VEGETABLE MARROW SOUP.—Take a large vegetable marrow, peel it, cut it open, remove all the pips, and place it in a stew-pan with about two ounces of fresh butter. Add a brimming teaspoonful of powdered sugar, a little grated nutmeg, and pepper and salt. Keep turning the pieces of vegetable marrow over in the butter, taking care that they do not at all turn colour. After frying these pieces gently for five or ten minutes, add some boiling milk, and let the whole simmer gently till it can be rubbed through a wire sieve. Care must be taken not to get this soup too thin, as the vegetable marrow itself contains a large quantity of water. Season with pepper and salt, and serve fried or toasted bread with the soup.

VEGETABLE SOUP.—(See JARDINIERE SOUP.)

VERMICELLI SOUP.—Take a quarter of a pound of vermicelli and break it up into small pieces, throw it into boiling water, and let it boil for five minutes to get rid of the dirt and floury taste, then throw it immediately into about a quart of clear soup. The vermicelli must be taken from the boiling water and thrown into the boiling soup at once. If you were to boil the vermicelli, strain it off, and put it by to add to the soup, you would find it would stick together in one lump and be spoilt.

VERMICELLI SOUP, WHITE.—The vermicelli must be thrown into white soup instead of clear soup. (See WHITE SOUP.)

WHITE SOUP.—Just as in ordinary white soup the secret of success is to have some strongly reduced stock, so in vegetarian white soup it is essential that we should have a small quantity of liquid strongly impregnated with the flavour of vegetables. For this purpose, place an onion, the white part of a head of celery, and a slice of turnip in a stew-pan with a little butter, and fry them till they are tender without becoming brown. Now add sufficient water to enable you to boil them, and let the water boil away till very little is left. Now rub this through a wire sieve and add it to a quart of milk in which a couple of bay-leaves have been boiled. Thicken the soup with a little white roux, add a suspicion of nutmeg, and also, if possible, a little cream. Flavour with pepper and salt. Serve fried or toasted bread with the soup.



CHAPTER II.

SAUCES.

SAUCE ALLEMANDE.—Take a pint of butter sauce—(see BUTTER SAUCE)—and add to it four yolks of eggs. In order to do this you must beat up the yolks separately in a basin and add the hot butter sauce gradually, otherwise the yolks of eggs will curdle and the sauce will be spoilt. In fact, it must be treated exactly like custard, and in warming up the sauce it is often a good plan, if you have no bain-marie, to put the sauce in a jug and place the jug in a saucepan of boiling water. The sauce should be flavoured with a little essence of mushroom if possible. Essence of mushroom can be made from the trimmings of mushrooms, but mushroom ketchup must not be used on account of the colour. Essence of mushroom can be made by placing the trimmings of mushrooms in a saucepan, stewing them gently, and extracting the flavour. The large black mushrooms, however, are not suited. In addition to this essence of mushroom, a little lemon juice—allowing the juice of half a lemon to every pint, should be added to the sauce, as well as a slight suspicion of nutmeg, a pint of sauce requiring about a dozen grates of a nutmeg. A little cream is a great improvement to this sauce, but is not absolutely necessary. The sauce should be perfectly smooth. Should it therefore contain any lumps, which is not unfrequently the case in butter sauce, pass the sauce through a sieve with a wooden spoon and then put it by in a bain-marie, or warm it up in a jug as directed.

ALMOND SAUCE.—This is suitable for puddings. The simplest way of making it is to make, say half a pint of butter sauce, or, cheaper, thicken half a pint of milk with a little corn-flour, sweeten it with white sugar, and then add a few drops of essence of almonds. About a dozen drops will be sufficient if the essence is strong, but essence of almonds varies greatly in strength. The sauce can be coloured pink with a few drops of cochineal.

ALMOND SAUCE (CLEAR).—Thicken half a pint of water with a little corn-flour, sweeten it with white sugar, add a dozen drops of essence of almonds and a few drops of cochineal to colour it pink. The sauce is very suitable to pour over custard puddings made in a basin or cup and turned out on to a dish. It is also very cheap.

APPLE SAUCE.—Peel say a dozen apples; cut them into quarters; and be very careful in removing all the core, as many a child is choked through carelessness in this respect. Stew the apples in a little water till they become a pulp, placing with them half a dozen cloves and half a dozen strips of the yellow part only of the outside of the rind of a fresh lemon of the size and thickness of the thumb-nail; sweeten with brown sugar, that known as Porto Rico being the most economical. Add a small piece of butter before serving.

ARROWROOT SAUCE.—Thicken half a pint of water with about a dessertspoonful of arrowroot and sweeten it with white sugar. The sauce can be flavoured by rubbing a few lumps of sugar on the outside of a lemon, or with a few drops of essence of vanilla, or with the addition of a little sherry or spirit, the best spirit being rum. This sauce can, of course, be coloured pink with cochineal.

ARTICHOKE SAUCE.—Proceed exactly as if you were making artichoke soup, only make the puree thicker by using less liquid. A simple artichoke sauce can be made by boiling down a few Jerusalem artichokes to a pulp, rubbing them through a wire sieve, and flavouring with pepper and salt.

ASPARAGUS SAUCE.—Boil a bundle of asparagus and rub all the green, tender part through a wire sieve, till it is a thick pulp, flavour with a little pepper and salt, add a small piece of butter, and a little spinach extract (vegetable colouring sold in bottles) in order to give it a good colour.

BREAD SAUCE.—Take some dry crumb of bread, and rub through a wire sieve. The simplest plan is to turn the wire sieve upside down on a large sheet of paper. The bread must be stale, and stale pieces can be put by for this purpose. Next take, say, a pint of milk, and let it boil; then throw in the bread-crumbs and let them boil in the milk. This is the secret of good bread sauce. Add a dozen peppercorns, and place a whole onion in the saucepan containing the bread and milk, and place the saucepan beside the fire in order to allow the bread-crumbs to swell. It will be found that though at starting the bread sauce was quite thin and milky, yet after a time it becomes thick. Take out the onion, add a little piece of butter, stir it up, and serve. A little cream is a great improvement, but is not absolutely necessary. This sauce, though very simple, requires care: Many persons will probably recollect having met with bread sauce which in appearance resembled a poultice too much to be agreeable either to the palate or the eye.

BUTTER SAUCE.—This is the most important of all the sauces with which we have to deal. The great mistake made by the vast majority of women cooks is that they will use milk. They thicken a pint of milk with a little butter and flour, and then call it melted butter, and, as a rule, send to table enough for twenty persons when only two or three are dining. As butter sauce will be served with the majority of vegetables, we would call the attention of vegetarians to the fact that, as a rule, ordinary cookery-books take for granted that vegetables will be served with the meat. When therefore vegetables are served separately, and are intended to be eaten with bread as a course by themselves, some alteration must be made in the method of serving them. Again, vegetarians should bear in mind that, except in cases where poverty necessitates rigid economy, a certain amount of butter may be considered almost a necessity, should the meal be wished to be both wholesome and nourishing. Francatelli, who was chef-de-cuisine to the Earl of Chesterfield, and was also chief cook to the Queen and chef at the Reform Club, and afterwards manager of the Freemasons' Tavern, in writing on this subject observes:—"Butter sauce, or, as it is more absurdly called, melted butter, is the foundation of the whole of the following sauces, and requires very great care in its preparation. Though simple, it is nevertheless a very useful and agreeable sauce when properly made. So far from this being usually the case, it is too generally left to assistants to prepare, as an insignificant matter; the result is therefore seldom satisfactory. When a large quantity of butter sauce is required, put four ounces of fresh butter into a middle-sized stew-pan, with some grated nutmeg and minionette pepper; to these add four ounces of sifted flour, knead the whole well together, and moisten with a pint of cold spring water; stir the sauce on the fire till it boils, and after having kept it gently boiling for twenty minutes (observing that it be not thicker than the consistency of common white sauce), proceed to mix in one pound and a half of sweet fresh butter, taking care to stir the sauce quickly the whole time of the operation. Should it appear to turn oily, add now and then a spoonful of cold spring water; finish with the juice of half a lemon, and salt to palate; then pass the sauce through a tammy into a large bain-marie for use."

