on it, +in places about an inch apart, wet lightly round each, and place a piece +of paste over all; take a small round cutter as large as a dollar, and +press round the part where the marmalade or jam is with the thick part +of the cutter; then cut them out with a cutter a size larger, lay them +on a baking tin, brush over with white of egg; then cut some little +rings the size of a quarter dollar, put one on each, egg over again, and +bake twenty minutes in a nice hot oven; then sift white sugar all over, +put them back in the oven to glaze; a little red currant jelly in each +ring looks pretty; serve in the form of a pyramid. + +PASTRY TABLETS.--Cut strips of paste three inches and a half long, and +an inch and a half wide, and as thick as a twenty-five cent piece; lay +on half of them a thin filmy layer of jam or marmalade, not jelly; then +on each lay a strip without jam, and bake in a quick oven. When the +paste is well risen and brown, take them out, glaze them with white of +egg and sugar, and sprinkle chopped almonds over them; return to the +oven till the glazing is set and the almonds just colored; serve them +hot or cold on a napkin piled log-cabin fashion. + +FRANGIPANE TARTLETS.--One quarter pint of cream, four yolks of eggs, two +ounces of flour, three macaroons, four tablespoonfuls of powdered sugar, +the peel of a grated lemon, and a little citron cut very fine, a little +brandy and orange-flower water. Put all the ingredients, except the +eggs, in a saucepan--of course you will mix the flour smooth in the +cream first--let them come to a boil slowly, stirring to prevent lumps; +when the flour smells cooked, take it off the fire for a minute, then +stir the beaten yolks of eggs into it. Stand the saucepan in another of +boiling water and return to the stove, stirring till the eggs seem +done--about five minutes, if the water boils all the time. Line patty +pans with puff paste, and fill with frangipane and bake. Ornament with +chopped almonds and meringue, or not, as you please. + +It is very difficult to make fine puff paste in warm weather, and almost +impossible without ice; for this reason I think the brioche paste +preferable; but if it is necessary to have it for any purpose, you must +take the following precautions: + +Have your water iced; have your butter as firm as possible by being +kept on ice till the last moment; make the paste in the coolest place +you have, and under the breeze of an open window, if possible; make it +the day before you use it, and put it on the ice between every "turn," +as each rolling out is technically called; then leave it on the ice, as +you use it, taking pieces from it as you need them, so that the warmth +cannot soften the whole at once, when it would become quite +unmanageable. The condition of the oven is a very important matter, and +I cannot do better than transcribe the rules given by Gouffe, by which +you may test its fitness for any purpose: + +Put half a sheet of writing paper in the oven; if it catches fire it is +too hot; open the dampers and wait ten minutes, when put in another +piece of paper; if it blackens it is still too hot. Ten minutes later +put in a third piece; if it _gets dark brown_ the oven is right for all +small pastry. Called "_dark brown paper heat_." _Light brown paper heat_ +is suitable for _vol-au-vents_ or fruit pies. _Dark yellow paper heat_ +for large pieces of pastry or meat pies, pound cake, bread, etc. _Light +yellow paper heat_ for sponge cake, meringues, etc. + +To obtain these various degrees of heat, you try paper every ten minutes +till the heat required for your purpose is attained. But remember that +"light yellow" means the paper only tinged; "dark yellow," the paper the +color of ordinary pine wood; "light brown" is only a shade darker, about +the color of nice pie-crust, and dark brown a shade darker, by no means +coffee color. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +WHAT TO HAVE IN YOUR STORE-ROOM. + + +ONE great trouble with many young housekeepers is betrayed by the common +remark, "Cookery books always require so many things that one never has +in the house, and they coolly order you to 'moisten with gravy,' 'take a +little gravy,' as if you had only to go to the pump and get it." It is +very true that economy in cooking is much aided by having a supply of +various condiments; warmed-over meat may then be converted into a +delicious little entree with little trouble. I would recommend, +therefore, any one who is in earnest about reforming her dinner table to +begin by expending a few dollars in the following articles: + + + 1 bottle of capers, + 1 " olives, + 1 " gherkins, + 1 " soy, + 1 " anchovies, + 1 " tarragon vinegar, + 1 " claret, + 1 " white wine, + 1 " sherry for cooking, + 1 " brandy, + 1 " Harvey sauce, + 1 " walnut ketchup. + +And a package of compressed vegetables and a few bay leaves. + + +Ten dollars thus spent may seem a good deal of money to a young +housewife trying to make her husband's salary go as far as it will; but +I assure her it is in the end an economy, especially in a small family, +who are so apt to get tired of seeing the same thing, that it has to be +thrown or given away. With these condiments and others I have yet to +mention you will have no trouble in using every scrap; not using it and +eating it from a sense of duty, and wishing it was something better, but +enjoying it. With your store-room well provided, you can indeed go for +gravy "as if to the pump." + +Besides the foregoing list of articles to be bought of any good grocer, +there are others which can be made at home to advantage, and once made +are always ready. Mushroom powder I prefer for any use to mushroom +catsup; it is easily made and its uses are infinite. Sprinkled over +steak (when it must be sifted) or chops, it is delicious. For ordinary +purposes, such as flavoring soup or gravy, it need not be sifted. To +prepare it, take a peck of large and very fresh mushrooms, look them +over carefully that they are not wormy, then cleanse them with a piece +of flannel from sand or grit, then peel them and put them in the sun or +a cool oven to dry; they require long, slow drying, and must become in a +state to crumble. Your peck will have diminished by the process into +half a pint or less of mushroom powder, but you have the means with it +of making a rich gravy at a few minutes' notice. + +Apropos of gravies--that much-vexed question in small households--for +without gravies on hand you cannot make good hash, or many other things +that are miserable without, and excellent with it. Yet how difficult it +is to have gravy always on hand every mistress of a small family knows, +in spite of the constant advice to "save your trimming to make stock." +Do by all means save your bones, gristle, odds and ends of meat of all +kinds, and convert them into broth; but even if you do, it often happens +that the days you have done so no gravy is required, and then it sours +quickly in summer, although it may be arrested by reboiling. In no +family of three or four are there odds and ends enough, unless there is +a very extravagant table kept, to insure stock for every day. My remedy +for this, then, is to make a stock that will keep for months or +years--in other words, _glaze_. So very rarely forming part of a +housewife's stores, yet so valuable that the fact is simply astonishing; +with a piece of glaze, you have a dish of soup on an emergency, rich +gravy for any purpose, and all with the expenditure of less time than +would make a pot of sweetmeats. + +Take six pounds of a knuckle of veal or leg of beef, cut it in pieces +the size of an egg, as also half a pound of lean ham; then rub a quarter +of a pound of butter on the bottom of your pot, which should hold two +gallons; then put in the meat with half a pint of water, three +middle-sized onions, with two cloves in each, a turnip, a carrot, and a +_small_ head of celery; then place over a quick fire, occasionally +stirring it round, until the bottom of the pot is covered with a thick +glaze, which will adhere lightly to the spoon; then fill up the pot with +cold water, and when on the boiling point, draw it to the back of the +stove, where it may gently simmer three hours, if veal, six if beef, +carefully skimming it to remove scum. This stock, as it is, will make a +delicious foundation, with the addition of salt, for all kinds of clear +soup or gravies. To reduce it to glaze proceed as follows: Pass the +stock through a fine hair sieve or cloth into a pan; then fill up the +pot again with _hot_ water, and let it boil four hours longer to obtain +all the glutinous part from the meat; strain, and pour both stocks in a +large pot or stew-pan together; set it over the fire, and let it boil +as fast as possible with the lid off, leaving a large spoon in it to +prevent it boiling over, and to stir occasionally. When reduced to about +three pints, pour it into a small stew-pan or saucepan, set again to +boil, but more slowly, skimming it if necessary; when it is reduced to a +quart, set it where it will again boil quickly, stirring it well with a +wooden spoon until it begins to get thick and of a fine yellowish-brown +color; at this point be careful it does not burn. + +You may either pour it into a pot for use, or, what is more convenient +for making gravies, get a sausage skin from your butcher, cut a yard of +it, tie one end very tightly, then pour into it by means of a large +funnel the glaze; from this cut slices for use. A thick slice dissolved +in hot water makes a cup of nutritious soup, into which you may put any +cooked vegetables, or rice, or barley. A piece is very useful to take on +a journey, especially for an invalid who does not want to depend on +wayside hotel food, or is tired of beef-tea. + +The foregoing is the orthodox recipe for glaze, and if you have to buy +meat for the purpose the very best way in which you can make it; but if +it happen that you have some strong meat soup or jelly, for which you +have no use while fresh, then boil it down till it is thick and brown +(not burnt); it will be excellent glaze; not so fine in flavor, perhaps, +but it preserves to good use what would otherwise be lost. Very many +people do not know the value of pork for making jelly. If you live in +the country and kill a pig, use his hocks for making glaze instead of +beef. + +Glaze also adds much to the beauty of many dishes. If roast beef is not +quite brown enough on any one spot set your jar of glaze--for this +purpose it is well to have some put in a jar as well as in the skin--in +boiling water. Keep a small stiff brush; such as are sold for the +purpose at house-furnishing stores, called a glazing brush, are best; +but you may manage with any other or even a stiff feather. When the +glaze softens, as glue would do, brush over your meat with it, it will +give the lacking brown; or, if you have a ham or tongue you wish to +decorate you may "varnish" it, as it were, with the melted glaze; then +when cold beat some fresh butter to a white cream, and with a kitchen +syringe, if you have one, a stiff paper funnel if you have not, trace +any design you please on the glazed surface; this makes a very handsome +dish, and if your ham has been properly boiled will be very satisfactory +to the palate. Of the boiling of ham I will speak in another chapter. + +I have a few more articles to recommend for your store-room, and then I +think you will find yourself equal to the emergency of providing an +elegant little meal if called upon unexpectedly, provided you have any +cold scraps at all in the house, and _maitre d'hotel_ butter. + +To make the latter, take half a pound of fine butter, one tablespoonful +of very fresh parsley, chopped not too fine, salt, pepper, and a small +tablespoonful of lemon juice; mix together, but do not work more than +sufficient for that purpose, and pack in a jar, keeping it in a cool +place. A tablespoonful of this laid in a hot dish on which you serve +beefsteak, chops, or any kind of fish, is a great addition, and turns +plain boiled potatoes into _pomme de terre a la maitre d'hotel_. It is +excellent with stewed potatoes, or added to anything for which parsley +is needed, and not always at hand; a spoonful with half the quantity of +flour stirred into a gill of milk or water makes the renowned _maitre +d'hotel_ sauce (or English parsley butter) for boiled fish, mutton, or +veal. In short, it is one of the most valuable things to have in the +house. Equally valuable, even, and more elegant is the preparation known +as "Ravigotte" or Montpellier butter. + +Take one pound in equal quantities of chervil, tarragon, burnet +(pimpernel), chives, and garden cress (peppergrass); scald _two_ +minutes, drain quite dry; pound in a mortar three hard eggs, three +anchovies, and one scant ounce of pickled cucumbers, and same quantity +of capers well pressed to extract the vinegar; add salt, pepper, and a +bit of garlic half as large as a pea, rub all through a sieve; then put +a pound of fine butter into the mortar, which must be well cleansed from +the herbs, add the herbs, with two tablespoonfuls of oil and one of +tarragon vinegar, mix perfectly, and if not of a fine green, add the +juice of some pounded spinach. + +This is the celebrated "_beurre de Montpellier_" sold in Paris in tiny +jars at a high price. Ravigotte is the same thing, only in place of the +eggs, anchovies, pickles, and capers, put half a pound more butter; it +is good, but less piquant. + +Pack in a jar, and keep cool. This butter is excellent for many +purposes. For salad, beaten with oil, vinegar, and yolks of eggs, as for +mayonnaise, it makes a delicious dressing. For cold meat or fish it is +excellent, and also for chops. + +Two or three other articles serve to simplify the art of cooking in its +especially difficult branches, and in the branches a lady finds +difficult to attend to herself without remaining in the kitchen until +the last minute before dinner; but with the aid of blanc and roux a +fairly intelligent girl can make excellent sauces. + +For roux melt slowly half a pound of butter over the fire, skim it, let +it settle, then dredge in eight ounces of fine flour, stir it till it is +of a bright brown, then put away in a jar for use. + +Blanc is the same thing, only it is not allowed to brown; it should be +stirred only enough to make all hot through, then put away in a jar. + +If you need thickening for a white sauce and do not wish to stand over +it yourself, having taught your cook the simple fact that a piece of +blanc put into the milk _before it boils_ (or it will harden instead of +melt) and allowed to dissolve, stirring constantly, will make the sauce +you wish, she will be able at all times to produce a white sauce that +you need not be ashamed of. When the sauce is nearly ready to serve, +stir in a good piece of butter--a large spoonful to half a pint; when +mixed, the sauce is ready. Brown sauce can always be made by taking a +cup of broth or soup and dissolving in the same way a piece of the roux; +and also, if desired, a piece of Montpellier butter. If there is no soup +of course you make it with a piece of glaze. + +Brown flour is also a convenient thing to have ready; it is simply +cooking flour in the oven until it is a _pale_ brown; if it is allowed +to get dark it will be bitter, and, that it may brown evenly, it +requires to be laid on a large flat baking pan and stirred often. Useful +for thickening stews, hash, etc. + + + + +CHAPTER V. + +LUNCHEON. + + +LUNCHEON is usually, in this country, either a forlorn meal of cold meat +or hash, or else a sort of early dinner, both of which are a mistake. If +it is veritably _luncheon_, and not early dinner, it should be as unlike +that later meal as possible for variety's sake, and, in any but very +small families, there are so many dishes more suitable for luncheon than +any other meal, that it is easy to have great variety with very little +trouble. + +I wish it were more the fashion here to have many of the cold dishes +which are popular on the other side the Atlantic; and, in spite of the +fact that table prejudices are very difficult to get over, I will append +a few recipes in the hope that some lady, more progressive than +prejudiced, may give them a trial, convinced that their excellence, +appearance, and convenience will win them favor. + +By having most dishes cold at luncheon, it makes it a distinct meal from +the hot breakfast and dinner. In summer, the cold food and a salad is +especially refreshing; in winter, a nice hot soup or puree--thick soup +is preferable at luncheon to clear, which is well fitted to precede a +heavy meal--and some savory _entree_ are very desirable, while cold +raised pie, galantine, jellied fish, and potted meats may ever, at that +season, find their appropriate place on the luncheon table. The +potatoes, which are the only vegetable introduced at strict lunch, +should be prepared in some fancy manner, as croquettes, mashed and +browned, _a la maitre d'hotel_, or in snow. The latter mode is pretty +and novel; I will, therefore, include it in my recipes for luncheon +dishes. Omelets, too, are excellent at luncheon. + +In these remarks I am thinking especially of large families, whose +luncheon table might be provided with a dish of galantine, one of +collared fish, and a meat pie, besides the steak, cutlets, or +warmed-over meat, without anything going to waste. In winter most cold +jellied articles will keep a fortnight, and in summer three or four +days. + +WINDSOR PIE.