We have quoted the recipe of the late M. Francatelli in full, as we believe it is necessary to refer to some very great authority in order to knock out the prejudice from the minds of many who think that they not only can themselves cook, but teach others, but who are bound in the chains of prejudice and tradition which, too often, in the most simple recipes, lead them to follow in the footsteps of their grandmothers.

Real butter sauce can be made as follows, on a small scale:—Take a claret-glass of water, and about a small teaspoonful of flour mixed with rather more than the same quantity of butter, and mix this in the water over the fire till it is of the consistency of very thin gruel. If it is thicker than this, add a little more water. Now take any quantity of butter, and gradually dissolve as much as you can in this thin gruel, adding say half an ounce at a time, till the sauce becomes a rich oily compound. After a time, if you add too much butter, the sauce will curdle and turn oily, as described by Francatelli.

Of course, in everyday life it is not necessary to have the butter sauce so rich, still it is simply ridiculous to thicken a pint of milk, or a pint of water, with a little butter and flour, and then call it butter sauce or melted butter. Suppose we have a large white cabbage, like those met with in the West of England, and we are going to make a meal off it in conjunction with plenty of bread. Suppose the cabbage is sufficiently large for six persons, surely half a pound of butter is not an excessive quantity to use in making butter sauce for the purpose. Yet prejudice is such that if we use half a pound of butter for the butter sauce, housekeepers consider it extravagant. On the other hand, if the butter were placed on the table, and the six persons helped themselves, and ate bread and butter with the cabbage and finished the half-pound, it would not be considered extravagant. Of course, this is simply prejudice.

A simple way of making melted butter is as follows:—Take half a pint of cold water, put it in a saucepan, and add sufficient white roux, or butter and flour mixed, till it is of the consistency of thin gruel. Now gradually dissolve in this, adding a little piece at a time, as much butter as you can afford; add a suspicion of nutmeg, a little pepper and salt, and a few drops of lemon-juice from a fresh lemon, if you have one in use.

BUTTER, MELTED, OR OILED BUTTER.—Melted butter, properly speaking, is rarely met with in this country, but is a common everyday sauce on the Continent. It is simply what it says. A piece of butter is placed in a little sauce-boat and placed in the oven till the butter runs to oil, and then sent to table with all kinds of fish with which in our present work we have nothing to do; but it is also sent to table with all kinds of vegetables, such as French artichokes, &c.; sometimes a spoonful of French capers is added to the oiled butter.

BUTTER, BLACK, OR BEURRE NOIR.—Take two ounces of butter, and dissolve it in a frying-pan, and let it frizzle till the butter turns a brown colour; then add a tablespoonful of French vinegar, a teaspoonful of chopped capers, a teaspoonful of Harvey's sauce, and a teaspoonful of mushroom ketchup. Let it remain on the fire till the acidity of the vinegar is removed by evaporation. This is a very delicious sauce, and can be served with Jerusalem artichokes boiled whole, fried eggs, &c.

CAPER SAUCE.—Make some butter sauce, and to every half-pint of sauce add a dessertspoonful of chopped French capers. If the sauce is liked sharp, add some of the vinegar from the bottle of capers.

CARROT SAUCE.—Proceed exactly as in carrot soup, using less liquid.

CAULIFLOWER SAUCE.—Proceed exactly as in cauliflower soup, using less liquid.

CELERY SAUCE.—Proceed exactly as in celery soup, only using less liquid. The thicker this sauce is the better.

CHERRY SAUCE.—Take a quarter of a pound of dried cherries, and put them into a small stew-pan, with a dessertspoonful of black currant jelly, a small stick of cinnamon, with half a dozen cloves, and add rather less than half a pint of water, and let the whole simmer gently for about ten minutes, when you must take out the spices and send the rest to table.

N.B.—If wine is not objected to in cooking, it is a very good plan to add claret instead of water.

CHESTNUT SAUCE.—Proceed as in making chestnut soup, using as little liquid as possible, so as to make the sauce thick.

CINNAMON SAUCE.—The simplest way of making cinnamon sauce is to sweeten some butter sauce with some white sugar, and then add a few drops of essence of cinnamon. The sauce can be coloured pink with a little cochineal. A little wine is an improvement. The sauce can also be made by breaking up and boiling a stick of cinnamon in some water, and then using the water to make some butter sauce.

COCOANUT SAUCE.—Grate the white, part of a cocoanut very finely, and boil it till tender in a very small quantity of water; add about an equal quantity of white sugar as there was cocoa-nut; mix in either the yolk of an egg or a tablespoonful of cream. A little lemon juice is an improvement.

CUCUMBER SAUCE.—Take two or three small cucumbers, peel them, slice them, and place them in a dish with a little salt, which has the effect of extracting the water. Now drain the pieces off and strain then in a cloth, to extract as much moisture as possible. Put then in a frying-pan with a little butter; fry them very gently, till they begin to turn colour, then nib them through a wire sieve; moisten the pulp with a little butter sauce; add a little pepper, salt, and grated nutmeg and vinegar to taste.

CURRANT SAUCE (RED).—Put a couple of tablespoonfuls of red currant jelly into a small stew-pan, with half a dozen cloves, a small stick of cinnamon, and the rind of an orange. Moisten with a little water, or still better, a little claret, strain it off, and add the juice of the orange.

CURRANT SAUCE (BLACK).—Proceed exactly as in the above recipe, substituting black currant jelly for red.

CURRY SAUCE.—Take six large onions, peel them, cut them up into small pieces, and fry them in a frying-pan in about two ounces of butter. As soon as the onions begin to change colour, take a small carrot and cut it up into little piece; and a sour apple. When the onions, etc., are fried a nice brown, add about a pint of vegetable stock or water and let the whole simmer till the vegetables are quite tender, then add a tea-spoonful of Captain White's curry paste and a dessertspoonful of curry powder; now rub the whole through a wire sieve, and take care that all the vegetables go through. It is rather troublesome, but will repay you, as good curry sauce cannot be made without. The curry sauce should be sufficiently thick owing to the vegetables being rubbed through the wire sieve. Should therefore the onions be small, less water or stock had better be added. Curry sauce could be thickened with a little brown roux, but it takes away from the flavour of the curry. A few bay-leaves may be added to the sauce and served up whole in whatever is curried. For instance, if we have a dish of curried rice, half a dozen or more bay-leaves could be added to the sauce and served up with the rice.

There are many varieties of curry. In India fresh mangoes take the part of our sour apples. Some persons add grated cocoanut to curry, and it is well worth a trial, although on the P. and O. boats the Indian curry-cook mixes the curry fresh every day and uses cocoanut oil for the purpose. In some parts of India it is customary to serve up whole chillies in the curry, but this would be better adapted to a stomach suffering from the effects of brandy-pawnee than to the simple taste of the vegetarian.

DUTCH SAUCE.—This is very similar to Allemande Sauce. Take half a pint of good butter sauce, make it thoroughly hot, add two yolks of eggs, taking care that they do not curdle, a little pepper and salt, a suspicion of nutmeg, and about a tablespoonful of tarragon vinegar. Some persons instead of using tarragon vinegar add a little lemon juice, say the half of a fresh lemon to this quantity, and half a dozen fresh tarragon leaves, blanched—that is, dipped for a few seconds in boiling water—and then chopped very fine. The tarragon vinegar is much the simplest, as it is very difficult to get fresh tarragon leaves unless one has a good garden or lives near Covent Garden Market.

DUTCH SAUCE (GREEN).—Proceed exactly as above and colour the sauce a bright green with a little spinach extract (vegetable colouring, sold in bottles by all grocers).

EGG SAUCE.—Take half a dozen eggs, put them in a saucepan with sufficient cold water to cover them. Put them on the fire and let them boil for ten minutes after the water boils. Take them out and put them into cold water and let them stand for ten minutes, when the shells can be removed; then cut up the six hard-boiled eggs into little pieces, add sufficient butter sauce to moisten them, make the whole hot, and serve.

N.B.—Inexperienced cooks often think that hard-boiled eggs are bad when they are not, owing to their often having a tinge of green colour round the outside of the yolk and to their emitting a peculiar smell when the shells are first removed while hot All eggs contain a small quantity of sulphuretted hydrogen.

FENNEL SAUCE.—Blanch and chop up sufficient fennel to colour half a pint of butter sauce a bright green, add a little pepper, salt, and lemon juice, and serve.

GERMAN SWEET SAUCE.—Take a quarter of a pound of dried cherries, a small saltspoonful of powdered cinnamon, and a few strips of lemon peel, and put them in a small saucepan with about a quarter of a pint of water, or still better, claret, if wine is allowed, and let them simmer on the fire gently for about half an hour; then rub the cherries through a wire sieve with the liquor—(of course, the lemon peel and cloves will not rub through)—and add this to a quarter of a pound of stewed prunes. This is a very popular sauce abroad.

GINGER SAUCE.—The simplest way of making ginger sauce is to sweeten half a pint of butter sauce and then add a few drops of essence of ginger. A richer ginger sauce can be made by taking two or three tablespoonfuls of preserved ginger and two or three tablespoonfuls of the syrup in which they are preserved, rubbing this through a wire sieve, adding about an equal quantity of butter sauce, making the whole hot in a saucepan.

GOOSEBERRY SAUCE.—Pick and then stew some green gooseberries, just moistening the stewpan with a little water to prevent them burning. Rub the whole through a hair sieve in order to avoid having any pips in the sauce. Sweeten with a little Demerara sugar, as Porto Rico would be too dark in colour. Colour the sauce a bright green with a little spinach extract.

N.B.—It is a mistake to add cream to gooseberry sauce, which is distinct altogether from gooseberry fool. In Germany, vinegar is added to this sauce and it is served with meat.

HORSE-RADISH SAUCE.—Horse-radish sauce is made, properly speaking, by mixing grated horse-radish with cream, vinegar, sugar, made mustard, and a little pepper and salt. A very simple method of making this sauce is to substitute tinned Swiss milk for the cream and sugar. It is equally nice, more economical, and possesses this great advantage: a few tins of Swiss milk can always be kept in the store cupboard, whereas there is considerable difficulty, especially in all large towns, in obtaining cream without giving twenty-four hours' notice, and the result even then is not always satisfactory. Horse-radish sauce is very delicious, and its thickness should be entirely dependent upon the amount of grated horse-radish. Sticks of horse-radish vary so very much in size that we will say, grate sufficient to fill a teacup, throw this into a sauce tureen, mix a dessertspoonful of Swiss milk with a tablespoonful of vinegar and about two tablespoonfuls of milk and a teaspoonful of made mustard, add this to the horse-radish, and, if necessary, sufficient milk to make the whole of the consistency of bread sauce. As the sauce is very hot, as a rule it is best not to add any pepper, which can be easily added afterwards by those who like it.

INDIAN PICKLE SAUCE.—Chop up two or three tablespoonfuls of Indian pickles, place them in a frying-pan with a quarter of a pint of water, and if the pickles are sour as well as hot, let them simmer some little time so as to get rid of the vinegar by evaporation. Then thicken the whole with some brown roux till the sauce is as thick as pea soup. The vinegar should be got rid of as much as possible. This is a very appetising dish with boiled rice and Parmesan cheese.

ITALIAN SAUCE.—This is an old-fashioned recipe taken from a book written in French, and published more than fifty years ago. Put into a saucepan a little parsley, a shallot, some mushrooms and truffles, chopped very finely, with a piece of butter about the size of a walnut. Let all boil gently for half an hour, add a spoonful of oil, and serve.

MAITRE D'HOTEL SAUCE.—Maitre d'hotel sauce is simply a lump of butter mixed with some chopped parsley, a little pepper and salt, and lemon juice.

Hot sauce is often called Maitre d'hotel when chopped blanched parsley and lemon juice is added to a little white sauce.

MANGO CHUTNEY SAUCE.—Take a couple of tablespoonfuls of Mango Chutney, moisten it with two or three tablespoonfuls of butter sauce, rub the whole through a wire sieve, and serve either hot or cold. Or the chutney can be simply chopped up fine and added to the butter sauce without rubbing through the wire sieve.

MAYONNAISE SAUCE.—This is the most delicious of all cold sauces. It is composed entirely of raw yolk of egg and oil, flavoured with a dash of vinegar. When made properly it should be of the consistency of butter in summer time. Many women cooks labour under the delusion that it requires the addition of cream. Mayonnaise sauce is made as follows:—Break an egg and separate the yolk from the white, and place the yolk at the bottom of a large basin. Next take a bottle of oil, which must be cool but bright; if the oil is cloudy, as it often is in cold weather, you cannot make the sauce. Nor can you if the oil has been kept in a warm place. Now proceed to let the oil drop, drop by drop, on the yolk of egg, and with a silver fork, or still better, a wooden one, beat the yolk of egg and oil quickly together. Continue to drop the oil, taking care that only a few drops drop at a time, especially at starting, and continue to beat the mixture lightly and quickly. Gradually the yolk of egg and oil will begin to get thick, first of all like custard. When this is the case a little more oil may be added at a time, but never more than a teaspoonful. As more oil is added, and the beating continues, the sauce gets thicker and thicker, till it is nearly as thick as butter in summer time. When it arrives at this stage no more oil should be added. A little tarragon vinegar may be added at the finish, or a little lemon juice. This makes the sauce whiter in colour. One yolk of egg will take a teacupful of oil. It is best to add pepper and salt when the salad is mixed. Mayonnaise sauce is by far the best sauce for lettuce salad. It will keep a day, but should be kept in a cool place, and the basin should be covered over with a moist cloth.