--Take slices of veal cutlet, half an inch thick, and very +thin slices of lean boiled ham; put at the bottom of one of these +veal-pie dishes or "bakers," about two to three inches deep, a layer of +the veal, seasoned, then one of ham, then one of force-meat, made as +follows: Take a little veal, or if you have sausage-meat ready-made, it +will do, as much fine dry bread-crumbs, a dessert-spoonful of _finely_ +chopped parsley, in which is a salt-spoonful of powdered thyme, savory, +and marjoram, if you have them, with salt and pepper, and mix with +enough butter to make it a crumbling paste; lay a _thin_ layer of this +on the ham, then another of veal, then ham and force-meat again, until +the dish is quite full. Lay something flat upon it, and then a weight +for an hour. You must have prepared, from bones and scraps of veal, +about a pint of stiff veal jelly; pour this over the meat, and then take +strips of rich puff paste (the _brioche_ paste would be excellent in hot +weather), wet the edge of the dish, and lay the strips round, pressing +them lightly to the dish; roll the cover a little larger than the top +of the dish, and lay it on, first wetting the surface, _not the edge_, +of the strips round the lips of the dish; press the two together, then +make a hole in the center and ornament as you please; but I never +ornament the _edge_ of a pie, as it is apt to prevent the paste from +rising. An appropriate and simple ornament for meat pies is to roll a +piece of paste very thin, cut it in four diamond-shaped pieces, put one +point of each to the hole in the center so that you have one on each +end, and one each side, then roll another little piece of paste as thin +as possible, flour it and double it, then double it again, bring all the +corners together in your hand, like a little bundle, then with a sharp +knife give a quick cut over the top of the ball of paste, cutting quite +deeply, then another across; if your cut has been clean and quick, you +will now be able to turn half back the leaves of paste as if it were a +half-blown rose. The ends which you have gathered together in your hand +are to be inserted in the hole in the center of the pie. Then brush over +with yolk of egg beaten very well in a little milk or water, and bake an +hour and a half. + +This way of covering and ornamenting a pie is appropriate for all meat +pies; pigeon pie should, however, have the little red feet skinned by +dipping in boiling water, then rubbed in a cloth, when skin and nails +peel off; if allowed to lie in the water, the flesh comes too; then one +pair is put at each end of the pie, a hole being cut to insert them, or +four are put in the center instead of the rose. + +The Windsor pie is intended to be eaten cold, as are all veal and ham +pies, the beauty of the jelly being lost in a hot pie. Do not fail to +try it on that account, for cold pies are excellent things. + +ANOTHER VEAL AND HAM PIE, more usual, and probably the "weal and hammer" +that "mellered the organ" of Silas Wegg, was manufactured by Mrs. Boffin +from this recipe; it is as follows: + +Take the thick part of breast of veal, removing all the bones, which put +on for gravy, stewing them long and slowly; put a layer of veal, pepper +and salt, then a thin sprinkling of ham; if boiled, cut in slices; if +raw, cut a slice in dice, which scald before using, then more veal and +again ham. If force-meat balls are liked, make some force-meat as for +Windsor pie, using if you prefer it chopped hard-boiled eggs in place of +chopped meat, and binding into a paste with a raw egg; then make into +balls, which drop into the crevices of the pie; boil two or three eggs +quite hard, cut each in four and lay them round the sides and over the +top, pour in about a gill of gravy, and cover the same as the Windsor +pie. In either of these pies the force-meat may be left out, a +sweetbread cut up, or mushrooms put in. + +A chicken pie to eat cold is very fine made in this way. + +RAISED PORK PIES are so familiar to every one who has visited England, +and, in spite of the greasy idea, are so very good, that I introduce a +well-tried recipe, feeling sure any one who eats pork at all will find +it worth while to give them a trial; they will follow it with many +another. + +The paste for them is made as follows: + +Rub into two pounds of flour a liberal half pound of butter, then melt +in half a pint of hot, but not boiling milk, another half pound--or it +may be lard; pour this into the flour, and knead it into a smooth, firm +paste. Properly raised pies should be molded by hand, and I will +endeavor to describe the method in case any persevering lady would like +to try and have the orthodox thing. But pie molds of tin, opening at +the side, are to be bought, and save much trouble; the mold, if used, +should be well buttered, and the pie taken out when done, and returned +to the oven for the sides to brown. + +To "raise" a pie, proceed thus: While the paste is warm, form a ball of +paste into a cone; then with the fist work inside it, till it forms an +oval cup; continue to knead till you have the walls of an even +thickness, then pinch a fold all around the bottom. If properly done, +you have an oval, flat-bottomed crust, with sides about two inches high; +fill this with pork, fat and lean together, well peppered and salted; +then work an oval cover, as near the size of the bottom cover as you +can, and wet the edges of the wall, lay the cover on, and pinch to match +the bottom; ornament as directed for Windsor pie, wash with egg, and +bake a pale brown in a moderate oven; they must be well cooked, or the +meat will not be good. One containing a pound of meat may be cooked an +hour and a quarter. All these pies are served in slices, cut through to +the bottom. + +Galantines are very handsome dishes, not very difficult to make, and +generally popular. I give a recipe for a very simple and delicious one: + +Take a fine breast of veal, remove all gristle, tendons, bones, and trim +to fifteen inches in length and eight wide; use the trimmings and bones +to help make the jelly, then put on the meat a layer of force-meat made +thus: Take one pound of sausage meat, or lean veal, to which add half a +pound of bread-crumbs, parsley and thyme to taste; grate a _little_ +nutmeg, pepper, salt, and the juice of half a lemon; have also some long +strips an inch thick of fat bacon or pork, and lean of veal, and lean +ham, well seasoned with pepper, salt, and finely chopped shallots. Lay +on the meat a layer of force-meat an inch thick, leaving an inch and a +half on each side uncovered; then lay on your strips of ham, veal, and +bacon fat, alternately; then another of force-meat, but only half an +inch thick, as too much force-meat will spoil the appearance of the +dish; if you have any cold tongue, lay some strips in, also a few +blanched pistachio nuts (to be obtained of a confectioner) will give the +appearance of true French galantine. Roll up the veal, and sew it with a +packing or coarse needle and fine twine, tie it firmly up in a piece of +linen. Observe that you do not put your pistachio nuts amid the +force-meat, where, being green, their appearance would be lost; put them +in crevices of the meats. + +Cook this in sufficient water to cover, in which you must have the +trimmings of the breast and a knuckle of veal, or hock of pork, two +onions, a carrot, half a head of celery, two cloves, a blade of mace, +and a good bunch of parsley, thyme and bay leaf, two ounces of salt. Set +the pot on the fire till it is at boiling point, then draw it to the +back and let it simmer three hours, skimming carefully; then take it +from the fire, leaving it in the stock till nearly cold; then take it +out, remove the string from the napkin, and roll the galantine up +tighter--if too tight at first it will be hard--tying the napkin at each +end only; then place it on a dish, set another dish on it, on which +place a fourteen-pound weight; this will cause it to cut firm. When +quite cold, remove strings and cloth, and it is ready to be ornamented +with jelly. When the stock in which the galantine was cooked is cold +take off the fat and clarify it, first trying, however, if it is in +right condition, by putting a little on ice. If it is not stiff enough +to cut firm, you must reduce it by boiling; if too stiff, that is +approaching glaze, add a _little_ water, then clarify by adding whites +of eggs, as directed to clarify soup (see soups). A glass of sherry and +two spoonfuls of tarragon or common vinegar are a great improvement. +Some people like this jelly cut in dice, to ornament the galantine, part +of it may then also serve to ornament other dishes at the table. But I +prefer to have the galantine enveloped in jelly, which may be done by +putting it in an oblong soup tureen or other vessel that will contain +it, leaving an inch space all round, then pouring the jelly over it. + +Jellied fish is a favorite dish with many, and is very simple to +prepare; it is also very ornamental. Take flounders or almost any flat +fish that is cheapest at the time you require them. Clean and scrape +them, cut them in small pieces, but do not cut off the fins; put them in +a stew-pan with a few small button onions or one large one, a half +teaspoonful of sugar, a glass of sherry, a dessert-spoonful of lemon +juice, and a small bunch of parsley. To one large flounder put a quart +of water, and if you are going to jelly oysters put in their liquor and +a little salt. Stew long and slowly, skimming well; then strain, and if +not perfectly clear clarify as elsewhere directed. (See if your stock +jellies, by trying it on ice before you clarify.) Now take a mold, put +in it pieces of cold salmon, eels that have been cooked, or oysters, the +latter only just cooked enough in the stock to plump them; pour a little +of the jelly in the mold, then three or four half slices of lemon, then +oysters or the cold fish, until the mold is near full, disposing the +lemon so that it will be near the sides and decorate the jelly; then +pour the rest of the jelly over all and stand in boiling water for a few +minutes, then put it in a cold place, on ice is best, for some hours. +When about to serve, dip the mold in hot water, turn out on a dish, +garnish with lettuce leaves or parsley and hard-boiled eggs. The latter +may be introduced into the jelly cut in quarters if it is desired; very +ornamental force-meat balls made bright green with spinach juice are +also an improvement in appearance. + +A NEW MAYONNAISE (Soyer's).--Put a quarter of a pint of stiff veal jelly +(that has been nicely flavored with vegetables) on ice in a bowl, +whisking it till it is a white froth; then add half a pint of salad oil +and six spoonfuls of tarragon vinegar, _by degrees_, first oil, then +vinegar, continually whisking till it forms a white, smooth, sauce-like +cream; season with half a teaspoonful of salt, a quarter ditto of white +pepper, and a very little sugar, whisk it a little more and it is ready. +It should be dressed pyramidically over the article it is served with. +The advantage of this sauce is that (although more delicate than any +other) you may dress it to any height you like, and it will remain so +any length of time; if the temperature is cool, it will remain hours +without appearing greasy or melting. It is absolutely necessary, +however, that it should be prepared on ice. + +All these dishes, however, are only adapted for large families, but +there are several ways of improving on the ordinary lunch table of very +small ones. And nothing is more pleasant for the mistress of one of +these very small families than to have a friend drop in to lunch, and +have a _recherche_ lunch to offer with little trouble. Warming over will +aid her in this, and to that chapter I refer her; but there are one or +two ways of having cold relishes always ready, which help out an +impromptu meal wonderfully. + +Potted meats are a great resource to English housekeepers; this side +the Atlantic they are chiefly known through the medium of Cross & +Blackwell, though latterly one or two American firms have introduced +some very admirable articles of the sort. Home-made potted meats are, +however, better and less expensive than those bought; they should be +packed away in jars, Liebig's extract of meat jars not being too small +for the purpose, as, while covered with the fat they keep well; once +opened, they require eating within a week or ten days, except in very +cold weather. + +Potted bloater is one of the least expensive and appetizing of all +potted meats. To make it, take two or three or more bloaters, cut off +the heads and cleanse them, put them in the oven long enough to cook +them through; take them out, take off the skin, and remove the meat from +the bones carefully; put the meat of the fish in a jar with half its +weight of butter, leave it to _slowly_ cook in a cool oven for an hour, +then take it out, put the fish into a mortar or strong dish, pour the +butter on it carefully, but don't let the gravy pass too, unless the +fish is to be eaten very quickly, as it would prevent it keeping. Beat +both butter and fish till they form a paste, add a little cayenne, and +press it into small pots, pouring on each melted butter, or mutton suet. +Either should be the third of an inch thick on the bloater. This makes +excellent sandwiches. + +POTTED HAM.--Take any remains of ham you have, even fried, if of a nice +quality, is good for the purpose; take away all stringy parts, sinew, or +gristle, put it in a slow oven with its weight of butter, let it stay +macerating in the butter till very tender, then beat it in a mortar, add +cayenne, and pack in pots in the same way as the bloater. Thus you may +pot odds and ends of any meat or fish you have, and as a little potted +meat goes a long way, when you have a little lobster, a bit of chicken +breast, or even cold veal, I advise you to use it in this way; you will +then have a little stock of dainties in the house to fall back on at any +time for unexpected calls--a very important thing in the country. + +Potted chicken or veal requires either a little tongue or lean ham to +give flavor; but failing these, a little ravigotte butter, beaten in +after the meat is well pounded, is by no means a bad substitute. + +Many people like the flavor of anchovies, but do not like the idea of +eating raw fish; for these anchovy butter is very acceptable. + +Take the anchovies out of the liquor in which they are packed, but do +not wash them, put them in twice their weight of butter in a jar, which +stand in boiling water; set all back of the stove for an hour, then +pound, add cayenne, and pack in glasses. + +Unexpected company to luncheon with a lady who has to eat that meal +alone generally, and (as is the unwise way of such ladies) makes it a +very slender meal, is one of the ordeals of a young housekeeper; company +to lunch and nothing in the house. But there is generally a dainty +luncheon in every house if you know how to prepare it; there certainly +always will be if you keep your store-room supplied with the things I +have named. Let the table be prettily laid at all times, then if you +have potted meat and preserves, have them put on the table. Are there +cold potatoes? If so cut them up into potato salad, if they are whole; +if broken, warm them in a wineglass of milk, a teaspoonful of flour, +and a piece as large as an egg of _maitre d'hotel_ butter. Have you +such scraps of cold meat as could not come to table? Toss them up with a +half cup of water, a slice of glaze (oh, blessed ever-ready glaze!) a +teaspoonful of ravigotte, or _maitre d'hotel_, and a teaspoonful of roux +or blanc, according as your meat is light or dark, season, and serve. Or +you have no meat, then you have eggs, and what better than an omelet and +such an omelet as the following? Take the crumb of a slice of bread, +soak it in hot milk (cold will do, but hot is better), beat up whites of +four eggs to a high froth; mix the bread with all the milk it will +absorb, _no more_, into a paste, add the yolks of eggs with a little +salt, set the pan on the fire with an ounce of butter. Let it get very +hot, then mix the whites of eggs with the yolks and bread lightly, pour +in the pan, and move about for a minute; if the oven is hot, when the +omelet is brown underneath, set the pan in the oven for five minutes, or +until the top is set; then double half over, and serve. If your guests +have a liking for sweets, and your potted meats supply the savory part +of your luncheon, then have a brown gravy ready to serve with it. Put +into a half cup of boiling water a slice of glaze, a spoonful of roux, +and enough Harvey sauce, or mushroom powder, to flavor. If your omelet +is to be sweet, before you fold it put in a layer of preserves. + +The advantage of the omelet I have here given is that it keeps plump and +tender till cold, so that five minutes of waiting does not turn it into +leather, the great objection with omelets generally. + +Potatoes for luncheon, as I have said, should always be prepared in some +fancy way, and snow is a very pretty one. Have some fine mealy potatoes +boiled, carefully poured off, and set back of the stove with a cloth +over them till they are quite dry and fall apart; then have a colander, +or coarse wire sieve made _hot_ and a _hot_ dish in which to serve them, +pass the floury potatoes through the sieve, taking care not to crush the +snow as it falls. You require a large dish heaping full, and be +careful it is kept hot. + +This mode of preparing potatoes, although very pretty and novel, must +never be attempted with any but the whitest and mealiest kind. + +The remains of cold potatoes may be prepared thus: Put three ounces of +butter in a frying-pan in which fry three onions sliced till tender, but +not very brown, then put on the potatoes cut in slices, and shake them +till they are of a nice brown color, put a spoonful of chopped parsley, +salt, pepper, and juice of a lemon, shake well that all may mix +together, dish, and serve very hot. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +A CHAPTER ON GENERAL MANAGEMENT IN VERY SMALL FAMILIES. + + +A VERY small family, "a young _menage_," for instance, is very much more +difficult to cater for without waste than a larger one; two people are +so apt to get tired of anything, be it ever so good eating, when it has +been on the table once or twice; therefore it would be useless to make +galantine or the large pies I have indicated, except for occasions when +guests are expected; but, as I hope to aid young housekeepers to have +nice dishes when alone, I will devote this chapter to their needs. + +The chapter on "Warming Over" will be very useful also to this large +class. + +In the first place it is well to have regard, when part of a dish leaves +the table, as to whether it, or any particular part of it, will make a +nice little cold dish, or a _rechauffe_; in that case have it saved, +unless it is required for the servants' dinner (it is well to manage so +that it is not needed for that purpose); for instance, if there is the +wing and a slice or two of the breast of a chicken left, it will make a +dainty little breakfast dish, or cold, in jelly, be nice for lunch. +There is always jelly if you have roast chicken, if you manage properly, +and this is how you do it: + +Carefully save the feet, throat, gizzard, and liver of your chickens; +scald the feet by pouring boiling water over them; leave them just a +minute, and pull off the outer skin and nails; they come away very +readily, leaving the feet delicately white; put these with the other +giblets, properly cleansed, into a small saucepan with an onion, a slice +of carrot, a sprig of parsley, and a pint of water (if you have the +giblets of one chicken), if of two, put a quart; let this _slowly_ +simmer for two hours and a half; it will be reduced to about half, and +form a stiff jelly when cold; a glass of sherry, and squeeze of lemon, +or teaspoonful of tarragon vinegar, makes this into a delicious aspic, +and should be added if to be eaten cold. The jelly must of course be +strained. + +In roasting chickens, if you follow the rule for meat, that is, put no +water in the pan, but a piece of butter, and dredge a _very little_ +flour over the chicken, you will have a nice brown glaze at the bottom +of the pan, provided it has been cooked in a _quick oven_; if in a cool +oven there will be nothing brown at all; but we will suppose the bird is +browned to a turn; pour your gravy from the giblets into the pan, take +off every bit of the glaze or osma-zone that adheres, and let it +dissolve, rubbing it with the back of the spoon; then, if you are likely +to have any chicken left cold, pour off a little gravy in a cup through +a fine strainer, leaving in your pan sufficient for the dinner; in this +mash up the liver till it is a smooth paste which thickens the gravy, +and serve. Some object to liver, therefore the use of it is a matter of +taste. If you dress the chickens English fashion, you will _need_ the +liver and gizzard to tuck under the wings; in this case, stew only the +feet and throat, using a little meat of any kind, if you have it, to +take their place; but on no account fail to use the feet, as they are as +rich in jelly as calves' feet in proportion to their size. + +The jelly laid aside will be enough to ornament and give relish to a +little dish of cold chicken, and changes it from a dry and commonplace +thing to a _recherche_ one. If two chickens are cooked it is more +economical than one; there is, then, double the amount of gravy, +generally sufficient, if you lay some very nice pieces of cold chicken +in a bowl, to pour over it and leave it enveloped in jelly; you still +then, if from dinner for two people, have perhaps joints enough to make +a dish of curry or fricassee, or any of the many ways in which cold +chicken may be used, for which see chapter on "_Warming Over_." + +For small households large joints are to be avoided, but even a small +roast is a large joint when there are but two or three to eat it. For +this reason it is a good plan to buy such joints as divide well. A +sirloin of beef is better made into two fine dishes than into one roast, +and then warmed over twice. Every one knows that "_Filet de b[oe]uf +Chateaubriand_" is one of the classical dishes of the French table, that +to a Frenchman luxury can go no further; but every one does not know how +entirely within his power it is to have that dish as often as he has +roast beef; how convenient it would be to so have it. Here it is: When +your sirloin roast comes from the butcher, take out the tenderloin or +fillets, which you must always choose thick; cut it across into steaks +an inch thick, trim them, cover them with a coat of butter (or oil, +which is much better), and broil them ten minutes, turning them often; +garnish with fried potatoes, and serve with _sauce Chateaubriand_, as +follows: Put a gill of white wine (or claret will do if you have no +white) into a saucepan, with a piece of glaze, weighing an ounce and a +half; add three quarters of a pint of _espagnole_, and simmer fifteen +minutes; when ready to serve, thicken with two ounces of _maitre +d'hotel_ butter in which a dessert-spoonful of flour has been worked. +That is how Jules Gouffe's recipe runs; but, as no small family will +keep _espagnole_ ready made, allow a little more glaze (of course the +recipe as given may be divided to half or quarter, provided the correct +proportions are retained), and use a tablespoonful of roux and the +_maitre d'hotel_ butter, both of which you have probably in your +store-room; if not, brown a little flour, chop some parsley, and add to +two ounces of butter; work them together, then let them dissolve in the +sauce, for which purpose let it go off the boil; let the sauce simmer a +minute, skim, and serve. + +The sirloin of beef, denuded of its fillet, is still a good roast; and +as you can't have your cake and eat it too, and hot fresh roast beef is +better than the same warmed over, warm ye never so wisely, I think this +plan may commend itself to those who like nice _little_ dinners. + +A nice little dinner of a soup, an _entree_, or made dish, salad, and +dessert, really costs no more than frequent roast meat, or even steak +and pudding, by following some such plan as this: + +Sunday.--_Pot-au-feu_ and roast lamb, leg of mutton or other good joint, +etc. + +Monday.--Rice or vermicelli soup made with remains of the _bouillon_ +from _pot-au-feu_. If the Sunday joint was a fore or hindquarter of lamb +it should have been divided, say the leg from the loin, thus providing +choice roasts for two days, and yet having enough cold lamb--that +favorite dish with so many--for luncheon with a salad; and, surprising +to say, after hot roast lamb for dinner Sunday, cold lunch for Monday, +another roast Monday, and cold or warmed up for lunch Tuesday, there +will still be (supposing as I do, in preparing this chapter, that the +family consists only of gentleman, lady, and servant) remains enough +from the two cold joints to make cromesquis of lamb (see recipe), a +little dish of mince, or a delicate _saute_ of lamb for breakfast. It is +surprising what may be done with odds and ends in a small family; a tiny +plate of pieces, far too small to make an appearance on the table, and +which, if special directions are not given, will seem to Bridget not +worth saving, will, with each piece dipped into the batter _a la +Careme_, and fried in hot fat, make a tempting dish for breakfast, or an +_entree_ for dinner or luncheon. Two tablespoonfuls only of chopped meat +of any kind will make croquettes for two or three people; hence, 'save +the pieces.' But to return to our bills of fare: I have given the two +roasts of lamb for consecutive days, because the weather in lamb season +is usually too warm to keep it; when this can be done, however, it is +pleasanter to leave the second joint of lamb till Tuesday. Should a +forequarter (abroad held in greater esteem than the hindquarter) have +been chosen, get the butcher to take out the shoulder in one round thick +joint, English fashion; this crisply roasted is far more delicious than +the leg; you then have the chops to be breaded, and an excellent dish of +the neck and breast, either broiled, curried, stewed with peas, or +roast. + +Yet how often we see a whole quarter of lamb put in the oven for two or +three people who get tired of the sight of it cold, yet feel in economy +bound to eat it. + +Should sirloin of beef have been the Sunday dinner, you will know what +to do with it, from directions already given; and as a sirloin of beef, +even with the fillet out, will be more than required for one dinner, it +may serve for a third day, dressed in one of the various ways I shall +give in chapter on "Warming Over." You have still at your disposal the +bouilli or beef from which you have made your _pot-au-feu_, which, if it +has been carefully boiled, not galloped, nor allowed to fall to rags, is +very good eating. Cut thin with lettuce, or in winter celery, in about +equal quantities, and a good salad dressing, it is excellent; or, made +into hash, fritadella, or even rissoles, is savory and delicious; only +bear in mind with this, as all cooked meats, the gravy drawn out must be +replaced by stock or glaze; it is very easy to warm over bouilli +satisfactorily, as a cup of the soup made from it can always be kept for +gravy. + +A leg of mutton makes two excellent joints, and is seldom liked cold--as +beef and lamb often are. + +Select a large fine leg, have it cut across, that each part may weigh +about equally; roast the thick or fillet end and serve with or without +onion sauce (_a la soubise_); boil the knuckle in a small quantity of +water, just enough to cover it, with a carrot, turnip, onion, and bunch +of parsley, and salt in the water, serve with caper sauce and mashed +turnips. The broth from this is excellent soup served thus: Skim it +carefully, take out the vegetables, and chop a small quantity of parsley +very fine, then beat up in a bowl two eggs, pour into them a little of +the broth--not boiling--beating all the time, then draw your soup back +till it is off the boil, and pour in the eggs, stirring continually till +it is on the boiling point again (but it must not boil, or the eggs will +curdle and spoil the soup), and then turn it into a _hot_ tureen and +serve. Use remains of the cold roast and boiled mutton together, to make +made dishes; between the days of having the roast and boiled mutton you +may have had a fowl, and the remains from that will make you a second +dish to go with your joint. + +The remains from the first cooked mutton, in form of curry, mince, +salmi, or _saute_, will be a second dish with your fowl. + +Veal is one of the most convenient things to have for a small family, as +it warms over in a variety of ways, and in some is actually better than +when put on the table as a joint. By having a little fish one day, +instead of soup, and a little game another, and remembering when you +have an especially dainty thing, to have one with it a little more +substantial and less costly, you may have variety at little expense. + +For instance, if you find it convenient to have for dinner fritadella +(see "_Warming Over_") or miroton of beef, or cold mutton curried, you +might have broiled birds, or roast pigeon, or game. In this consists +good management, to live so that the expenses of one day balance those +of the other--unless you are so happily situated that expense is a small +matter, in which case these remarks will not apply to you at all. Then, +never mind warming over, or making one joint into two; let your poor +neighbors and Bridget's friends enjoy your superfluity. To the woman +with a moderate income it usually is a matter of importance, or ought to +be, that her weekly expenditure should not exceed a certain amount, and +for this she must arrange that any extra expense is balanced by a +subsequent economy. + +Salads add much to the health and elegance of a dinner; it is in early +spring an expensive item if lettuce is used; but no salad can be more +delicious or more healthful than dressed celery; and by buying when +cheap, arranging with a man to lay in your cellar, covered with soil, +enough for the winter's use, it need cost but moderately. Celeriac, or +turnip-rooted celery is another salad that is very popular with our +German friends; it is a bulbous celery, the root being the part eaten; +these are cooked like potatoes, cut in slices, and dressed with oil and +vinegar, or mayonnaise, it is exceedingly good. Potato salad is always +procurable, and in summer at lunch, instead of the hot vegetable, or in +winter when green salad is dear, is very valuable. It may be varied by +the addition, one day, of a few chopped pickles, another, a little +onion, or celery, or parsley, or tarragon, a little ravigotte butter +beaten to cream with the vinegar, or with meat, as follows: Boil the +potatoes in their skins, peel them, cut them into pieces twice the +thickness of a fifty-cent piece, and put them into a salad bowl with +cold meat (bouilli from soup is excellent); put to them a teaspoonful of +salt, half that quantity of pepper, two tablespoonfuls of vinegar, three +or even four of oil, and a teaspoonful of chopped parsley. You can vary +this by putting at different times some chopped celery or pickles, +olives, or anchovies. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +ON FRYING AND BROILING. + + +FRYING is one of the operations in cookery in which there are more +failures than any other, or, at least, there appear to be more, because +the failure is always so very apparent. Nothing can make a dish of +breaded cutlets on which are bald white spots look inviting, or +livid-looking fish, just flaked here and there with the bread that has +been persuaded to stay on. And, provided you have enough fat in the +pan--there should always be enough to immerse the article; therefore use +a deep iron or enameled pan--there can be but two reasons why you fail. +Your fat has not been hot enough, or your crumbs have not been fine and +_even_. + +Many suppose when the fat bubbles and boils in the pan that it is quite +hot; it is far from being so. Others again are so much nearer the truth +that they know it must become _silent_, that is, boil and cease to boil, +before it is ready, but even that is not enough; it must be silent some +time, smoke, and appear to be on the point of burning, then drop a bit +of bread in; if it crisps and takes color directly, quickly put in your +articles. + +These articles, whether cutlets or fish, must have been carefully +prepared, or herein may lie the second cause of failure. Any cookery +book will give you directions how to crumb, follow them; but what some +do not tell you is, that your bread-crumbs should be _finely sifted_; +every coarse crumb is liable to drop off and bring with it a good deal +of the surrounding surface. + +I also follow the French plan in using the egg, and mix with it oil and +water in the proportion of three eggs, one tablespoonful of oil, one of +water, and a little salt, beat together and use. It is a good plan to +keep a supply of _panure_ or dried bread-crumbs always ready. Cut any +slices of baker's bread, dry them in a cool oven so that they remain +quite colorless, or they will not do for the purpose. When as dry as +crackers, crush under a rolling-pin, and sift; keep in a jar for use. + +In no branch of cooking is excellence more appreciated than in that of +frying. A dish of _filets de sole_ or cutlets, crisp and golden brown, +is an ornament to any table, and is seldom disdained by any one. Apropos +of _filets de sole_; it is very high-sounding yet very attainable, as I +shall show. I was staying with a friend early in spring, a lady always +anxious for table novelties. "Oh, do tell me what fish to order, I +should like something fried, now that you are here to tell cook how to +do it; she hasn't the wildest idea, although she would be astounded to +hear me say so." "Have you ever had flounders?" I asked. "Flounders!" My +friend's pretty nose went up the eighth of an inch, and her confidence +in my powers as counselor went down to zero. "Flounders! but they are a +very common fish you know." "I know they are very delicious," I +answered. "Order them, and trust me; but I must coax the autocrat of +your kitchen to allow me to cook and prepare them myself." + +An hour before dinner I went into the kitchen, put at least a pound of +lard into a deep frying-pan, and set it where it would get gradually +hot, then I turned my attention to the fish; they were thick, firm +flounders, and were ready cleaned, scraped, and the heads off. I then +proceeded to bone one in the following way: Take a sharp knife and split +the flounder right down the middle of the back, then run the knife +carefully between the flesh and bones going toward the edge. You have +now detached one quarter of the flesh from the bone, do the other half +in the same way, and when the back is thus entirely loose from the bone, +turn the fish over and do the same with the other part. You will now +find you can remove the bone whole from the fish, detaching, as you do +so, any flesh still retaining the bone, then you have two halves of the +fish; cut away the fins, and you have four quarters of solid fish. Now +see if the fat is very hot, set it forward while you wipe your fish dry, +and dip each piece in milk, then in flour. Try if the fat is hot by +dropping a crumb into it; if it browns at once, put in the fish. When +they are beautifully brown, which will be in about ten minutes, take +them up in the colander, and then lay them on a towel to absorb any fat, +lay them on a hot dish, and garnish with slices of lemon and parsley or +celery tops. + +Now when this dish made its appearance, my friend's husband, a _bon +vivant_, greeted it with, "Aha! _Filets de sole a la Delmonico_," and as +nothing to the contrary was said until dinner was over, he ate them +under the impression that they were veritable _filets de sole_. Of +course I can't pretend to say whether M. Delmonico imports his soles, or +uses the homely flounder; but I do know that one of his frequenters knew +no difference. + +Oysters should be laid on a cloth to drain thoroughly, then rolled in +fine sifted cracker dust, and dropped into very hot fat; do not put more +oysters in the pan than will fry without one overlapping the other. +Very few minutes will brown them beautifully, if your fat was hot +enough, and as a minute too long toughens and shrinks them, be very +careful that it browns a cube of bread almost directly, before you begin +the oysters. Egg and bread-crumb may be used instead of cracker dust, +but it is not the proper thing, and is a great deal more trouble. Should +you be desirous of using it, however, the oysters must be carefully +wiped _dry_ before dipping them; while for cracker dust they are not +wiped, but only drained well. + +Fish of any kind, fried in batter _a la Careme_ (see recipe), is very +easy to do, and very nice. + +Carefully save veal, lamb, beef, and pork drippings. Keep a crock to put +it in, and, clarified as I shall direct, it is much better than lard for +many purposes, and for frying especially; it does not leave the dark +look that is sometimes seen on articles fried in lard. The perfection of +"friture," or frying-fat, according to Gouffe, is equal parts of lard +and beef fat melted together. + +Yet there are families where dripping is never used--is looked upon as +unfit to use--while the truth is that many persons quite unable to eat +articles fried in lard would find no inconvenience from those fried in +beef fat. It is as wholesome as butter, and far better for the purpose. +Butter, indeed, is only good for frying such things as omelets or +scrambled eggs; things that are cooked in a very short time, and require +no great degree of heat. + +The same may be said of oil, than which, for fish, nothing can be +better. Yet it can only be used once, and is unsuitable for things +requiring long-sustained heat, as it soon gets bitter and rank. + +Do not be afraid to put a pound or two of fat in your pan for frying; it +is quite as economical as to put less for it can be used over and over +again, a pail or crock being kept for the purpose of receiving it. +Always in returning it to the crock pour it through a fine strainer, so +that no sediment or brown particles may pass which would spoil the next +frying. + +To clarify dripping, when poured from the meat-pan, it should go into a +bowl, instead of the crock in which you wish to keep it. Then pour into +the bowl also some boiling water, and add a little salt, stir it, and +set it away. Next day, or when cold, run a knife round the bowl, and +(unless it is pork) it will turn out in a solid cake, leaving the water +and impurities at the bottom. Now scrape the bottom of your dripping, +and put it in more boiling water till it melts, then stir again, another +pinch of salt add, and let it cool again. When you take off the cake of +fat, scrape it as before, and it is ready to be melted into the general +crock, and will now keep for months in cool weather. If you are having +frequent joints it is as well to do all your dripping together, once a +week; but do not leave it long at any season with water under it, as +that would taint it. Fat skimmed from boiled meat, _pot-au-feu_, before +the vegetables, etc., go in, is quite as good as that from roast, +treated in the same way. + +Frying in batter is very easy and excellent for some things, such as +warming over meat, being far better than eggs and crumbs. Careme gives +the following recipe, which is excellent: + +Three quarters of a pound of sifted flour, mixed with two ounces of +butter melted in warm water; blow the butter off the water into the +flour first, then enough of the water to make a _soft_ paste, which +beat smooth, then more warm water till it is batter thick enough to mask +the back of a spoon dipped into it, and salt to taste; add the _last +thing_ the whites of two eggs well beaten. + +Another batter, called _a la Provencale_, is also exceedingly good, +especially for articles a little dry in themselves, such as chickens to +be warmed over, slices of cold veal, etc. + +Take same quantity of flour, two yolks of eggs, four tablespoonfuls of +oil, mix with _cold_ water, and add whites of eggs and salt as before. +Into this batter I sometimes put a little chopped parsley, and the least +bit of powdered thyme, or grated lemon-peel, or nutmeg; this is, +however, only a matter of taste. + +BROILING is the simplest of all forms of cooking, and is essentially +English. To broil well is very easy with a little attention. A brisk +clear fire, not too high in the stove, is necessary to do it with ease; +yet if, as must sometimes happen, to meet the necessities of other +cooking, your fire is very large, carefully fix the gridiron on two +bricks or in any convenient manner, to prevent the meat scorching, then +have the gridiron _very hot_ before putting your meat upon it; turn it, +if chop or steak, as soon as the gravy begins to start on the upper +side; if allowed to remain without turning long, the gravy forms a pool +on the top, which, when turned, falls into the fire and is lost; the +action of the heat, if turned quickly, seals the pores and the gravy +remains in the meat. If the fire is not very clear, put a cover over the +meat on the gridiron, it will prevent its blackening or burning--if the +article is thick I always do so--and it is an especially good plan with +birds or chickens, which are apt to be raw at the joints unless this is +done; indeed, with the latter, I think it a good way to put them in a +hot oven ten minutes before they go on to broil, then have a spoonful of +_maitre d'hotel_ butter to lay on the breast of each. Young spring +chickens are sometimes very dry, in which case dip them in melted +butter, or, better still, oil them all over a little while before +cooking. There is nothing more unsightly than a sprawling dish of +broiled chickens; therefore, in preparing them place them in good form, +then, with a gentle blow of the rolling-pin, break the bones that they +may remain so. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +ROASTING. + + +IN spite of Brillat-Savarin's maxim that one may become a cook, but must +be born a _rotisseur_, I am inclined to think one may also, by +remembering one or two things, become a very good "roaster" (to +translate the untranslatable), especially in our day, when the oven has +taken the place of the spit, although a great deal of meat is spoiled in +roasting; a loin of lamb or piece of beef, that comes to the table so +pale that you can't tell whether it has been boiled or merely wilted in +the oven, is an aggravation so familiar, that a rich brown, well-roasted +joint is generally a surprise. Perhaps the cook will tell you she has +had the "hottest kind of an oven;" but then she has probably also had a +well of water underneath it, the vapor from which, arising all the time, +has effectually soddened the meat, and checked the browning. The surface +of roast meat should be covered with a rich glaze, scientifically called +"osma-zone." That the meat may be thus glazed, it should always go into +a _hot_ oven, so that, as the gravy exudes, it may congeal on the +outside, thus sealing up the pores. The general plan, however, is to put +meat into a warm oven an hour or two earlier than it should go, with a +quantity of water and flour underneath it. The result in hot weather I +have known to be very disagreeable, the tepid oven having, in fact, +given a stale taste to the joint before it began to cook, and it at all +times results in flavorless, tough meat. There is no time saved, either, +in putting the meat in while the oven is yet cool. Heat up the oven till +it is quite brisk, then put the meat in a pan, in which, if it is fat, +you require _no water_; if very lean, you may put half a teacup, just +enough to prevent the pan burning; you may rub a little flour over the +joint or not, as you please, but never more than the surface moisture +absorbs; have no clinging particles of flour upon the joint, neither put +salt nor pepper upon the meat before it goes into the oven; salt draws +out the gravy, which it is your object to keep in, and the flavor of +pepper is entirely changed by the parching it undergoes when on the +surface of the meat, the odor of scorched pepper, while cooking, being +very offensive to refined nostrils. This does not occur when pepper is +not on the surface; for the _inside_ of birds, in stuffing, and in meat +pies it is indispensable, and the flavor undergoes no change. This +remark on pepper applies also to broiling and frying. Always pepper +_after_ the article is cooked, and both for appearance and delicacy of +flavor white pepper should always be used in preference to black. + +Meat, while in the oven, should be carefully turned about so that it may +brown equally, and when it has been in half the time you intend to give +it, or when the upper surface is well browned, turn it over. When it +comes out of the oven put it on a hot dish, then carefully pour off the +fat by holding the corner of the meat pan over your dripping-pan, and +very gently allowing the fat to run off; do not shake it; when you see +the thick brown sediment beginning to run too, check it; if there is +still much fat on the surface, take it off with a spoon; then pour into +the pan a little boiling water and salt, in quantity according to the +quantity of sediment or glaze in the pan, and with a spoon rub off every +speck of the dried gravy on the bottom and sides of the pan. Add no +flour, the gravy must be thick enough with its own richness. If you have +added too much water, so that it looks poor, you may always boil it down +by setting the pan on the stove for a few minutes; but it is better to +put very little water at first, and add as the richness of the gravy +allows. Now you have a rich brown gravy, instead of the thick +whitey-brown broth so often served with roast meat. Every drop of this +gravy and that from the dish should be carefully saved if left over. + +Save all dripping, except from mutton or meat with which onions are +cooked, for purposes which I shall indicate in another place. + +Veal and pork require to be very thoroughly cooked. For them, therefore, +the oven must not be too hot, neither must it be lukewarm, a good even +heat is best; if likely to get too brown before it is thoroughly cooked, +open the oven door. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + +BOILING. + + +BOILING is one of the things about which cooks are most careless; +theoretically they almost always know meat should be slowly boiled, but +their idea of "slow" is ruled by the fire; they never attempt to rule +that. There is a good rule given by Gouffe as to what slow boiling +actually is: the surface of the pot should only show signs of ebullition +at one side, just an occasional bubble. _Simmering_ is a still slower +process, and in this the pot should have only a sizzling round one part +of the edge. All fresh meat should boil _slowly_; ham or corn beef +should barely simmer. Yet they must not go off the boil at all, which +would spoil fresh meat entirely; steeping in water gives a flat, insipid +taste. + +All vegetables except potatoes, asparagus, peas, and cauliflower should +boil as fast as possible; these four only moderately. Most vegetables +are boiled far too long. Cabbage is as delicate as cauliflower in the +summer and fall if boiled in plenty of water, to which a salt spoonful +of soda has been added, _as fast as possible_ for twenty minutes or half +an hour, then drained and dressed. In winter it should be cut in six or +eight pieces, boiled _fast_, in plenty of water, for half an hour, _no +longer_. Always give it plenty of room, let the water boil rapidly when +you put it in the pot, which set on the hottest part of the fire to +come to that point again, and you will have no more strong, rank, yellow +stuff on your table, no bad odor in your house. Peas require no more +than twenty minutes' boiling if young; asparagus the same; the latter +should always be boiled in a saucepan deep enough to let it stand up in +the water when tied up in bunches, for this saves the heads. Potatoes +should be poured off the minute they are done, and allowed to stand at +the back of the stove with a clean cloth folded over them. They are the +only vegetable that should be put into _cold_ water. When new, boiling +water is proper. When quite ripe they are more floury if put in cold +water. + +SOUPS.--As I have before said, I do not pretend to give many recipes, +only to tell you how to succeed with the recipes given in other books. I +shall, therefore, only give one recipe which I know is a novelty and one +for the foundation of all soups. In one sense I have done the latter +already. The stock for glaze is an excellent soup before it is reduced; +but I will also give Jules Gouffe's method of making _pot-au-feu_, it +being a most beautifully clear soup. + +It often happens, however, that you have sufficient stock from bones, +trimmings of meat, and odds and ends of gravies, which may always be +turned to account; but the stock from such a source, although excellent, +will not always be clear; therefore, you must proceed with it in the +following manner, unless you wish to use it for thick soup: + +Make your stock boiling hot and skim well; then have ready the whites of +three eggs (I am supposing you have three quarts of stock--one egg to a +quart), to which add half a pint of cold water; whisk well together; +then add half a pint of the boiling stock gradually, still whisking the +eggs; then stir the boiling stock rapidly, pouring in the whites of +eggs, etc.; as you do it, stir quickly till nearly boiling again, then +take it from the fire, let it remain till the whites of eggs separate; +then strain through a clean, fine cloth into a basin. This rule once +learned will clear every kind of soup or jelly. + +There are many people who are good cooks, yet fail in clear soup, which +is with them semi-opaque, while it should be like sherry. The cause of +this opacity is generally quick boiling while the meat is in. This gives +it a milky appearance. After the stock is once made and clear, quick +boiling will do no harm, but of course wastes the soup, unless resorted +to for the purpose of making it stronger. A word here about coloring +soup: Most persons resort to burnt sugar, and, very carefully used, it +is not at all a bad makeshift. But how often have we a rich-looking soup +put before us, the vermicelli appearing to repose under a lake of strong +russet _bouillon_, but which, on tasting, we find suggestive of nothing +but burnt sugar and salt, every bit of flavor destroyed by the acrid +coloring. Sometimes stock made by the recipe for _pot-au-feu_ (to +follow) requires no color; this depends on the beef; but usually all +soup is more appetizing in appearance for a little browning, and for +this purpose I always use burnt onions in preference to anything else. +If you have none in store when the soup is put on, put a small onion in +the oven (or on the back of the stove; should you be baking anything the +odor would taint); turn it often till it gets quite black, but not +_charred_. Then put it to the soup; it adds a fine flavor as well as +color, and you need not fear overdoing it. + +Soup that is to be reduced must be very lightly salted; for this reason +salt is left out altogether for glaze, as the reduction causes the +water only to evaporate, the salt remains. + +GOUFFE'S POT-AU-FEU.--Four pounds of lean beef, six quarts of water, six +ounces of carrot, six of turnip, six of onion, half an ounce of celery, +one clove, salt. + +Put the meat on in cold water, and just before it comes to the boil skim +it, and throw in a wineglass of cold water, skim again, and, when it is +"on the boil," again throw in another wineglass of cold water; do this +two or three times. The object of adding the cold water is to keep it +just off the boil until all the scum has risen, as the boiling point is +when it comes to the surface, yet once having boiled, the scum is broken +up, and the soup is never so clear. + +The meat must simmer slowly, _not boil_, for three hours before the +vegetables are added, then for a couple of hours more. + +It is necessary to be very exact in the proportions of vegetables; but, +of course, after having weighed them for soups once or twice, you will +get to know about the size of a carrot, turnip, etc., that will weigh +six ounces. The exact weight is given until the eye is accustomed to it. + +This soup strained, and boiled down to one half, becomes _consomme_. + +CELERY CREAM is a most delicious and little-known white soup, and all +lovers of good things will thank me for introducing it. + +Have some nice veal stock, or the water in which chickens have been +boiled, reduced till it is rich enough, will do, or some very rich +mutton broth, but either of the former are preferable; then put on a +half cup of rice in a pint of rich milk, and grate into it the white +part and root of two heads of celery. Let the rice milk cook very +slowly at the back of the stove, adding more milk before it gets at all +stiff; when tender enough to mash through a coarse sieve or fine +colander add it to the stock, which must have been strained and be quite +free from sediment, season with salt and a little _white_ pepper or +cayenne, boil all together gently a few minutes. It should look like +rich cream, and be strongly flavored with celery. Of course the quantity +of rice, milk, and celery must depend on the quantity of stock you have. +I have given the proportion for one quart, which, with the milk, etc., +added, would make about three pints of soup. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + +SAUCES. + + +TALLEYRAND said England was a country with twenty-four religions and +only one sauce. He might have said two sauces, and he would have been +literally right as regards both England and America. Everything is +served with brown sauce or white sauce. And how often the white sauce is +like bookbinder's paste, the brown, a bitter, tasteless brown mess! +Strictly speaking, perhaps, the French have but two sauces either, +_espagnole_, or brown sauce, and white sauce, which they call the mother +sauces; but what changes they ring on these mother sauces! The espagnole +once made, with no two meats is it served alike in flavor, and in this +matter of flavor the artist appears. In making brown sauce for any +purpose, bethink yourself of anything there may be in your store-room +with which to vary its flavor, taking care that it shall agree with the +meat for which it is intended. The ordinary cook flies at once to +Worcestershire or Harvey sauce, which are excellent at times, but +"_toujours perdrix_" is not always welcome. A pinch of mushroom powder, +or a few chopped oysters, are excellent with beef or veal; so will be a +spoonful of Montpellier butter stirred in, or curry, not enough to +yellow the sauce, but enough to give a dash of piquancy. A pickled +walnut chopped, or a gherkin or two, go admirably with mutton or pork +chops. In short, this is just where imagination and brains will tell in +cooking, and little essays of invention may be tried with profit. But +beware of trying too much; make yourself perfect in one thing before +venturing on another. + +ESPAGNOLE, or brown sauce, is simply a rich stock well flavored with +vegetables and herbs, and thickened with a piece of _roux_ or with brown +flour. + +WHITE SAUCE is one of those things we rarely find perfectly made; bad, +it is the _ne plus ultra_ of badness; good, it is delicious. Those who +have tried to have it good, and failed, I beg to try the following +method of making it: Take an ounce and a half of butter and a scant +tablespoonful of flour, mix both with a spoon into a paste; when smooth +add half a pint of warm milk, a _small_ teaspoonful of salt, and the +sixth part of one of _white_ pepper; set it on the fire till it boils, +and is thick enough to mask the back of the spoon transparently; then +add a squeeze of lemon juice, and another ounce and a half of fresh +butter; stir this till quite blended. This sauce is the foundation for +many others, and, for some purposes, the beaten yolk of an egg is +introduced when just off the boil. Capers may be added to it, or chopped +mushrooms, or chopped celery, or oysters, according to the use for which +it is intended. The object of adding the second butter is because +boiling takes away the flavor of butter; by stirring half of it in, +without boiling, you retain it. + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + +WARMING OVER. + + +HASH is a peculiarly American institution. In no other country is every +remnant of cold meat turned into that one unvarying dish. What do I say? +_remnants_ of cold meat! rather _joints_ of cold meat, a roast of beef +of which the tenderloin had sufficed for the first day's dinner, the leg +of mutton from which a few slices only have been taken, the fillet of +veal, available for so many delicate dishes, all are ruthlessly turned +into the all-pervading hash. The curious thing is that people are not +fond of it. Men exclaim against it, and its name stinks in the nostrils +of those unhappy ones whose home is the boarding-house. + +Yet hash in itself is not a bad dish; when I say it is a peculiarly +_American_ institution, I mean, that when English people speak of hash, +they mean something quite different--meat warmed in slices. Our hash, in +its best form--that is, made with nice gravy, garnished with sippets of +toast and pickles, surrounded with mashed potatoes or rice--is dignified +abroad by the name of _mince_, and makes its appearance as an elegant +little _entree_. Nor would it be anathematized in the way it is with us, +if it were only occasionally introduced. It is the familiarity that has +led to contempt. "But what shall I do?" asks the young wife +distressfully; "John likes joints, and he and I and Bridget can't +possibly eat a roast at a meal." + +Very true; and it is to just such perplexed young housekeepers that I +hope this chapter will be especially useful--that is to say, small +families with moderate means and a taste for good things. In this, as in +many other ways, large families are easier to cater for; they can +consume the better part of a roast at a meal, and the remains it is no +great harm to turn into hash, although even they might, with little +trouble and expense, have agreeable variety introduced into their bill +of fare. + +In England and America there is great prejudice against warmed-over +food, but on the continent one eats it half the time in some of the most +delicious-made dishes without suspecting it. Herein lies the secret. +With us and our transatlantic cousins the warming over is so artlessly +done, that the _hard_ fact too often stares at us from out the watery +expanse in which it reposes. + +One great reason of the failure to make warmed-over meat satisfactory is +the lack of gravy. On the goodness of this (as well as its presence) +depends the success of your _rechauffe_. + +The glaze, for which I have given the recipe, renders you at all times +independent in this respect, but at the same time it should not alone be +depended on. Every drop of what remains in the dish from the roast +should be saved, and great care be taken of all scraps, bones, and +gristle, which should be carefully boiled down to save the necessity of +flying to the glaze for every purpose. I will here give several recipes, +which I think may be new to many readers. + +SALMI OF COLD MEAT is exceedingly good. Melt butter in a saucepan, if +for quite a small dish two ounces will be sufficient; when melted, stir +in a little flour to thicken; let it brown, but not burn, or, if you are +preparing the dish in haste, put in some brown flour; then add a glass +of white or red wine and a cup of broth, or a cup of water and a slice +of glaze, a sprig or two of thyme, parsley, a small onion, chopped, and +one bay leaf, pepper, and salt. Simmer all thoroughly (all savory dishes +to which wine is added should simmer long enough for the distinct +"winey" flavor to disappear, only the strength and richness remaining). +Strain this when simmered half an hour and lay in the cold meat. Squeeze +in a little lemon juice and draw the stew-pan to the back of the stove, +but where it will cook no longer, or the meat will harden. Serve on +toast, and pour the sauce over. A glass of brandy added to this dish +when the meat goes in is a great addition, if an extra fine salmi is +desired. By not allowing the flour and butter to brown and using white +wine, this is a very fine sauce in which to warm cold chicken, veal, or +any _white_ meat. + +B[OE]UF A LA JARDINIERE.