MAYONNAISE SAUCE, GREEN.—Make some mayonnaise sauce as above, and colour it with some spinach colouring (vegetable colouring, sold in bottles by all grocers).

MINT SAUCE.—Take plenty of fresh mint leaves, as the secret of good mint sauce is to have plenty of mint. Chop up sufficient mint to fill a teacup, put this at the bottom of a sauce tureen, pour sufficient boiling water on the mint to thoroughly moisten it, and add a tablespoonful of brown sugar, which dissolves best when the water is hot. Press the mint with a tablespoon to extract the flavour, let it stand till it is quite cold, and then add three or four tablespoonfuls of malt vinegar, stir it up, and the sauce is ready. The quantity of vinegar added is purely a matter of taste, but a teaspoonful of chopped mint floating in half a pint of vinegar is no more mint sauce than dipping a mutton chop in a quart of boiling water would be soup in ordinary cookery.

MUSHROOM SAUCE, WHITE.—Mushroom sauce can be made from fresh mushrooms or tinned mushrooms. When made from fresh they must be small button mushrooms, and not those that are black underneath. They must be peeled, cut small, and have a little lemon juice squeezed over them to prevent them turning colour, or they had still better be thrown into lemon juice and water. They must now be fried in a frying-pan with a small quantity of butter till they are tender, and then added to a little thickened milk, or still better, cream. When made from tinned mushrooms, simply chop up the mushrooms, reserving the liquor, then add a little cream and thicken with a little white roux. A little pepper and salt should be added in both cases. Instead of using either milk or cream, you can use a small quantity of sauce Allemande.

MUSHROOM SAUCE, BROWN.—Proceed exactly as above with regard to the mushrooms, both fresh and tinned, only instead of adding milk, cream, or Allemande sauce, add a little stock or water, and then thicken the sauce with a little brown roux.

MUSHROOM SAUCE, PUREE.—Mushroom sauce, both white and brown, is sometimes served as a puree. It is simply either of the above sauces rubbed through a wire sieve.

MUSTARD SAUCE.—Make, say, half a pint of good butter sauce, add to this a tablespoonful of French mustard and a tablespoonful of made English mustard. Stir this into the sauce, make it hot, and serve.

N.B.—French mustard is sold ready-made in jars, and is flavoured with tarragon, capers, ravigotte, &c.

ONION SAUCE.—Take half a dozen large onions, peel them and boil them in a little salted water till they are tender. Then take them out and chop them up fine, and put them in a stew-pan with a little milk. Thicken the sauce with a little butter and flour, or white roux, and season with pepper and salt. A very nice mild onion sauce is made by using Spanish onions.

ONION SAUCE, BROWN.—Slice up half a dozen good-sized onions; put them in a frying-pan and fry them in a little butter till they begin to get brown, but be careful not to burn them, and should there be a few black pieces in the frying-pan, remove them; now chop up the onions, not too finely, and put them in a saucepan with a very little stock or water, let them simmer till they are tender, and then thicken the sauce with a little brown roux, and flavour with pepper and salt.

ORANGE CREAM SAUCE FOR PUDDINGS.—Take a large ripe orange and rub a dozen lumps of sugar on the outside of the rind and dissolve these in a small quantity of butter sauce, and add the juice of the orange, strained. Now add a little cream, or half a pint of milk that has been boiled separately, in which case the sauce will want thickening with a little white roux. Rubbing the sugar on the outside of the rind of the orange gives a very strong orange flavour indeed—far more than the juice of almost any number of oranges would produce, so care must be taken not to overdo it. This is what French cooks call zest of orange.

PARSLEY SAUCE.—Blanch and chop up sufficient parsley to make a brimming tablespoonful when chopped. Add this to half a pint of butter sauce, with a little pepper, salt, and lemon juice. It is very important to blanch the parsley, i.e., throw it into a little boiling water before chopping.

PINE-APPLE SAUCE.—Take a pine-apple, peel it, cut it up into little pieces on a dish, taking care not to lose any of the juice, place it in a saucepan with a very little water, just sufficient to cover the pine-apple; let it simmer gently until it is tender, and then add sufficient white sugar to make the liquid almost a syrup; a teaspoonful of corn-flour, made smooth in a little cold water, can be added; but the sauce should be of the consistency of syrup, and the corn-flour does away with the difficulty of making it too sickly. The juice of half a lemon may be added, and is, perhaps, an improvement.

PLUM SAUCE.—When made from ripe plums, take, say, a pound, and place them in a stew-pan with a very little water and a quarter of a pound of sugar. Take out the stones and crack them. Throw the kernels into boiling water so that you can rub off the skin, and add them to the sauce after you have rubbed the stewed plums through a wire sieve.

To make plum sauce from dried French plums proceed exactly as in making Prune Sauce. (See PRUNE SAUCE.)

POIVRADE SAUCE.—Take an onion, a very small head of celery, and a carrot, and cut them into little pieces, and put them into a frying-pan with a little butter, a saltspoonful of thyme, one or two dried bay-leaves, and about a quarter of a grated nutmeg and two or three sprigs of parsley. Fry these till they turn a light-brown colour, then add a little stock or water, and two tablespoonfuls of vinegar. Let this boil in the frying-pan for about half an hour, till the liquid is reduced in quantity. Thicken it with a little brown roux, and rub it through a wire sieve, make it hot, and serve. If wine is allowed, the addition of a little sherry is a great improvement to this sauce.

PRUNE SAUCE.—Take a quarter of a pound of prunes, put them in a stew-pan with just sufficient water to cover them, and let them stew. Put in one or two strips of lemon-peel to stew with them, add a teaspoonful of brown sugar, about sufficient powdered cinnamon to cover a shilling, and the juice of half a lemon. When the prunes are quite tender take out the strip of lemon-peel and stones, rub the whole through a wire sieve, and serve.

RADISH SAUCE.—Take a few bunches of radishes and grate them, and mix this grated radish with a little oil, vinegar, pepper, and salt. You can colour the sauce red by adding a little beetroot, and make the sauce hot by adding a little grated horse-radish. This cold sauce is exceedingly nice with cheese. These grated radishes are more digestible than radishes served whole.

RASPBERRY SAUCE.—This sauce is simply stewed raspberries rubbed through a wire sieve and sweetened. Some red-currant juice should be added to give it a colour. It is very nice made hot and then added to one or two beaten-up eggs and poured over any plain puddings, such as boiled rice, &c.

RATAFIA SAUCE.—Add a few drops of essence of ratafia to some sweetened arrowroot or to some butter sauce. The sauce can be coloured pink with a few drops of cochineal.

RAVIGOTTE SAUCE.—Put a tablespoonful each of Harvey's sauce, tarragon vinegar, and chilli vinegar into a small saucepan, and let it boil till it is reduced to almost one-half in quantity, in order to get rid of the acidity. Now add about half a pint of butter sauce, and throw in a tablespoonful of chopped blanched parsley.

ROBERT SAUCE.—Take a couple of onions, cut them up into small pieces, and fry them with about an ounce of butter in a frying-pan. Drain off the butter and add a couple of tablespoonfuls of vinegar to the frying-pan, and let it simmer for ten minutes or a quarter of an hour so as to get rid of the acidity of the vinegar. Now add a very little stock or water, stir it tip, and thicken the sauce with a little brown roux. Add a dessertspoonful of fresh mustard and a little pepper and salt.