--Put in a fireproof dish if you have it, or a +thick saucepan, a pint of beef broth, a small bunch each of parsley, +chervil, tarragon--very little of this--shallot or onion, capers, +pickled gherkins, of each or any a teaspoonful chopped fine; roll a +large tablespoonful of butter with a dessert-spoonful of brown flour, +stir it in; then take slices of underdone beef, with a blunt knife hack +each slice all over in fine dice, but not to separate or cut up the +slices; then pepper and salt each one and lay it in with the herbs, +sprinkle a layer of herbs over the beef and cover closely; then stand +the dish in the oven to slowly cook for an hour, or, if you use a +stew-pan, set in a pan of boiling water on the stove for an hour where +the water will just boil. Serve on a dish surrounded with young carrots +and turnips if in season, or old ones cut. + +BEEF AU GRATIN.--Cut a little fat bacon or pork very thin, sprinkle on +it chopped parsley, onion, and mushrooms (mushroom powder will do) and +bread-crumbs; then put in layers of beef, cut thick, and well and +closely hacked, then another layer of bacon or pork cut thin as a wafer, +and of seasoning, crumbs last; pour over enough broth or gravy to +moisten well, in which a little brandy or wine may be added if an +especially good dish is desired; bake slowly an hour. + +PSEUDO BEEFSTEAK.--Cut cold boiled or roast beef in thick slices, broil +slowly, lay in a _hot_ dish in which you have a large spoonful of +Montpellier butter melted, sprinkle a little mushroom powder if you +desire, and garnish with fried potato. + +CUTLETS A LA JARDINIERE.--Trim some thick cutlets from a cold leg of +mutton, or chops from the loin, dip them in frying batter, _a la +Careme_, fry crisp and quickly, and serve wreathed round green peas, or +a ragout made as follows: Take young carrots, turnips, green peas, white +beans; stew gently in a little water to which the bones of the meat and +trimmings have been added (and which must be carefully removed not to +disfigure the vegetables). Encircle this ragout with the fried cutlets, +and crown with a cauliflower. + +CROMESQUIS OF LAMB is a Polish recipe. Cut some underdone lamb--mutton +will of course do--quite small; also some mushrooms, cut small, or the +powder. Put in a saucepan a piece of glaze the size of a pigeon's egg, +with a _little_ water or broth, warm it and thicken with yolks of two +eggs, just as you would make boiled custard, that is, without letting +it come to the boil, or it will curdle; then add the mushrooms and meat, +let all get cold, and divide it into small pieces, roll in bread-crumbs +sifted, then in egg, then in crumbs again, and fry in very hot fat; or +you may, _after_ rolling in bread-crumbs, lay each piece in a spoon and +dip it into frying batter; let the extra batter run off, and drop the +cromesquis into the hot fat. These will be good made of beef and rolled +up in a bard of fat pork cut thin, and fried; serve with sauce piquant +made thus: Take some chopped parsley, onion, and pickled cucumbers, +simmer till tender, and thicken with an equal quantity of butter and +flour. Of course your own brightness will tell you that, if you are in +haste, a spoonful of Montpellier butter, the same of flour, melted in a +little water, to which you add a teaspoonful of vinegar, will make an +excellent sauce piquant, and this same is excellent for anything fried, +as breaded chops, croquettes, etc. I may here say, that where two or +three herbs are mentioned as necessary, for instance, parsley, tarragon, +and chervil, if you have no tarragon you must leave it out, or chervil +the same. It is only a matter of flavoring, at the same time _flavor_ is +a great deal, and these French herbs give that indescribable _cachet_ to +a dish which is one of the secrets of French cooking. Therefore if you +are a wise matron you will have a supply on hand, even if only bought +dry from the druggist. + +MIROTON OF BEEF.--Peel and cut into thin slices two large onions, put +them in a stew-pan with two ounces of butter, place it over a slow fire; +stir the onions round till they are rather brown, but not in the least +burnt; add a teaspoonful of brown flour, mix smoothly, then moisten with +half a pint of broth, or water with a little piece of glaze, three +salt-spoonfuls of salt unless your broth was salted, then half the +quantity or less, two of sugar, and one of pepper. Put in the cold beef, +cut in thin slices as lean as possible, let it remain five minutes at +the back of the stove; then serve on a very hot dish garnished with +fried potatoes, or sippets of toast. To vary the flavor, sometimes put a +spoonful of tarragon or plain vinegar, or a teaspoonful of mushroom +powder, or a pinch of curry, unless objected to, or a few sweet herbs. +In fact, as you may see, variety is as easy to produce as it is rare to +meet with in average cooking, and depends more on intelligence and +thoughtfulness than on anything else. + +The simplest of all ways of warming a joint that is not far cut, is to +wrap it in thickly buttered paper, and put it in the oven again, +contriving, if possible, to cover it closely, let it remain long enough +to get _hot_ through, not to cook. By keeping it closely covered it will +get hot through in less time, and the steam will prevent it getting hard +and dry; make some gravy hot and serve with the meat. If your gravy is +good and plentiful, your meat will be as nice as the first day; without +gravy it would be an unsatisfactory dish. If you cannot manage to cover +the joint in the oven, you may put it in a pot over the fire _without_ +water, but with a dessert spoonful of vinegar to create steam; let it +get hot through, and serve as before. + +For the third day the meat may be warmed up in any of the ways I am +going to mention, repeating once more, that you must have gravy of some +kind, or else carefully make some, with cracked bones, gristle, etc., +stewed _long_, and nicely flavored with any kind of sauce. + +RAGOUT.--A very nice ragout may be made from cold meat thus: Slice the +meat, put it in a stew-pan in which an onion, or several if you like +them, has been sliced; squeeze half a lemon into it, or a +dessert-spoonful of vinegar, cover closely without water, and when it +begins to cook, set the stew-pan at the back of the stove for three +quarters of an hour, shaking it occasionally. The onions should now be +brown; take out the meat, dredge in a little flour, stir it round, and +add a cup of gravy, pepper, salt, and a small quantity of any sauce or +flavoring you prefer; stew gently a minute or two, then put the meat +back to get hot, and serve; garnish with sippets of toast, or pickles. + +A NICE LITTLE BREAKFAST DISH IS made thus: Cut two long slices of cold +meat and three of bread, buttered thickly, about the same shape and +size; season the meat with pepper, salt, and a little finely chopped +parsley; or, if it is veal, a little chopped ham; then lay one slice of +bread between two of meat, and have the other two slices outside; fasten +together with short wooden skewers. If you have a quick oven, put it in; +and take care to baste with butter thoroughly, that the bread may be all +over crisp and brown. If you can't depend on your oven, fry it in very +hot fat as you would crullers; garnish with sprigs of parsley, and serve +very hot. + +TO WARM A GOOD-SIZED PIECE OF BEEF.--Trim it as much like a thick fillet +as you can; cut it horizontally half way through, then scoop out as much +as you can of the meat from the inside of each piece. Chop the meat fine +that you have thus scooped out, season with a little finely chopped +parsley and thyme, a shred of onion, if you like it; or if you have +celery boil a little of the coarser part till tender, chop it and add +as much bread finely crumbled as you have meat, and a good piece of +butter; add pepper and salt, and make all into a paste with an egg, +mixed with an equal quantity of gravy or milk; fill up the hollow in the +meat and tie, or still better, sew it together. You may either put this +in a pot with a slice of pork or bacon, and a cup of gravy; or you may +brush it over with beaten egg, cover it with crumbs, and pour over these +a cup of butter, melted, so that it moistens every part; and bake it, +taking care to baste well while baking; serve with nice gravy. + +BEEF OLIVES are no novelty to the ear, but it is a novel thing to find +them satisfactory to the palate. + +Take some stale bread-crumbs, an equal quantity of beef finely chopped, +some parsley, and thyme; a little scraped ham if you have it, a few +chives, or a slice of onion, all chopped small as possible; put some +butter in a pan, and let this force-meat just simmer, _not fry_, in it +for ten minutes. While this is cooking, cut some underdone oblong slices +of beef about half an inch thick, hack it with a sharp knife on _both +sides_; then mix the cooked force-meat with the yolk of an egg and a +tablespoonful of gravy; put a spoonful of this paste in the center of +each slice of meat and tie it up carefully in the shape of an egg. Then +if you have some nice gravy, thicken it with a piece of butter rolled in +flour, roll each olive slightly in flour and lay it in the gravy and let +it very gently _simmer_ for half an hour. A few chopped oysters added to +the gravy will be a great addition. Or you may lay each olive on a thin +slice of fat pork, roll it up, tie it, dip it in flour, and bake in a +quick oven until beautifully brown. + +TO WARM OVER COLD MUTTON.--An excellent and simple way is to cut it, if +loin, into chops, or leg, into thick collops, and dip each into egg +well beaten with a tablespoonful of milk, then in _fine_ bread-crumbs +and fry in plenty of _very hot_ fat. + +If your crumbs are not very fine and even, the larger crumbs will fall +off, and the appearance be spoilt. These chops will be almost as nice, +if quickly fried, as fresh cooked ones. They will also be excellent if, +instead of being breaded, they are dipped into thick batter (see recipe) +and fried brown in the same way. This method answers for any kind of +meat, chicken thus warmed over being especially good. The batter, or egg +and bread-crumbs form a sort of crust which keeps it tender and juicy. +Any attempt to fry cold meat without either results in a hard, stringy, +uneatable dish. + +WHITE MEAT OF ANY KIND is excellent warmed over in a little milk, in +which you have cut a large onion, and, if you like it, a slice of salt +pork or ham, and a little sliced cucumber, if it is summer; thicken with +the yolks of one or two eggs, added after the whole has simmered twenty +minutes; take care the egg thickens in the gravy, but does not _boil_, +or it will curdle. If it is in winter, chop a teaspoonful of pickled +cucumber or capers and add just on going to table. In summer when you +have the sliced cucumber, squeeze half a lemon into the gravy, the last +thing, to give the requisite dash of acid. You may vary the above by +adding sometimes a few chopped oysters; at others, mushrooms, or celery. +The last must be put in with the onion and before the meat. + +DEVILED MEAT.--Our better halves are usually fond of this, especially +for breakfast or lunch. + +For this dish take a pair of turkey or chicken drumsticks or some nice +thick wedges of underdone beef or mutton, score them deeply with a +knife and rub them over with a sauce made thus: A teaspoonful of +vinegar, the same of Harvey or Worcestershire sauce, the same of +mustard, a _little_ cayenne, and a tablespoonful of salad oil, or butter +melted; mix all till like cream, and take care your meat is thoroughly +moistened all over with the mixture, then rub your gridiron with butter. +See that the fire is clear, and while the gridiron is getting hot, chop +a teaspoonful of parsley very fine, mix it up with a piece of butter the +size of a walnut, and lay this in a dish which you will put to get hot. +Then put the meat to be grilled on the fire and turn often, so that it +will not burn; when hot through and brown, lay it in the hot dish, lay +another hot dish over it, and serve as quickly as possible with hot +plates. + +Or the grill may be served with what Soyer calls his _Mephistophelian +sauce_, which he especially designed for serving with deviled meats. +Chop six shallots or small onions, wash and press them in the corner of +a clean cloth, put them in a stew-pan with half a wineglass of chili +vinegar (pepper sauce), a chopped clove, a tiny bit of garlic, two bay +leaves, an ounce of glaze; boil all together ten minutes; then add four +tablespoonfuls of tomato sauce, a _little_ sugar, and ten of broth +thickened with roux (or water will do if you have no broth). + +It will be remarked that in many French recipes a _little_ sugar is +ordered. This is not meant to sweeten, or even be perceptible; but it +enriches, softens, tones, as it were, the other ingredients as salt +does. + +SOYER'S FRITADELLA (twenty recipes in one).--Put half a pound of +bread-crumb to soak in a pint of cold water; take the same quantity of +any kind of roast, or boiled meat, with a little fat, chop it fine, +press the bread in a clean cloth to extract the water; put in a +stew-pan two ounces of butter, a tablespoonful of chopped onions; fry +two minutes and stir, then add the bread, stir and fry till rather dry, +then the meat; season with a teaspoonful of salt, half of pepper, and a +little grated nutmeg, and lemon peel; stir continually till very hot, +then add two eggs, one at a time; mix well and pour on a dish to get +cold. Then take a piece, shape it like a small egg, flatten it a little, +egg and bread-crumb it all over, taking care to keep in good shape. Do +all the same way, then put into a frying-pan a quarter of a pound of +lard or dripping, let it get hot, and put in the pieces, and saute (or +as we call it "_fry_") them a fine yellow brown. Serve very hot with a +border of mashed potatoes, or any garniture you fancy. Sauce piquant, or +not, as you please. + +The above can be made with any kind of meat, poultry, game, fish, or +even vegetables; hard eggs, or potatoes, may be introduced in small +quantities, and they may be fried instead of sauteed (frying in the +French and strict sense, meaning as I need hardly say, entire immersion +in very hot fat). To _fry_ them you require at least two pounds of fat +in your pan. + +Oysters or lobsters prepared as above are excellent. + +Boileau says, "_Un diner rechauffe ne valut jamais rien_." But I think a +good French cook of the present day would make him alter his opinion. + +Indeed Savarin quotes a friend of his own, a notable gourmand, who +considered spinach cooked on Monday only reached perfection the +following Saturday, having each day of the week been warmed up with +butter, and each day gaining succulence and a more marrowy consistency. + +The only trouble I find in relation to this part of my present task is +the difficulty of knowing when to leave off. There are so many ways of +warming meats to advantage--and in every one way there is the suggestion +for another--that I suffer from an _embarras de richesse_, and have had +difficulty in selecting. Dozens come to my mind, blanquettes, patties, +curries, as I write; but as this is not, I have said, to be a recipe +book, I forbear. Of one thing I am quite sure: when women once know how +to make nice dishes of cold meat they will live well where they now live +badly, and for less money; and "hash" will be relegated to its proper +place as an occasional and acceptable dish. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + +ON FRIANDISES. + + + "Le role du gourmand finit avec l'entremets, et celui du friand + commence au dessert."--_Grimod de la Reyniere._ + + +AMERICAN ladies, as a rule, excel in cake making and preserving, and I +feel that on that head I have very little to teach; indeed, were they as +accomplished in all branches of cooking as in making dainty sweet dishes +this book would be uncalled for. + +Yet, notwithstanding their undoubted taste and ability in making +"_friandises_," it seems to me a few recipes borrowed from what the +French call _la grande cuisine_, and possible of execution at home, will +be welcome to those who wish to vary the eternal ice cream and charlotte +russe, with other sweets more elegant and likely to be equally popular. + +ICED SOUFFLE A LA BYRON.--One pint of sugar syrup of 32 degrees (get +this at a druggist's if you do not understand sugar boiling), three +gills of strained raspberry juice, one lemon, one gill of maraschino, +fifteen yolks of eggs, two ounces of chocolate drops, half a pint of +very thick cream whipped. + +Method of making this and the next recipe is as follows: Mix the syrup +and yolks of eggs, strain into a warm bowl, add the raspberry and lemon +juice and maraschino, whisk till it creams well, then take the bowl out +of the hot water and whisk ten minutes longer; add the chocolate drops +and whipped cream; lightly fill a case or mold, and set in a freezer for +two hours, then cover the surface with lady-fingers (or sponge cake) +dried in the oven a pale brown, and rolled. Serve at once. + +Another frozen _souffle_ is as follows: + +One pint of syrup, 32 degrees, half a pint of noyeau, half a pint of +cherry juice, two ounces of bruised macaroons, half a pint of thick +cream whipped, made in the same way as the last. I may here say that the +fruit juices can be procured now at all good druggists, so that these +_souffles_ are very attainable in winter, and as noyeau and maraschino +do not form part of the stores in a family of small means, I will give +in this chapter recipes for the making of very fair imitations of the +genuine _liqueurs_. + +BISCUIT GLACE A LA CHARLES DICKENS.--One pint of syrup (32 deg.), fifteen +yolks of eggs, three gills of peach pulp, colored pink with cochineal, +one gill of noyeau, half a pint of thick cream, and a little chocolate +water-ice, made with half a pint of syrup and four ounces of the best +chocolate smoothly mixed and frozen ready. + +Mix syrup, yolks, peach pulps, noyeau, and a few drops of vanilla, whip +high; mix with the whipped cream, and set in ice for one hour and a half +in brick-shaped molds, then turn out (if very firm), and cut in slices +an inch thick, and coat them all over, or on top and sides, with the +chocolate ice, smoothing with a knife dipped in cold water; serve in +paper cases. + +BISCUIT GLACE A LA THACKERAY.