SOUBISE SAUCE.—Sauce Soubise is simply white onion sauce, rubbed through a wire sieve, and a little cream added. It is more delicate than ordinary onion sauce, and is often served in France with roast pheasant. It owes its name to a famous French general.

SORREL SAUCE.—Put about a quart of fresh green sorrel leaves (after being thoroughly washed) into an enamelled saucepan, with a little fresh butter, and let the sorrel stew till it is tender. Rub this through a wire sieve, add a little powdered sugar and a little lemon juice; a little cream may be added, but is not absolutely essential.

SWEET SAUCE.—Take half a pint of butter sauce, and sweeten it with a little sugar. It can be flavoured by rubbing a little sugar on the outside of a lemon, or with vanilla, essence of almonds, or any kind of sweet essence. A little wine, brandy, or, still better, rum, is a great improvement. Some persons add cream.

TARRAGON SAUCE.—Blanch a dozen tarragon leaves, chop them up, and stew them in any kind of stock thickened with brown roux.

TARTAR SAUCE.—Take two or three tablespoonfuls of mayonnaise sauce, and add to this a brimming teaspoonful of chopped blanched parsley, as well as a piece of onion or shallot about as big as the top of the thumb down to the first joint, chopped very fine, and a brimming teaspoonful of French mustard. Mix the whole well together.

N.B.—A teaspoonful of anchovy sauce would be a great improvement were anchovy sauce allowed in vegetarian cookery.

TOMATO SAUCE.—The great secret of tomato sauce is to taste nothing but the tomato. Take a dozen ripe tomatoes, cut off the stalks, and squeeze out the pips, and put them in a stew-pan with a little butter, and let them stew till they are tender, and then rub the whole through a wire sieve. This, in our opinion, is the best tomato sauce that can be made, the only seasoning being a little pepper and salt. This wholesome and delicious sauce can, however, be spoilt in a variety of ways—by the addition of mace, cloves, shallots, onions, thyme, &c. It can also be made very unwholesome by the addition of a quantity of vinegar.

TRUFFLE SAUCE.—This sauce is very expensive if made from whole fresh truffles, but can be made more cheaply if you can obtain some truffle chips or parings. These must be stewed in a little stock, thickened with brown roux, and then rubbed through a wire sieve, a little sherry being a great improvement if wine is allowed.

VANILLA SAUCE.—Add some essence of vanilla to some sweetened butter sauce.

WHITE SAUCE.—White sauce is sometimes required for vegetables and sometimes for puddings. In the former case some good-flavoured, uncoloured stock must be thickened with white roux, and then have sufficient cream added to it to make the sauce a pure white.

When white sauce is wanted for puddings, sufficient butter sauce must be sweetened, and very slightly flavoured with nutmeg or almond, and then an equal quantity of cream added to it to make it a pure white. White sauce should not have with it any strong predominant flavour.



CHAPTER III.

SAVOURY RICE, MACARONI, OATMEAL, &c.

RICE.

Probably all persons will admit that rice is a too much neglected form of food in England. When we remember how small a quantity of rice weekly is found sufficient to keep alive millions and millions of our fellow-creatures in the East, it seems to be a matter of regret that rice as an article of food is not more used by the thousands and thousands of our fellow creatures in the East—not in the ordinary acceptation of the term, but East of Temple Bar. Rice is cheap, nourishing, easily cooked, and equally easily digested, yet that monster, custom, seems to step in and prevent the bulk of the poor availing themselves of this light and nourishing food solely for the reason that, as their grandfathers and grandmothers did not eat rice before them, they do not see any reason why they should, like the Irishman who objected to have his feet washed on the same ground. Of the different kinds of rice Carolina is the best, the largest, and the most expensive. Patna rice is almost as good; the grains are long, small, and white, and it is the best rice for curry. Madras rice is the cheapest.

Rice, pure and simple, is the food most suited for hot climates and where a natural indolence of disposition results in one's day's work of an ordinary Englishman being divided among twenty people. As we move towards more temperate zones it will be found the universal custom to qualify it by mixing it with some other substance; thus, though rice is largely eaten in Italy, it is almost invariably used in conjunction with Parmesan cheese. Rice contains no flesh-forming properties whatever, as it contains no nitrogen; and with all due respect to vegetarians, it will be found that as we recede from the Equator and advance towards the Poles our food must of necessity vary with the latitude, and, whereas we may start on a diet of rice, we shall be forced, sooner or later, to depend upon a diet of pemmican, or food of a similar nature.

RICE, TO BOIL.—The best method of boiling rice is, at any rate, a much disputed point, if not an open question. There are as many ways almost of boiling rice as dressing a salad, and each one thinks his own way the best. We will mention a few of the most simple, and will illustrate it by boiling a small quantity that can be contained in a teacup. Of course, boiling rice is very much simplified if you want some rice-water as well as rice itself. Rice-water contains a great deal of nourishment, a fact which is well illustrated by the well-known story of the black troops who served in India under Clive, who, at the siege of Arcot, told Clive, when they were short of provisions, that the water in which the rice was boiled would be sufficient for them, while the more substantial grain could be preserved for the European troops. Take a teacupful of rice and wash the rice in several waters till the water ceases to be discoloured. Now throw the rice into boiling water, say a quart; let the rice boil gently till it is tender, strain off the rice and reserve the rice-water for other purposes. The time rice will take to boil treated this way would be probably about twenty minutes, but this time would vary slightly with the quality and size of the rice.

* * * * *

Many years ago we watched a black man boiling rice on board a P. and O. boat (the Mizapore); he proceeded as follows:—He boiled the rice for about ten minutes, or perhaps a minute or two longer, strained it off in a sieve, and then washed the rice with cold water, and then put the rice back in the stew-pan to once more get hot and swell. Of course, this rice was being boiled for curry, and certainly the result was that each grain was beautifully separated from every other grain. We do not think, however, that this method of boiling rice is customary on all the boats of the P. and O. Company. Of course this method of boiling rice was somewhat wasteful.

By far the most economical method of boiling rice is as follows; and we would recommend it to all who are in the habit of practising economy on the grounds of either duty or necessity. Wash thoroughly, as before, a teacupful of rice and put it in a small stew-pan or saucepan with two breakfastcupfuls of water, bring this to a boil and let it boil for ten minutes, then remove the saucepan to the side of the fire and let the rice soak and swell for about twenty minutes. After a little time, you can put a cloth on the top of the saucepan to absorb the steam, similar to the way you treat potatoes after having strained off the water.

In boiling rice we must remember that there are two ways in which rice is served. One is as a meal in itself, the other as an accompaniment to some other kind of food. It will be found in Italy and Turkey and in the East generally, where rice forms, so to speak, the staff of life, that it is not cooked so soft and tender as it is in England, where it is generally served with something else. In fact, each grain of rice may be said to resemble an Irish potato, inasmuch as it has a heart in it. In Ireland potatoes, as a rule, are not cooked so much as they are in most parts of England. Probably the reason of this is, in most cases, that experience has taught people that there is more stay in rice and potatoes when served in a state that English people would call "under-done." There is no doubt that the waste throughout the length and breadth of this prosperous land through over-cooking is something appalling.

Another very good method of boiling rice is the American style. Take a good-sized stew-pan or saucepan that has a tight-fitting lid. Put a cloth over the saucepan, after first pouring in, say, a pint of water; push down the cloth, keeping it tight, so as to make a well, but do not let the cloth reach the water; wash the rice as before, and put on the lid tight. Of course, with the cloth the lid will fit very tight indeed. Now put the saucepan on the fire and make the water boil continuously. By these means you steam the rice till it is tender and lose none of the nourishment. We can always learn from America.

RISOTTO A LA MILANNAISE.—Take a teacupful of rice, wash it thoroughly and dry it. Chop up a small onion and put it in the bottom of a small stew-pan and fry the onion to a light-brown colour. Now add the dry rice, and stir this up with the onion and butter till the rice also is fried of a nice light-brown colour. Now add two breakfastcupfuls of stock or water and a pinch of powdered saffron, about sufficient to cover a threepenny-piece; let the rice boil for ten or eleven minutes, move the saucepan to the side of the fire and let it stand for twenty minutes or half an hour till it has absorbed all the stock or water. Now mix in a couple of tablespoonfuls of grated Parmesan cheese. Flavour with a little pepper and salt, and serve the whole very hot.

RICE WITH CABBAGE AND CHEESE.—Wash some rice and let it soak in some hot water, with a cabbage sliced up, for about an hour; then strain it off and put the rice and cabbage in a stew-pan with some butter, a little pepper and salt, and about a quarter of a grated nutmeg. Toss these about in the butter for ten minutes or a quarter of an hour over the fire, but do not let them turn colour; then add a small quantity of water or stock, let it stew till it is tender, and then serve it very hot with some grated cheese sprinkled over the top.

N.B.—The end of cheese rind can be utilised with this dish.

RICE WITH CHEESE.—Wash some rice and then boil it for ten or eleven minutes in some milk, and let it stand till it has soaked up all the milk. The proportion generally is, as we have said before, a teacupful of rice to two breakfastcupfuls of milk; but as we shall want the rice rather moist on the present occasion, we must allow a little more milk. Now mix in some grated cheese and a little pepper and salt, place the mixture in a pie-dish, and cover the top with grated cheese, and place the pie-dish in the oven and bake till the top is nicely browned, and then serve.

Some cooks add a good spoonful of made mustard to the mixture. Some persons prefer it and some don't; it is therefore best to serve some made mustard with the rice and cheese at table. Unless the mixture was fairly moist before it was put into the pie-dish, it would dry up in the oven and become uneatable.

RICE, CURRIED.—Boil a teacupful of well-washed rice in two breakfastcupfuls of water, and let the rice absorb all the water; put a cloth in the saucepan, and stir up the rice occasionally with a fork till the grains become dry and separate easily the one from the other. Now mix it up with some curry sauce, make the whole hot, and send it to table with a few whole bay-leaves mixed in with the rice. Only sufficient curry sauce should be added to moisten the rice—it must not be rice swimming in gravy; or you can make a well in the middle of the boiled rice and pour the curry sauce into this.

RICE BORDERS (CASSEROLES).—Casseroles, or rice borders, form a very handsome dish. It consists of a large border made of rice, the outside of which can be ornamented and the centre of which can be filled with a macedoine (i.e., a mixture) of fruit or vegetables. As you are probably aware, grocers have in their shop-windows small tins with copper labels, on which the word is printed "Macedoine." This tin contains a mixture of cut-up, cooked vegetables. These are very useful to have in the house, as a nice dish can be served at a few moments' notice. Mixed fruits are also sold in bottles under the name of Macedoine of Fruits. Of course, both vegetables and fruit can be prepared at home much cheaper from fresh fruit and vegetables, but this requires time and forethought. These mixtures are very much improved in appearance when served in a handsomely made rice border, and as the border is eaten with the vegetables and fruit there is no want of economy in the recipe. Suppose we are going to make a rice border. Take a pound of rice and wash it carefully if we are going to fill it with fruit we must boil it in sweetened milk, but if we are going to fill it with vegetables we must boil it in vegetable stock or water. Add, as the case may be, sufficient liquid to boil the rice till it is thoroughly tender and soft. Now place it in a large bowl, and with a wooden spoon mash it till it becomes a sort of firm, compact paste; then take it out and roll it into the shape of a cannon-ball, and having done this, flatten it till it becomes of the shape of the cheeses one meets with in Holland—flat top and bottom, with rounded edges. You can now ornament the outside by making it resemble a fluted mould of jelly. The best way of doing this is to cut a carrot in half and scoop out part of the inside with a cheese-scoop, so that the width of the part where it is scooped is about the same as the two flat sides. Make the outside of the rice perfectly smooth with the back of a wooden spoon. Butter the carrot mould to prevent it sticking, and press this gently on the outside of the shape of rice till it resembles the outside of a column in Gothic architecture, then place it in the oven and let it bake till it is firm and dry. Then scoop out the centre and put it back for a short time. If the border is going to be used for a macedoine of vegetables, beat up a yolk of egg and paint the outside of the casserole with this, and then it will bake a nice golden-brown colour. Now take it out of the oven and fill it accordingly. It can be served hot or cold, or it can be filled with a German salad. (See MACEDOINE OF FRUIT; MACEDOINE OF VEGETABLES; SALAD, GERMAN.)

RICE CROQUETTES, SAVOURY.—Boil a teacupful of rice in some stock or water (about two breakfastcupfuls), till it is tender, and until the rice has absorbed all the water or stock. Chop up a small onion very fine, fry it till tender in a very little butter, but do not let it brown; add a small teaspoonful of mixed savoury herbs, a brimming teaspoonful of chopped parsley, to the contents of the frying-pan for two or three minutes, and then add them to the rice. Mix it well together, and let the rice dry in the oven till the mixture is capable of being rolled into balls. Now take two eggs, separate the yolk from the white of one, beat up the whole egg and one white thoroughly in a basin, but do no beat it to a froth; add the rice mixture to this, mix it again very thoroughly, and then roll it into balls about the size of a small walnut, seasoning the mixture with sufficient pepper and salt. Roll these balls in flour, in order to insure the outside being dry, and roll them backwards and forwards on the sieve in order to get rid of the superfluous flour. Make some very fine bread-crumbs from some stale bread; next beat up the yolk of egg with about a dessertspoonful of warm water. Dip the rice-balls into this, and then cover them with the bread-crumbs. Let them stand for an hour or two for the bread-crumbs to get dry, and then fry them a light golden-brown colour in a little oil. Fried parsley can be served with them.

Instead of bread-crumbs you can use up broken vermicelli—the bottom of a jar of vermicelli can sometimes be utilised this way. This has a very pretty appearance. The vermicelli browns quickly, and the croquettes have the appearance of little balls covered in brown network.

RICE, SAVOURY.—There are several ways of serving savoury rice. The rice can be boiled in some stock, strongly flavoured with onion and celery, and when cooked sufficiently tender one or two eggs can be beaten up with it, pepper and salt added, and the mixture served with grated cheese.

Rice can also be rendered savoury by the addition of chopped mushrooms, pepper and salt, and a little butter, and if a tin of mushrooms is used, the liquor in the tin should be added to the boiled rice, but in every case the rice should be made to absorb the liquor in which it is boiled. Eggs can again be added, as well as grated Parmesan cheese.