--One pint of syrup (32 deg.), one pint of +strawberry pulp, fifteen yolks of eggs, one ounce of vanilla sugar +(flavor a little sugar with vanilla), half a pint of thick cream. + +Mix syrup, yolks, strawberry, and vanilla sugar, whipping as before, +then add the whipped cream lightly; fill paper cases, either round or +square; surround each with a band of stiff paper, to reach half an inch +above the edge of the case, the bands to be pinned together to secure +them; place them in a freezer. When about to send to table, remove the +bands of paper, and cover with macaroons bruised fine and browned in the +oven. The bands of paper are meant to give the biscuit the appearance of +having risen while supposed to bake. + +These delicious ices were invented by Francatelli, the Queen of +England's chief cook, to do homage to the different great men whose +names they bear, on the occasion of preparing dinners given in their +honor. They read as if somewhat intricate, but any lady who has ever had +ice cream made at home, and had the patience to make charlotte russe, +need not shrink appalled before these novelties, or fear for a +successful result. + +Baba is a cake many call for at a confectioner's, yet few, if any one, +attempts to make it at home. That the recipes generally offered do not +lead to success may be one reason, and I offer the following, quite +sure, if accurately followed, such a baba will result as never was eaten +outside of Paris. + +BABA.--One pound of flour; take one quarter of it, and make a sponge +with half an ounce of compressed yeast and a little warm water, set it +to rise, make a hole in the rest of the flour, add to it ten ounces of +butter, three eggs, and a dessert-spoonful of sugar, a little salt, +unless your butter salts it enough, which is generally the case. Beat +all together well, then add five more eggs, one at a time, that is to +say, add one egg and beat well, then another and beat again, and so on +until the five are used. When the paste leaves the bowl it is beaten +enough, but not before; then add the sponge to it, and a large half +ounce of citron chopped, the same of currants, and an ounce and a half +of sultana raisins, seedless. Let it rise to twice its size, then bake +it in an oven of dark yellow paper heat; the small round babas are an +innovation of the pastry-cook to enable him to sell them uncut. But the +baba proper should be baked in a large, deep, upright tin, such as a +large charlotte russe mold, when they keep for several days fresh, and +if they get stale, make delicious fritters, soaked in sherry and dipped +in frying batter. + +In some cases, however, it may be preferred to make them as usually seen +at French pastry cooks; for this purpose you require a dozen small-sized +_round_ charlotte russe molds, which fill half full only, as they rise +very much; bake these in a hotter oven, light brown paper heat; try with +a twig as you would any other cake, if it comes out dry it is done; then +prepare a syrup as follows: Boil half pound of sugar in a pint of water, +add to this the third of a pint of rum, and some apricot pulp--peach +will of course do--and boil all together a few minutes; pour this half +an inch deep in a dish, and stand the cake or cakes in it; it should +drink up all the syrup, you may also sprinkle some over it. If any syrup +remains, use it to warm over your cake when stale, instead of the +sherry. + +Baba was introduced into France by Stanislas Leczinski, king of Poland, +and the father-in-law of Louis XIV.; and his Polish royal descendants +still use with it, says Careme, a syrup made of Malaga wine and one +sixth part of _eau de tanaisie_. + +But, although our forefathers seemed to have relished tansy very much, +to judge from old recipe books, I doubt if such flavoring would be +appreciated in our time. + +SAVARINS--commonly called wine cake by New York pastry cooks--are made +as follows: + +One pound of flour, of which take one quarter to make a sponge, using +half an ounce of German compressed yeast, and a little warm milk; when +it has risen to twice its bulk, add one gill of hot milk, two eggs, and +the rest of the flour; mix well; then add one more egg and beat, +another, still beating; then add three quarters of a pound of fresh +butter, a quarter of an ounce of salt, half an ounce of sugar, and half +a gill of hot milk, beat well; then add eggs, one at a time, beating +continually, until you have used five more. Cut in small dice three +ounces of candied orange peel; butter a tin, which should be deep and +straight-sided--a tin pudding boiler is not a bad thing--and sprinkle +with chopped almonds. Fill the mold half full, and when risen to twice +its bulk, bake in a moderate oven, dark yellow paper heat. When served, +this cake should stand in a dish of syrup, flavored with rum, as for +baba, or with sherry wine. + +BOUCHEES DES DAMES, a very ornamental and delicious little French cake, +is sufficiently novel to deserve a place here, I think. Make any nice +drop cake batter (either sponge, or sponge with a little butter in it I +prefer); drop one on buttered paper and bake; if it runs, beat in a +_little_ more flour and sugar, but not much, or your cakes will be +brittle; they should be the size, when done, of a fifty-cent piece, and +I find half a teaspoonful of batter dropped generally makes them about +right. Have a tin cutter or tin box lid, if you have no cutter so small, +about the size, and with it trim each cake when baked; then take half +the number and spread some with a very thin layer of red currant jelly, +others with peach or raspberry; then on each so spread put a cake that +is unspread, thus making a tiny sandwich or jelly cake. If you have +different sorts of jelly, put each separate, as you must adapt the +flavor of your icing to the jelly. For red currant, ice with chocolate +icing. Recipes for icing are so general that I refer you to your cookery +book. Those with peach may have white icing, flavored with almond, or +with rum, beating in a little more sugar if the flavoring dilutes your +icing too much. Almond flavoring goes well with raspberry. Cakes with +raspberry jelly or jam should be iced pink, coloring the icing with +prepared cochineal or cranberry juice. Thus you have your cakes brown, +pink, and white, which look very pretty mixed. + +The process of icing is difficult to do after they are put together, but +they are much handsomer this way, and keep longer. You require, to +accomplish it, a good quantity of each kind of icing, and a number of +little wooden skewers; stick one into each cake and dip it in the icing, +let it run off, then stand the other end of the skewer in a box of sand +or granulated sugar. The easiest way is to ice each half cake before +putting in the jelly; when the icing is hard spread with jelly, and put +together. + +CURACOA may be successfully imitated by pouring over eight ounces of the +_thinly_ pared rind of very ripe oranges a pint of boiling water, cover, +and let it cool; then add two quarts of brandy, or strong French spirit, +cover closely, and let it stand fourteen days, shaking it every day. +Make a clarified syrup of two pounds of sugar into one pint of water, +well boiled; strain the brandy into it, leaving it covered close +another day. Rub up in a mortar one drachm of potash, with a teaspoonful +of the liqueurs; when well blended, put this into the liqueur, and in +the same way pound and add a drachm of alum, shake well, and in an hour +or two filter through thin muslin. Ready for use in a week or two. + +MARASCHINO.--Bruise slightly a dozen cherry kernels, put them in a deep +jar with the outer rind of three oranges and two lemons, cover with two +quarts of gin, then add syrup and leave it a fortnight, as for curacoa. +Stir syrup and spirit together, leave it another day, run it through a +jelly bag, and bottle. Ready to use in ten days. + +NOYEAU.--Blanch and pound two pounds of bitter almonds, or four of peach +kernels; put to them a gallon of spirit or brandy, two pounds of white +sugar candy--or sugar will do--a grated nutmeg, and a pod of vanilla; +leave it three weeks covered close, then filter and bottle; but do not +use it for three months. To be used with caution. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + +FRENCH CANDY AT HOME. + + +THIS chapter I shall have to make one of recipes chiefly, for it treats +of a branch of cooking not usually found in cookery books, or at least +there is seldom anything on the art of confectionery beyond molasses or +cream taffy and nougat. These, therefore, I shall not touch upon, but +rather show you how to make the expensive French candies. + +The great art of making these exquisite candies is in boiling the sugar, +and it is an art easily acquired with patience. + +Put into a marbleized saucepan (by long experience in sugar-boiling I +find them less likely to burn even than brass, and I keep one for the +purpose) one pound of sugar and half a pint of water; when it has boiled +ten minutes begin to try it; have a bowl of water with a piece of ice +near you, and drop it from the end of a spoon. When it falls to the +bottom, and you can take it up and make it into a softish ball (not at +all sticky) between your thumb and finger, it is at the right point; +remove it from the fire to a cold place; when cool, if perfectly right, +a thin jelly-like film will be over the surface, _not a sugary one_; if +it is sugary, and you want your candy very creamy, you must add a few +spoonfuls of water, return to the fire and boil again, going through +the same process of trying it. You must be careful that there is not the +least inclination to be brittle in the ball of candy you take from the +water; if so, it is boiled a degree too high; put a little water to +bring it back again, and try once more. A speck of cream of tartar is +useful in checking a tendency in the syrup to go to sugar. When you have +your sugar boiled just right set it to cool, and when you can bear your +finger in it, begin to beat it with a spoon; in ten minutes it will be a +white paste resembling lard, which you will find you can work like bread +dough. This, then, is your foundation, called by French confectioners +_fondant_; with your _fondant_ you can work marvels. But to begin with +the simplest French candies. + +Take a piece of _fondant_, flavor part of it with vanilla, part of it +with lemon, color yellow (see coloring candies), and another part with +raspberry, color pink; make these into balls, grooved cones, or anything +that strikes your fancy, let them stand till they harden, they are then +ready for use. + +Take another part of your _fondant_, have some English walnuts chopped, +flavor with vanilla and color pink; work the walnuts into the paste as +you would fruit into a loaf cake; when mixed, make a paper case an inch +wide and deep, and three or four inches long; oil it; press the paste +into it, and when firm turn it out and cut into cubes. Or, instead of +walnuts, use chopped almonds, flavor with vanilla, and leave the +_fondant_ white. This makes VANILLA ALMOND CREAM. + +TUTTI FRUTTI CANDY.--Chop some almonds, citron, a _few_ currants, and +seedless raisins; work into some _fondant_, flavor with rum and lemon, +thus making Roman punch, or with vanilla or raspberry; press into the +paper forms as you did the walnut cream. You see how you can ring the +changes on these bars, varying the flavoring, inventing new +combinations, etc. + +FONDANT PANACHE.--Take your _fondant_, divide it in three equal parts, +color one pink and flavor as you choose, leave the other white and +flavor also as you please; but it must agree with the pink, and both +must agree with the next, which is chocolate. Melt a little unsweetened +chocolate by setting it in a saucer over the boiling kettle, then take +enough of it to make your third piece of _fondant_ a fine brown; now +divide the white into two parts; make each an inch and a half wide, and +as long as it will; do the same with the chocolate _fondant_; then take +the pink, make it the same width and length, but of course, not being +divided, it will be twice as thick; now butter slightly the back of a +plate, or, better still, get a few sheets of waxed paper from the +confectioner's; lay one strip of the chocolate on it, then a strip of +white on that, then the pink, the other white, and lastly the chocolate +again; then lightly press them to make them adhere, but not to squeeze +them out of shape. You have now an oblong brick of parti-colored candy; +leave it for a few hours to harden, then trim it neatly with a knife and +cut it crosswise into slices half an inch think, lay on waxed paper to +dry, turning once in a while, and pack away in boxes. + +If your _fondant_ gets very hard while you work, stand it over hot water +a few minutes. + +Creamed candies are very fashionable just now, and, your _fondant_ once +ready, are very easy to make. + +CREAM WALNUTS.--Make ready some almonds, some walnuts in halves, some +hazelnuts, or anything of the sort you fancy; let them be very dry. Take +_fondant_ made from a pound of sugar, set it in a bowl in a saucepan of +boiling water, stirring it till it is like cream. Then having flavored +it with vanilla or lemon, drop in your nuts one by one, taking them out +with the other hand on the end of a fork, resting it on the edge of your +bowl to drain for a second, then drop the nut on to a waxed or buttered +paper neatly. If the nut shows through the cream it is too hot; take it +out of the boiling water and beat till it is just thick enough to mask +the nut entirely, then return it to the boiling water, as it cools very +rapidly and becomes unmanageable, when it has to be warmed over again. + +VERY FINE CHOCOLATE CREAMS are made as follows: Boil half a pound of +sugar with three tablespoonfuls of thick cream till it makes a _soft_ +ball in water, then let it cool. When cool beat it till it is very +white, flavor with a few drops of vanilla and make it into balls the +size of a large pea; then take some unsweetened chocolate warmed, mix it +with a piece of _fondant_ melted--there should be more chocolate than +sugar--and when quite smooth and thick enough to mask the cream, drop +them in from the end of a fork, take them out, and drop on to wax paper. + +Another very fine candy to be made without heat, and therefore +convenient for hot weather, is made as follows: + +PUNCH DROPS.--Sift some powdered sugar. Have ready some fine white +gum-arabic, put a tablespoonful with the sugar (say half a pound of +sugar), and make it into a firm paste; if too wet, add more sugar, +flavor with lemon and a tiny speck of tartaric acid or a very little +lemon juice. Make the paste into small balls, then take more sugar and +make it into icing with a spoonful of Santa Cruz rum and half the white +of an egg. Try if it hardens, if not, beat in more sugar and color it a +bright pink, then dip each ball in the pink icing and harden on wax +paper. These are very novel, beautiful to look at, and the flavors may +vary to taste. + +TO MAKE COCHINEAL COLORING WHICH IS QUITE HARMLESS.--Take one ounce of +powdered cochineal, one ounce of cream of tartar, two drachms of alum, +half a pint of water; boil the cochineal, water, and cream of tartar +till reduced to one half, then add the alum, and put up in small bottles +for use. Yellow is obtained by the infusion of Spanish saffron in a +little water, or a still better one from the grated rind of a ripe +orange put into muslin, and a little of the juice squeezed through it. + +Be careful in boiling the sugar for _fondant_, not to stir it after it +is dissolved; stirring causes it to become rough instead of creamy. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + +A CHAPTER FOR PEOPLE OF VERY SMALL MEANS. + + +I AM sorry to say in these days this chapter may appeal to many, who are +yet not to be called "poor people," who may have been well-to-do and +only suffering from the pressure of the times, and for whose cultivated +appetites the coarse, substantial food of the laboring man (even if they +could buy it) would not be eatable, who must have what they do have +good, or starve. But, as some of the things for which I give recipes +will seem over-economical for people who can afford to buy meat at least +once a day, I advise those who have even fifty dollars a month income to +skip it; reminding them, if they do not, "that necessity knows no law." + +A bone of soup meat can be got at a good butcher's for ten or fifteen +cents, and is about the best investment, for that sum I know of, as two +nourishing and savory meals, at least, for four or five persons can be +got from it. + +Carefully make a nice soup, with plenty of vegetables, rice, or any +other thickening you like. Your bone will weigh from four to six pounds, +perhaps; put it on with water according to size, and let it boil down +slowly until nice and strong. If you have had any scraps of meat or +bones, put them also to your soup. + +When you serve it, keep back a cup of soup and a few of the vegetables, +and save the meat, from which you can make a very appetizing hash in the +following way: Take the meat from the bone, chop it with some cold +potatoes and the vegetables you saved from the soup. Cold stewed onions, +boiled carrots or turnips, all help to make the dish savory. Chop an +onion very fine, unless you have cold ones, a little parsley and thyme, +if liked, and sometimes, for variety's sake, if you have it, a pinch of +curry powder, not enough to make it hot or yellow, yet to impart +piquancy. If you have a tiny bit of fried bacon or cold ham or cold +pork, chop it with the other ingredients, mix all well, moisten with the +cold soup, and, when nicely seasoned, put the hash into an iron +frying-pan, in which you have a little fat made hot; pack it smoothly +in, cover it with a pot-lid, and either set it in a hot oven, or leave +it to brown on the stove. If there was more soup than enough to moisten +the hash, put it on in a tiny saucepan, with a little brown flour made +into a paste with butter, add a drop of tomato catsup, or a little +stewed tomato, or anything you have for flavoring, and stir till it +boils. Then turn the hash out whole on a dish, it should be brown and +crisp, pour the gravy you have made round it, and serve. For a change +make a pie of the hash, pouring the gravy in through a hole in the top +when done. + +It is not generally known that a very nice plain paste can be made with +a piece of bread dough, to which you have added an egg, and some lard, +dripping, or butter. The dripping is particularly nice for the hash pie, +and, as you need only a piece of dough as large as an orange, you will +probably have enough from the soup, if you skimmed off all the fat +before putting the vegetables in (see _pot-au-feu_); work your dripping +into the dough, and let it rise well, then roll as ordinary pie-crust. +Potato crust is also very good for plain pies of any sort, but as there +are plenty of recipes for it, I will not give one here. + +One of the very best hashes I ever ate was prepared by a lady who, in +better times, kept a very fine table. And she told me there were a good +many cold beans in it, well mashed; and often since, when taking +"travelers' hash" in an hotel, I have thought of that savory dish with +regret. + +Instead of making your chopped meat into hash, vary it, by rolling the +same mixture into egg-shaped pieces, or flat cakes, flouring them, and +frying them nicely in very hot fat; pieces of pork or bacon fried and +laid round will help out the dish, and be an improvement to what is +already very good. + +To return once more to the soup bone. If any one of your family is fond +of marrow, seal up each end of the bone with a paste made of flour and +water. When done, take off the paste, and remove the marrow. Made very +hot, and spread on toast, with pepper and salt, it will be a relish for +some one's tea or breakfast. + +In this country there is a prejudice against sheep's liver; while in +England, where beef liver is looked upon as too coarse to eat (and falls +to the lot of the "cats-meat man," or cat butcher), sheep's is esteemed +next to calf's, and it is, in fact, more delicate than beef liver. The +nicest way to cook it is in very _thin_ slices (not the inch-thick +pieces one often sees), each slice dipped in flour and fried in pork or +bacon fat, and pork or bacon served with it. But the more economical way +is to put it in a pan, dredge it with flour, pin some fat pork over it, +and set it in a hot oven; when very brown take it out; make nice brown +gravy by pouring water in the pan and letting it boil on the stove, +stirring it well to dissolve the glaze; pour into the dish, and serve. +The heart should be stuffed with bread-crumbs, parsley, thyme, and a +_little_ onion, and baked separately. Or, for a change, you may chop the +liver up with a few sweet herbs and a little pork (onion, or not, as you +like), and some bread-crumbs. Put all together in a crock, dredge with +flour, cover, and set in a slow oven for an hour and a half; then serve, +with toasted bread around the dish. + +It is very poor economy to buy inferior meat. One pound of fine beef has +more nourishment than two of poor quality. But there is a great +difference in prices of different parts of meat, and it is better +management to choose the cheap part of fine beef than to buy the sirloin +of a poor ox even at the same price; and, by good cooking many parts not +usually chosen, and therefore sold cheaply, can be made very good. Yet +you must remember, that a piece of meat at seven cents a pound, in which +there is at least half fat and bone, such as brisket, etc., is less +economical than solid meat at ten or twelve. + +Pot roasts are very good for parts of meat not tender enough for +roasting, the "cross-rib," as some butchers term it, being very good for +this purpose; it is all solid meat, and being very lean, requires a +little fat pork, which may be laid at the bottom of the pot; or better +still, holes made in the meat and pieces of the fat drawn through, +larding in a rough way, so that they cut together. A pot roast is best +put on in an iron pot, without water, allowed to get finely brown on one +side, then turned, and when thoroughly brown on the other a little water +may be added for gravy; chop parsley or any seasoning that is +preferred. Give your roast at least three hours to cook. Ox cheek, as +the head is called, is very good, and should be very cheap; prepare it +thus: + +Clean the cheek, soak it in water six hours, and cut the meat from the +bones, which break up for soup; then take the meat, cut into neat +pieces, put it in an earthen crock, a layer of beef, some thin pieces of +pork or bacon, some onions, carrots, and turnips, cut _thin_, or chopped +fine, and sprinkled over the meat; also, some chopped parsley, a little +thyme, and bay leaf, pepper and salt, and a clove to each layer; then +more beef and a little pork, vegetables, and seasoning, as before. When +all your meat is in pour over it, if you have it, a tumbler of hard +cider and one of water, or else two of water, in which put a half gill +of vinegar. If you have no tight-fitting cover to your crock, put a +paste of flour and water over it to keep the steam in. Place the crock +in a slow oven five or six hours, and when it is taken out remove the +crust and skim. Any piece of beef cooked in this way is excellent. + +Ox heart is one of the cheapest of dishes, and really remarkably nice, +and it is much used by economical people abroad. + +The heart should be soaked in vinegar and water three or four hours, +then cut off the lobes and gristle, and stuff it with fat pork chopped, +bread-crumbs, parsley, thyme, pepper, and salt; then tie it in a cloth +and very slowly simmer it (large end up) for two hours; take it up, +remove the cloth, and flour it, and roast it a nice brown. Lay in the +pan in which it is to be roasted some fat pork to baste it. Any of this +left over is excellent hashed, or, warmed in slices with a rich brown +gravy, cannot be told from game. Another way is to stuff it with sage +and onions. It must always be served _very hot_ with hot plates and on a +very hot dish. + +Fore quarter of mutton is another very economical part of meat, if you +get your butcher to cut it so that it may not only be economical, but +really afford a choice joint. Do not then let him hack the shoulder +across, but, before he does a thing to it, get him to take the shoulder +out in a round plate-shaped joint, with knuckle attached; if he does +this well, that is, cuts it close to the bone of the ribs, you will have +a nice joint; then do not have it chopped at all; this should be roasted +in the oven very nicely, and served with onion sauce or stewed onions. +If onions are not liked, mashed turnips are the appropriate vegetable. +This joint, to be enjoyed, must be properly carved, and that is, across +the middle from the edge to the bone, the same as a leg of mutton; and +like the leg, you must learn, as I cannot describe it in words, where +the bone lies, then have that side nearest you and cut from the opposite +side. + +You have, besides this joint, another roast from the ribs, or else cut +it up into chops till you come to the part under the shoulder; from this +the breast should be separated and both either made into a good Irish +stew, or the breast prepared alone in a way I shall describe, the neck +and thin ribs being stewed or boiled. + +The neck of mutton is very tender boiled and served with parsley or +caper sauce; the liquor it is boiled in served as broth, with vegetables +and rice, or prepared as directed in a former chapter for the broth from +leg of mutton. + +The mode I am about to give of preparing breast of mutton was told me by +a Welsh lady of rank, at whose table I ate it (it appeared as a side +dish), and who said, half laughingly, "Will you take some 'fluff'? We +are very fond of it, but breast of mutton is such a despised dish I +never expect any one else to like it." I took it, on my principle of +trying everything, and did find it very good. This lady told me that, +having of course a good deal of mutton killed on her father's estate, +and the breast being always despised by the servants, she had invented a +way of using it to avoid waste. Her way was this: + +Set the breast of mutton on the fire whole, just covered with water in +which is a little salt. When it comes to the boil draw it back and let +it _simmer_ three hours; then take it up and draw out the bones, and lay +a force-meat of bread-crumbs, parsley, thyme, chopped suet, salt and +pepper all over it; double or roll it, skewer it, and coat it thickly +with egg and bread-crumbs; then bake in a moderate oven, basting it +often with nice dripping or butter; when nicely brown it is done, and +eats like the tenderest lamb. It was, when I saw it, served on a bed of +spinach. I like it better on a bed of stewed onions. + +I now give some dishes made without meat. + +RAGOUT OF CUCUMBER AND ONIONS.--Fry equal quantities of large cucumbers +and onions in slices until they are a nice brown. The cucumber will +brown more easily if cut up and put to drain some time before using; +then flour each slice. When both are brown, pour on them a cup of water, +and let them stew for half an hour; then take a good piece of butter in +which you have worked a dessert-spoonful of flour (browned); add pepper, +salt, and a little tomato catsup or stewed tomato. This is a rich-eating +dish if nicely made, and will help out cold meat or a scant quantity of +it very well. A little cold meat may be added if you have it. ONION +SOUP.--Fry six large onions cut into slices with a quarter of a pound of +butter till they are of a bright brown, then well mix in a tablespoonful +of flour, and pour on them rather more than a quart of water. Stew +gently until the onions are quite tender, season with a spoonful of salt +and a little sugar; stir in quickly a _liaison_ made with the yolks of +two eggs mixed with a gill of milk or cream (do not let it boil +afterwards), put some toast in a tureen, and serve very hot. + +PEA SOUP.--Steep some yellow split peas all night, next morning set them +on to boil with two quarts of water to a pint of peas; in the water put +a tiny bit of soda. In another pot put a large carrot, a turnip, an +onion, and a large head of celery, all cut small and covered with water. +When both peas and vegetables are tender, put them together, season with +salt, pepper, and a little sugar, and let them gently stew till thick +enough; then strain through a colander, rubbing the vegetables well, and +return to the pot while you fry some sippets of bread a crisp brown; +then stir into the soup two ounces of butter in which you have rolled a +little flour. + +This soup is simply delicious, and the fact of it being _maigre_ will +not be remembered. + +POTATO SOUP is another of this good kind, for meat is scarcely required, +so good is it without. + +Boil some potatoes, then rub them through a colander into two quarts of +hot milk (skimmed does quite well); have some fine-chopped parsley and +onion, add both with salt and pepper, stew three quarters of an hour; +then stir in a large piece of butter, and beat two eggs with a little +cold milk, stir in quickly, and serve with fried bread. There should be +potatoes enough to make the soup as thick as cream. Do not be +prejudiced against a dish because there is no meat in it, and you think +it cannot be nourishing. This chapter is not written for those with whom +meat, or money, is plentiful; and if it be true that man is nourished +"not by what he eats, but by what he assimilates," and, according to an +American medical authority, "what is eaten with distaste is not +assimilated" (Dr. Hall), it follows that an enjoyable dinner, even +without meat, will be more nourishing than one forced down because it +lacks savor; that potato soup will be more nourishing than potatoes and +butter, with a cup of milk to drink, because more enjoyable. Yet it +costs no more, for the soup can be made without the eggs if they are +scarce. + +Or say bread and butter and onions. They will not be very appetizing, +especially if they had to be a frequent meal, yet onion soup is made +from the same materials, and in France is a very favorite dish, even +with those well able to put meat in it if they wished. + + + + +CHAPTER XV. + +A FEW THINGS IT IS WELL TO REMEMBER. + + +EVERY housekeeper has pet "wrinkles" of her own which she thinks are +especially valuable; some are known to all the world, others are new to +many. So it may be with mine; but, on the chance that some few things +are as new to my friends as they were to me, I jot them down without any +pretense of order or regularity. + +Lemons will keep fresher and better in water than any other way. Put +them in a crock, cover them with water. They will in winter keep two or +three months, and the peel be as fresh as the day they were put in. Take +care, of course, that they do not get frosted. In summer change the +water twice a week; they will keep a long time. + +In grating nutmegs begin at the flower end; if you commence at the +other, there will be a hole all the way through. + +Tea or coffee made hot (not at all scorched), before water is added, are +more fragrant and stronger. Thus, by putting three spoonfuls of tea in +the pot and setting in a warm place before infusing, it will be as +strong as if you make tea with four spoonfuls without warming it, and +much more fragrant. + +Vegetables that are strong can be made much milder by tying a bit of +bread in a clean rag and boiling it with them. + +Bread dough is just as good made the day before it is used; thus, a +small family can have fresh bread one day, rolls the next, by putting +the dough in a cold place enveloped in a damp cloth. In winter, kept +cold, yet not in danger of freezing, it will keep a week. + +Celery seed takes the place of celery for soup or stews when it is +scarce; parsley seed of parsley. + +Green beans, gherkins, etc., put down when plentiful in layers of rock +salt, will keep crisp and green for months, and can be taken out and +pickled when convenient. + +Lemon or orange peel grated and mixed with powdered sugar and a squeeze +of its own juice (the sugar making it into paste) is excellent to keep +for flavoring; put it into a little pot and it will keep for a year. + +Bread that is very stale may be made quite fresh for an hour or two by +dipping it quickly into milk or water, and putting it in a brisk oven +till _quite hot through_. It must be eaten at once, or it will be as +stale as ever when cold. + +Meat to be kept in warm weather should be rubbed over with salad oil, +every crevice filled with ginger; meat that is for roasting or frying is +much better preserved in this way than with salt; take care that every +part of the surface has a coat of oil. Steaks or chops cut off, which +always keep badly, should be dipped into warm butter or even dripping, +if oil is not handy (the object being to exclude the air), and then hung +up till wanted. + +Mutton in cold weather should be hung four or five weeks in a place not +subject to changes of temperature, and before it is so hung, every +crevice filled with ginger and thoroughly dredged with flour, which +must be then rubbed in with the hand till the surface is quite dry. This +is the English fashion of keeping venison. + +It may be useful for those who burn kerosene to know that when their +lamps smell, give a bad light, and smoke, it is not necessary to buy new +burners. Put the old ones in an old saucepan with water and a +tablespoonful of soda, let them boil half an hour, wipe them, and your +trouble will be over. + +Meat that has become slightly tainted may be quite restored by washing +it in water in which is a teaspoonful of borax, cutting away every part +in the least discolored. + +In summer when meat comes from the butcher's, if it is not going to be +used the same day, it should be washed over with vinegar. + +Poultry in summer should always have a piece of charcoal tied in a rag +placed in the stomach, to be removed before cooking. Pieces of charcoal +should also be put in the refrigerator and changed often. + +Oyster shells put one at a time in a stove that is "clinkered" will +clean the bricks entirely. They should be put in when the fire is +burning brightly. + +Salt and soapstone powder (to be bought at the druggist's) mend fire +brick; use equal quantities, make into a paste with water, and cement +the brick; they will be as strong as new ones. + +Ink spilled on carpets may be entirely removed by rubbing while wet with +blotting paper, using fresh as it soils. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. + +ON SOME TABLE PREJUDICES. + + +MANY people have strong prejudices against certain things which they +have never even tasted, or which they do frequently take and like as a +part of something else, without knowing it. How common it is to hear and +see untraveled people declare that they dislike garlic, and could not +touch anything with it in. Yet those very people will take +Worcestershire sauce, in which garlic is actually predominant, with +everything they eat; and think none but English pickles eatable, which +owe much of their excellence to the introduction of a _soupcon_ of +garlic. Therefore I beg those who actually only know garlic from hearsay +abuse of it, or from its presence on the breath of some inveterate +garlic eater, to give it a fair trial when it appears in a recipe. It is +just one of those things that require the most delicate handling, for +which the French term a "_suspicion_" is most appreciated; it should +only be a suspicion, its presence should never be pronounced. As Blot +once begged his readers, "Give garlic a fair trial in a _remolade_ +sauce." (Montpellier butter beaten into mayonnaise is a good _remolade_ +for cold meat or fish.) + +Curry is one of those things against which many are strongly prejudiced, +and I am inclined to think it is quite an acquired taste, but a taste +which is an enviable one to its possessors; for them there is endless +variety in all they eat. The capabilities of curry are very little known +in this country, and, as the taste for it is so limited, I will not do +more in its defense than indicate a pleasant use to which it may be put, +and in which form it would be a welcome condiment to many to whom "a +curry," pure and simple, would be obnoxious. I once knew an Anglo-Indian +who used curry as most people use cayenne; it was put in a pepper-box, +and with it he would at times pepper his fish or kidneys, even his eggs. +Used in this way, it imparts a delightful piquancy to food, and is +neither hot nor "spicy." + +Few people are so prejudiced as the English generally, and the +stay-at-home Americans; but the latter are to be taught by travel, the +Englishman rarely. + +The average Briton leaves his island shores with the conviction that he +will get nothing fit to eat till he gets back, and that he will have to +be uncommonly careful once across the channel, or he will be having +fricasseed frogs palmed on him for chicken. Poor man! in his horror of +frogs, he does not know that the Paris restaurateur who should give the +costly frog for chicken, would soon end in the bankruptcy court. + +"If I could only get a decent dinner, a good roast and plain potato, I +would like Paris much better," said an old Englishman to me once in that +gay city. + +"But surely you can." + +"No; I have been to restaurants of every class, and called for beefsteak +and roast beef, but have never got the real article, although it's my +belief," said he, leaning forward solemnly, "that I have eaten _horse_ +three times this week." Of course the Englishman of rank, who has spent +half his life on the continent, is not at all the _average_ Englishman. + +Americans think the hare and rabbits, of which the English make such +good use, very mean food indeed, and if they are unprejudiced enough to +try them, from the fact that they are never well cooked, they dislike +them, which prejudice the English reciprocate by looking on squirrels as +being as little fit for food as a rat. And a familiar instance of +prejudice from ignorance carried even to insanity, is that of the Irish +in 1848, starving rather than eat the "yaller male," sent them by +generous American sympathizers; yet they come here and soon get over +that dislike. Not so the French, who look on oatmeal and Indian meal as +most unwholesome food. "_Ca pese sur l'estomac, ca creuse l'estomac_," I +heard an old Frenchwoman say, trying to dissuade a mother from giving +her children mush. + +The moral of all of which is, that for our comfort's sake, and the +general good we should avoid unreasonable prejudices against unfamiliar +food. We of course have a right to our honest dislikes; but to condemn +things because we have heard them despised, is prejudice. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII. + +A CHAPTER OF ODDS AND ENDS--VALEDICTORY. + + +I HAVE alluded, in an earlier chapter, to the fact that many +inexperienced cooks are afraid of altering recipes; a few words on this +subject may not be out of place. As a rule, a recipe should be +faithfully followed in all important points; for instance, in making +soup you cannot because you are short of the given quantity of meat, put +the same amount of water as directed for the full quantity, without +damaging your soup; but you may easily reduce water and _every other +ingredient_ in the same proportion; and, in mere matters of flavoring, +you may vary to suit circumstances. If you are told to use cloves, and +have none, a bit of mace may be substituted. + +If you read a recipe, and it calls for something you have not, consider +whether that something has anything to do with the substance of the +dish, or whether it is merely an accessory for which something else can +be substituted. For instance, if you are ordered to use cream in a +sauce, milk with a larger amount of well-washed butter may take its +place; but if you are told to use cream for charlotte russe or trifles, +there is no way in which you could make milk serve, since it is not an +accessory but the chief part of those dishes. For a cake in which cream +is used, butter whipped to a cream may take its place. Wine is usually +optional in savory dishes; it gives richness only. + +Again, in cakes be very careful the exact proportions of flour, eggs, +and milk are observed; of butter you can generally use more or less, +having a more or less rich cake in proportion. In any but plain cup +cakes (which greatly depend on soda and acid for their lightness) never +lessen the allowance of eggs; never add milk if a cake is too stiff (but +an extra egg may always be used), unless milk is ordered in the recipe, +when more or less may be used as needed. Flavoring may be always varied. + +In reducing a recipe always reduce _every ingredient_, and it can make +no difference in the results. Sometimes, in cookery books, you are told +to use articles not frequently found in ordinary kitchens; for instance, +a larding-needle (although that can be bought for twenty-five cents at +any house-furnishing store, and should always be in a kitchen); but, in +case you have not one for meat, you may manage by making small cuts and +inserting slips of bacon. + +Another article that is very useful, but seldom, if ever, to be found in +small kitchens, is a salamander; but when you wish to brown the top of a +dish, and putting it in the oven would not do, or the oven is not quick +enough to serve, an iron shovel, made nearly red, and a few red cinders +in it, is a very good salamander. It must be held over the article that +requires browning near enough to color it, yet not to burn. + +In the recipes I have given nothing is required that cannot be obtained, +with more or less ease, in New York. For syrups, fruit juices, etc., +apply to your druggist; if he has not them he will tell you where to +obtain them. We often make up our minds that because a thing is not +commonly used in this country, it is impossible to get it. Really there +are very few things not to be got in New York City to the intelligent +seeker. You need an article of French or Italian or may be English +grocery, that your grocer, a first-class one, perhaps, has not, and you +make up your mind you cannot get it. But go into the quarters where +French people live, and you can get everything belonging to the French +_cuisine_. So prejudiced are the French in favor of the productions of +_la belle France_, that they do not believe in our parsley or our chives +or garlic or shallots; for I know at least one French grocer who imports +them for his customers. On being asked why he brought them from France +to a country where those very things were plentiful, he answered: + +"Oh, French herbs are much finer." + +Needless to say tarragon is one of the herbs so imported, and can thus +be bought; but, as several New Jersey truck gardeners grow all kinds of +French herbs, they can be got in Washington Market, and most druggists +keep them dried; but for salads, Montpellier butter, and some other +uses, the dried herb would not do, although for flavoring it would +serve; but the far better way is to grow them for yourself, as I have +done. Any large seedsman will supply you with burnet, tarragon, and +borage (very useful for salads, punch, etc.) seeds, and if you live in +the country, have an herb bed; if in town, there are few houses where +there is not ground enough to serve for the purpose; but even in these +few houses one can have a box of earth in the kitchen window, in which +your seeds will flourish. + +Parsley is a thing in almost daily request in winter, yet it is very +expensive to buy it constantly for the sake of using the small spray +that often suffices. It is a good plan, therefore, in fall, to get a few +roots, plant them in a pot or box, and they will flourish all winter, +if kept where they will not freeze, and be ready for garnishing at any +minute. + +Always, as far as your means allow, have every convenience for cooking. +By having utensils proper for every purpose you save a great deal of +work and much vexation of spirit. Yet it should be no excuse for bad +work that such utensils are not at hand. A willing and intelligent cook +will make the best of what she has. Apropos of this very thing Gouffe +relates that a friend of his, an "artist" of renown, was sent for to the +chateau of a Baron Argenteuil, who had taken a large company with him, +unexpectedly crowding the chateau in every part. He was shown into a +dark passage in which a plank was suspended from the ceiling, and told +this was to be his kitchen. He had to fashion his own utensils, for +there was nothing provided, and his pastry he had to bake in a +frying-pan--besides building two monumental _plats_ on that board--and +prepare a cold _entree_. But he cheerfully set to work to overcome +difficulties, achieved his task, and was rewarded by the plaudits of the +diners. Such difficulties as these our servants never have to encounter, +and a cheerful endeavor to make the best of everything should be the +rule. Yet, let us spare them all the labor we can, or rather make it as +easy and pleasant as possible; they will be more proud of their +well-furnished kitchen, more cheerful in it, than they will of one where +everything for their convenience is grudged, and such pride and +cheerfulness will be your gain. + +There is always a great deal of talk about servants in America, how bad +and inefficient they are, how badly they contrast with those of England. +Certainly, they are not so efficient as those of the older country; how +could they be? There, girls who are intended for servants have ever held +before their eyes what they may or may not do in the future calling, and +how it is to be done. But take one of these orderly, efficient girls, +put her in an American family as general servant or as cook, where two +are kept, washing and ironing to do, and a variety of other work, and +see how your English servant would stare at your requirements. She has +been accustomed to her own line of work at home; if housemaid, she has +been dressed for the day at noon; if cook, she has never done even her +own washing. + +She may, and will no doubt, fall into the way of the country, after a +while, and on account of her early habits of respect, will make a good +servant perhaps. But many of them would be quite indignant at being +asked to do the average servant's work here. I am speaking now of the +_trained_ servants; but, comparing the London "maid-of-all-work" or +"slavey" with our own general servants, and considering how much more is +expected of the latter, the comparison seems to me vastly in the favor +of our own Bridgets. We may rest assured, however smoothly the wheels of +household management glide along in wealthy families across the water, +people who can only keep one or two have all our troubles with servants +and a few added, and their faults are just as general a subject of +conversation among ladies. + +France (out of Paris, from Parisian servants deliver me!) and Germany +seem the favored lands where one servant does the work of three or four. +Yet even they, are, they say, degenerating. Let us, then, be contented +and make the best of what we have, assured that even Biddy is not so +hopeless as she is painted. Kindness (not weakness), firmness, and +patience work wonders, even with the roughest Emerald that ever crossed +the sea. + +I have said somewhere else that you must beware of attempting too much +at once; perfect yourself in one thing before you attempt another. Take +breaded chops or fried oysters, make opportunities for having them +rather often, and do not rest satisfied until you have them as well +fried as you have ever seen them anywhere; "practice makes perfect," and +you certainly will achieve perfection if you are not discouraged by one +failure. But above all things never make experiments for company; let +them be made when it really matters little whether you succeed or not, +and let your experiments be on a _small_ scale; don't attempt to fry a +_large_ dish of oysters or chops until it is a very easy task, or make +more than half a pound of puff paste at first; for if you fail with a +large task before you, you will be tired and disheartened, hate the +sight of what you are doing, and, as a consequence, not be likely to +return to it very soon. The same may be said of cooks; some of them are +very fond of experiments, which taste I should always encourage; but do +not let them jump from one experiment to the other; if they try a dish +and fail, they often make up their minds that the fault is not theirs, +that it is not worth while to "bother" with it. Here your knowledge will +be of service; you will show them that it can be done, how it should be +done, and order the dish cook failed in, frequently, giving it +sufficient surveillance to prevent your family suffering from her +inexperience; for, as a witty Frenchman said of Mme. du Deffaud's cook, +"Between her and Brinvilliers there is only the difference of +intention." + +Few things add more to a man or woman's social reputation than the fact +that they keep a good table. It need not be one where + + "The strong table groans + Beneath the smoking sirloin stretched immense;" + +but a table where whatever you do have will be good, be it pork and +beans, or salmi; the pork and beans would satisfy a Bostonian, the salmi +Grimod de la Reyniere himself. I do not admit with Di Walcott that + + "The turnpike road to people's hearts I find + Lies through their mouths, or I mistake mankind." + +But it is a fact that good living--by this I do not mean extravagant +living--presupposes good breeding. Well-bred people sometimes live +badly; but ill-bred people seldom or ever live well, in the right sense +of the term. + +Now, by way of valedictory, let me repeat that I do not think a lady's +best or proper place is the kitchen; but it is quite possible to have a +perfectly served table, yet spend very little time there. Only that one +little hour a day that Talleyrand, the busy man full of intrigue and +statecraft, found time to spend with his cook, would insure your table +being well served. For, after devoting say a few winter months to +perfecting yourself in a few things, you will be able to teach your +cook, who is often ambitious to excel if put in the right way. A word +here about cooks. + +The knowledge that if they fail to do a thing well you will do it +yourself, will often put them on their mettle to do their best; while +the feeling that you don't know, will make them careless. + +Servants have a great deal more _amour propre_ than people imagine; +therefore, stimulate it by judicious praise and appreciation; let them +think that to send in a dish perfect, is a glory to themselves as well +as a pleasure to you. While careful to remark when alone with them upon +any fault that results from carelessness, be equally careful to give all +the praise you can, and repeat to them complimentary remarks that may +have been made on their skill. Servants are usually--such is the +weakness of feminine nature, whether in the drawing-room or the +kitchen--very sensitive to the praise or blame of the gentlemen of the +family. Indulge poor humanity a little when you honestly can. + + + + + INDEX + + + PAGE + Almond creams, 93 + + Altering recipes, 111, 112 + + Asparagus, to boil, 66 + + + Baba, 86 + Small, 87 + Syrup for, 87 + + Batter for frying a la Careme, 59 + " " " " Provencale, 60 + + Beef, B[oe]uf a la jardiniere, 74 + " au Gratin, 75 + Filet de b[oe]uf Chateaubriand, 49 + Fritadella, 81 + Little breakfast dish of, 78 + Miroton of, 76 + Olives of, 79 + Pseudo-beefsteak, 75 + Ragout of cold, 78 + Salmi of cold, 73 + Simplest way to warm a joint, 77 + To warm over a large piece, 78 + Sirloin, to make two dishes, 49 + + Biscuit glace, a la Charles Dickens, 85 + " " " Thackeray, 85 + + Blanc for white sauce, 31 + + Boiling, asparagus, 66 + Cabbage, 65 + Potatoes, 66 + Peas, 65 + Rules for meat, 65 + + Bouchees de dames, 88 + To ice, 89 + + Bread, 12 + Baking, 14 + Cause of failure, 15 + " of thick crust, 14 + Compressed yeast, 15 + Kneading, 14 + Oven heating, 14 + Remarks, 12 + Rules of time for rising, 14 + To set sponge, 13 + + Bread-crumbs for frying, 56 + + Bread dough, to keep a day or two, 106 + " " for pie crust, 97 + Soufflee, 20 + + Brioche, 18 + Jockey Club, recipe for, 19 + for summer pastry, 19, 20 + + Broiling, 60 + Chickens and birds, 61 + + Brown flour, 34 + Sauce, 71 + + Butter, maitre d'hotel, 32 + Montpellier, 33 + Ravigotte, 33 + + + Cabbage, to boil, 65 + + Cakes, Baba, 86 + Bouchees de dames, 83 + Savarins, 88 + + Candies, 92 + Chocolate creams, 94 + Cream almonds, 93 + Cream walnuts, 93 + Fondant, 92 + Fondant panache, 93 + Punch drops, 94 + Simple French, 92 + Tutti frutti, 92 + Vanilla almond cream, 92 + Walnut cream, 92 + + Celeraic, or turnip-rooted celery, 54 + + Celery seed for soup, 106 + + Celery cream soup, 68 + + Chateaubriand, filet de b[oe]uf, 49 + + Chicken, 48 + Broiling, 60 + Cold, 49 + Pie, 38 + Potted, 44 + Roasting, 48 + Use of the feet, 48 + + Clinkered fire-bricks, 107 + + Cold meat salmi, 73 + Various ways of warming, 72-81 + + Coloring for candy and icing, 95 + + Company to lunch, and nothing in + the house, 44 + + Cromesquis of cold lamb, 75 + + Crumbs for frying, 56 + + Cucumber and onion ragout, 102 + + Curacoa, to make, 89 + + Curry, 108 + + + Deviled meats, 80 + + Dishes made without meat, 102 + + Dripping, to clarify, 59 + + + Feuilletonage, 23 + + Fire-bricks, to remove clinkers from, 107 + To mend, 107 + + Flavoring, 70 + + Flounders, to bone, 56 + As filet de sole, 56 + + Forequarter of mutton, 101 + + Frangipane tartlets, 26 + + French herbs, 113 + + Friandises, 84 + + Fritadella of cold meat, twenty + recipes in one, 81 + + Frying, 55 + Batter a la Careme, 59 + " " Provencale, 60 + Crumbing, 56 + Filet de sole, 56 + Flounders, 56 + Oil for, 58 + Oysters, 57 + Remarks on, 55 + To clarify dripping for, 59 + To test the heat of fat for, 57 + + + Galantine, 39 + + Garlic, 108 + + Glaze, 30 + To glaze ham, tongue, etc., 32 + + Gouffe's pot-au-feu, 68 + Rules for ovens, 27 + + Gravy, 29-63 + + Grating nutmegs, 105 + + + Ham, to boil, 65 + To glaze, 32 + To pot, 43 + + Hash, 97 + + Heart, beef, 100 + Sheep's, 99 + + + Iced soufflee, 85 + A la Byron, 84 + + Icing, 89 + + Ink, to remove from carpets, 107 + + + Jellied fish or oysters, 41 + + Jelly for cold chicken, 47 + + Jelly from pork, 31 + + + Kerosene lamps, 107 + + Keeping meat, 106 + Poultry, 107 + Dough, 106 + + Kitchen conveniences, 114 + + Kreuznach horns, 16 + + Kringles, 17 + + + Lamb, cromesquis of, 75 + + Lamps, 107 + + Larding needle, 112 + + Leg of mutton, 52 + A la Soubise, 52 + Boiled, 52 + + Lemons, to keep, 105 + Peels, 106 + + Little dinners, 50 + + Liver, sheep's, 98 + + Luncheons, 35 + + + Maitre d'hotel butter, 32 + + Management in small families, 47 + + Maraschino, to make, 90 + + Marrow from soup bone, 98 + + Mayonnaise, new, 42 + + Meat, to keep, 106 + Salad, 52 + + Mephistophelian sauce, 81 + + Miroton of beef, 76 + + Montpellier butter, 33 + + Mushroom powder, 29 + + Mutton broth, 52 + Forequarter, 101 + Leg, 52 + + + Neck of mutton, 101 + + Noyeau, 90 + + Nutmegs, best way to grate, 105 + + + Omelet, new, 45 + + Onion soup, maigre, 103 + + Ornamenting meat pies, 37 + + Ovens, 14 + Gouffe's rules for heating, 27 + + Oysters, to fry, 57 + In jelly, 41 + + Ox cheek, 100 + + + Panache fondant, 93 + + Parsley seed for soup, 106 + + Parsley in winter, 113 + + Paste, puff, 22 + To handle, 24 + + Pastry tablets, 26 + + Pate a la Careme for frying, 59 + " " Provencale, 60 + + Peas, to boil, 66 + + Pease soup, maigre, 103 + + Pie, bread dough for crust, 97 + Chicken, to eat cold, 38 + Fruit, 24 + English raised, 38 + To "raise" a, 39 + Veal and ham, 38 + Windsor, 36 + + Pork for jelly, 31 + + Potato salad, 54 + Snow, 45 + Soup, maigre, 103 + To warm over, 46 + + Pot-au-feu, 68 + + Pot roasts, 99 + + Potted meats, 43 + + Punch drops, 94 + + + Ragout of cold meat, 78 + Of cucumber and onion, 102 + + Ravigotte, 33 + + Remarks, preliminary, 1-12 + On boiling, 65 + On bread-making, 12 + On frying, 54 + On kitchen and servants, 114 + On little dinners, 50 + On luncheons, 35 + On maigre dishes, 104 + On management in small families, 47 + On sauces and flavoring, 70 + + Remarks on soups, 67 + On table prejudices, 108 + On true economy in buying meat, 99 + On roasting, 62 + + Rissolettes, 25 + + Rolls, 15 + + Roux, 34 + + Rusks, 16 + + + Salad, Celeraic, 54 + Potato, 54 + Cold meat, 52 + + Salamander, substitute for, 112 + + Sauces, 70 + Flavoring, 70 + Brown or espagnole, 71 + Mephistophelian, 81 + White, 71 + Mayonnaise, 42 + + Savarin (cake), 88 + + Soufflee bread, 20 + Iced, 85 + A la Byron, 84 + + Soup bone, 96 + + Soup, celery cream, 68 + Consomme, 68 + Pot-au-feu, 68 + Onion, 103 + Pease, 103 + Potato, 103 + To color, 67 + To clear stock, 66 + + Sugar boiling for candy, 91 + + + Tainted meat, to restore, 107 + + To make strong vegetables milder, 106 + + Tutti frutti candy, 92 + + + Vanilla almond cream, 92 + + Veal, 53 + + + Warming over, 72 + + What to do with scraps, 45 + + Where to buy articles not in general + use, 112 + + Why meat does not brown in cooking, 62 + + Windsor pie, 36 + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Culture and Cooking, by Catherine Owen + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CULTURE AND COOKING *** + +***** This file should be named 29982.txt or 29982.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/9/9/8/29982/ + +Produced by Turgut Dincer and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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