A cheap and quick way of making rice savoury is to mix it with a large tablespoonful of chutney; make it hot with a little butter, and add pepper—cayenne if preferred—and a little lemon-juice.

Rice can also be served as savoury by boiling it in any of the sauces that may be termed savoury in distinction to those that are sweet, given in the chapter entitled "Sauces."

RICE AND EGGS.—Boil, say half a pound of rice, and let it absorb the water in which it is boiled. Take four hard-boiled eggs, separate the yolks from the whites, chop the whites very fine, and add them to the rice with about a brimming teaspoonful of chopped blanched parsley and sufficient savoury herbs to cover a sixpence. Put this in the saucepan and make it hot, with a little butter, and flavour with plenty of pepper and salt. In the meantime beat the yellow hard-boiled yolks to a yellow powder, turn out the rice mixture, when thoroughly hot, into a vegetable dish, and put the yellow powder either in the centre or make a ring of the yellow powder round the edge of the rice, and serve a little pile of fried parsley in the middle.

RICE AND TOMATO.—Take half-a-dozen ripe tomatoes, squeeze out the pips, and put them in a tin in the oven with a little butter to bake; baste them occasionally with a little butter. In the meantime boil half a pound of rice in a little stock or water, only adding sufficient so that the rice can absorb the liquid. When this is done (and this will take about the same time as the tomatoes take to bake), pour all the liquid and butter in the tin on to the rice and stir it well up with some pepper and salt. Put this on a dish, and serve the tomatoes on the rice with the red, unbroken side uppermost.

MACARONI.—Macaroni is a preparation of pure wheaten flour. It is chiefly made in Italy, though a good deal is made in Geneva and Switzerland. The best macaroni is made in the neighbourhood of Naples. The wheat that grows there ripens quickly under the pure blue sky and hot sun, and consequently the outside of the wheat is browner while the inside of the wheat is whiter than that grown in England. The wheat is ground and sifted repeatedly. It is generally sifted about five times, and the pure snow-white flour that falls from the last sifting is made into macaroni. It is first mixed with water and made into a sort of dough, the dough being kneaded in the truly orthodox Eastern style by being trodden out with the feet. It is then forced by a sort of rough machinery through holes, partially baked during the process, and then hung up to dry. Macaroni contains a great amount of nourishment, and it is only made from the purest and finest flour. It is the staple dish throughout Italy, and in whatever form or way it is cooked, except as a sweet, tomatoes and grated Parmesan cheese seem bound to accompany it.

SPARGHETTI.—Sparghetti is a peculiar form of macaroni. Ordinary macaroni is made in the form of long tubes, and when macaroni pudding is served in schools, it is often irreverently nicknamed by the boys gas-pipes. Sparghetti is not a tube, but simply macaroni made in the shape of ordinary wax-tapers, which it resembles very much in appearance. In Italy it is often customary to commence dinner with a dish of sparghetti, and should the dinner consist as well of soup, fish, entree, salad, and sweet, the sparghetti would be served before the soup. Take, say, half a pound of sparghetti, wash it in cold water, and throw it instantly into boiling salted water; boil it till it is tender, about twenty minutes, drain it, put it into a hot vegetable-dish, and mix in two or three tablespoonfuls of grated Parmesan cheese; toss it about lightly with a couple of forks, till the cheese melts and forms what may be called cobwebs on tossing it about. Add also two tablespoonfuls of tomato conserve (sold by all grocers, in bottles), and serve immediately. This is very cheap, very satisfying, and very nourishing; and it is to be regretted that this popular dish is not more often used by those who are not vegetarians, who would benefit both in pocket and in health were they to lessen their butcher's bill by at any rate commencing dinner, like the Italians, with a dish of sparghetti.

MACARONI—ITALIAN FASHION.—This is very similar to sparghetti, only ordinary pipe macaroni is used. Take, say, a teacupful of macaroni, wash it, break it up into two-inch pieces, and throw it into boiling water that has been salted. Strain it of off, put it in the stew-pan for a few minutes, with a little piece of butter and some pepper and salt. Add a tablespoonful of tomato conserve, and serve it with some grated Parmesan cheese, served separate in a dish.

Some rub the stew-pan with a head of garlic. This gives it what may be called a more foreign flavour, but this should not be done unless you know your guests like garlic. Unfortunately, the proper use of garlic is very little understood in this country.

MACARONI CHEESE.—Some years back this was almost the only form in which macaroni was served in this country. Macaroni cheese used to be served at the finish of dinner in a dried-up state, and was perhaps one of the most indigestible dishes which the skill, or want of skill, of our English cooks was able to produce. Wash and then boil a quarter of a pound of macaroni in a little milk till it is quite tender, then put into a well-buttered oval tin a layer of macaroni, and cover this with a layer of bread-crumbs, mixed with grated cheese, and add a few little lumps of butter; then put another layer of macaroni and another layer of bread-crumbs and cheese. Continue alternate layers till you pile up the dish, taking care to have a layer of dried bread-crumbs at the top. Warm some butter, but do not oil it, and pour some of this warm butter over the top of the dish to moisten them; put the dish in the oven till it is hot through, then take it out and brown the top quickly with a red-hot salamander. If you leave the macaroni cheese in the oven too long the dish will taste oily and the cheese get so hard as to become absolutely indigestible. Any kind of grated cheese will do for this dish, but to the English palate it is best when made from a moist cheese similar to that which would be used in making Welsh rabbit.

MACARONI AND EGGS.—Take half a pound of macaroni and throw it into boiling water that has been salted. In the meantime have ready four hard-boiled eggs. When the macaroni is nearly tender throw the hard-boiled eggs into cold water for a minute, in order to enable you to take off the shells without burning your fingers. Cut the eggs in half, take out the half yellow yolk without breaking it; cut the whites of the eggs into rings and mix these rings with the macaroni on the dish. The macaroni and eggs must be flavoured with pepper and salt, and if possible pour a little white sauce over the whole. If you have no white sauce add a little cream or a little thickened milk with a little butter dissolved in it; now sprinkle a little chopped blanched parsley over the whole and ornament the dish with the eight half-yolks.

MACARONI A LA REINE.—Boil half a pound of pipe macaroni. Meanwhile warm slowly in a saucepan three-quarters of a pint of cream, and slice into it half a pound of Stilton or other white cheese, add two ounces of good fresh butter, two blades of mace, pounded, a good pinch of cayenne and a little salt. Stir until the cheese is melted and the whole is free from lumps, when put in the macaroni and move it gently round the pan until mixed and hot, or put the macaroni on a hot dish and pour the sauce over. It may be covered with fried bread-crumbs of a pale colour and browned in a Dutch oven.

MACARONI AU GRATIN.—Break up a pound of macaroni in three-inch lengths, boil as usual and drain. Put into a stew-pan a quarter of a pound of fresh butter, the macaroni, twelve ounces of Parmesan and Gruyere cheese mixed, and about a quarter of a pint of some good sauce, white sauce. Move the stew-pan and its contents over the fire until the macaroni has absorbed the butter, etc., then turn it out on a dish, which should be garnished with croutons of fried bread. Pile it in the shape of a dome, cover with bread-raspings, a little clarified butter run through a colander, and brown very lightly with a salamander.

N.B.—The above two recipes are taken from "Cassell's Dictionary of Cookery."

MACARONI AS AN ORNAMENT.—Macaroni is sometimes used to ornament the outside of puddings, either savoury or sweet. Suppose the pudding has to be made in a small round mould or basin. Some pipe macaroni is boiled in water till it is tender, and then cut up into little pieces a quarter of an inch in length. The inside of the mould is first thickly buttered, and then these little quarter-inch tubes are stuck in the butter close together; the pudding, for instance a custard pudding, is then poured into the mould and the mould steamed. When the pudding is turned out the outside of the pudding has the appearance of a honey-comb, and looks extremely pretty. The process is not difficult, but rather troublesome, as it requires time and patience.

MACARONI, TIMBALE OF—This is a somewhat expensive dish. You have first to decorate a plain mould with what is called nouilles paste, which is made by mixing half a pound of flour with five yolks of eggs. The mould is then lined with ordinary short paste, made with half a pound of flour, a quarter of a pound of butter, and one yolk of egg, mixed in the ordinary way. When the mould is lined, you have to fill it up with flour, and bake it in a moderate oven for about an hour. You then take it out, empty out the flour and brush it well out with an ordinary brush and dry the mould in a very slack oven. The mould is then filled with some macaroni that has been boiled tender in milk and flavoured with vanilla and sugar and Parmesan cheese. The macaroni must be so managed that it absorbs the moisture. The mould is filled, made hot, and then turned out. It is customary to shake some powdered sugar over the mould, and then glaze it with a red-hot salamander.

N.B.—Very few kitchens possess a proper salamander, but if you make the kitchen shovel red-hot it will be found to answer the same purpose.

MACARONI IN SCOLLOP SHELLS.—Take half a pound of macaroni, wash it, and throw it into boiling water. Take the macaroni out, drain it, and throw it into cold water. Then take it out and cut it into pieces not more than half an inch in length. Take about a quarter of a pound of butter, melt it in a stew-pan, and add about a cupful of milk, or still better, cream. Stir it and dredge in enough flour to make it thick, or still better, thicken it with a little white roux; now add some pepper and salt, about a quarter of a grated nutmeg, two or three spoonfuls of grated Parmesan cheese; add the cut-up macaroni and stir the whole well up over the fire together and fill the scollop shells with the mixture, and throw some grated cheese over the top. Bake the scollops in the oven till the cheese begins to brown; then pour a little oiled butter over the top of the cheese. If made with cream this dish is somewhat rich, but forms an admirable meal eaten with plenty of bread.

MACARONI NUDELS.—The word nudel is probably derived from French nouilles paste. It is made in a similar manner, or nearly so. French cooks use only yolk of egg and flour. English cooks use beaten-up eggs, and sometimes even reserve the yolks for other purposes and make the paste with white of egg. In any case, the yolks, the whole eggs, or the white without the yolks, must be well beaten up and then mixed in with the flour with the fingers till it makes a stiff paste. This paste or dough is then rolled out with a straight rolling pin—(not an English one)—till it is as thin as a wafer. The board must be well floured or it will stick. A marble slab is best, and if you are at a loss for a rolling-pin try an empty black bottle. It is very important to roll the pastry thin, and it has been well observed that the best test of thinness is to be able to read a book through the paste. When rolled out, let each thin cake dry for five or ten minutes. If you have a box of cutters you can cut this paste into all sorts of shapes according to the shape of the cutters, or you can cut each thin cake into pieces about the same size, and then with a sharp dry knife cut the paste into threads. These threads or ornamental shapes can be thrown into boiling clear soup, when they will separate of their own accord. Nudel paste is, in fact, home-made Italian paste, or, when cut into threads, home-made vermicelli. It is very nourishing, as it is made with eggs and flour.

MACARONI, SAVOURY.—Take half a pound of macaroni and boil it in some slightly salted water, and let it boil and simmer till the macaroni is tender and absorbs all the water in which it is boiled. Now take a dessertspoonful of raw mustard, i.e., mustard in the yellow powder. Mix this gradually with the macaroni, and add five or six tablespoonfuls of grated Parmesan cheese and a little cayenne or white pepper according to taste. Turn the mixture out on to a dish, sprinkle some more grated Parmesan cheese over the top, bake it in the oven till it is slightly brown, pour a little oiled butter on the top, and serve.

MACARONI AND CHESTNUTS.—Bake about twenty chestnuts till they are tender, and then peel them and pound them in a mortar, with a little pepper and salt and butter, till they are a paste. Next wash and boil in the ordinary way half a pound of macaroni. Drain off the macaroni and put it in a stew-pan with the chestnuts and about a couple of ounces of butter to moisten it, and stir it all together and put an onion in to flavour it as if you were making bread sauce; but the onion must be taken out whole before it is served. If the mixture gets too dry, it can be moistened with a little milk or stock. After it has been stirred together for about a quarter of an hour, turn it out on to a dish, cover it with a little Parmesan cheese, bake in the oven till it is brown, and moisten the top when browned with a little oiled butter.

MACARONI AND TOMATOES.—Take half a pound of macaroni; wash it and boil it until it is tender. In the meantime take half a dozen or more ripe tomatoes; cut off the stalks, squeeze out the pips, and place them in a tin in the oven with a little butter to prevent their sticking. It is as well to baste the tomatoes once or twice with the butter and the juice that will come from them. Put the macaroni when tender and well drained off into a vegetable-dish, pour the contents of the tin, butter and juice, over the macaroni and add pepper and salt, and toss it lightly together. Now place the whole tomatoes on the top of the macaroni, round the edge, at equal distances. It is a great improvement to the appearance of the dish to sprinkle a little chopped blanched parsley over the macaroni. The tomatoes should be placed with the smooth, red, unbroken side uppermost.

Macaroni and Cream.—Boil half a pound of macaroni; cut it up into pieces about two inches long and put it into a stew-pan with two ounces of butter and a quarter of a pound of grated cheese, composed of equal parts of Gruyere and Parmesan cheese. Moisten this with about three tablespoonfuls of cream. Toss it all lightly together till the cheese makes cobwebs. Add a little pepper and salt and serve with some fried bread round the edge cut up into ornamental shapes. Carefully made pieces of toast, cut into triangles, will do instead of the fried bread.

TAGLIATELLI.—Take some flour and water, and with the addition of a little salt make a paste which can be rolled out quite thin; cut this into shapes of the breadth of half a finger. Throw them into boiling water and let them boil a few minutes. Then remove them to cold water; drain them on a sieve and use them as macaroni; place at the bottom of a dish some butter and grated cheese, then a layer of tagliatelli seasoned with pepper, another layer of butter and cheese, and then one of tagliatelli, until the whole is used; pour over it a glass of cream, add a layer of cheese, and finish like macaroni cheese, browning it in the oven.

OATMEAL PORRIDGE.—Of all dishes used by vegetarians there are none more wholesome, more nourishing, or more useful as an article of everyday diet for breakfast than oatmeal porridge. When we remember that the Scotch, who, for both body and brain, rank perhaps first amongst civilised nations, almost live on this cheap and agreeable form of food, we should take particular pains in the preparation of a standing dish which is in itself a strong argument in favour of a vegetarian diet when we look at the results, both mentally and bodily, that have followed its use North of the Tweed. The following excellent recipe for the preparation of oatmeal porridge is taken from a book entitled, "A Year's Cookery," by Phyllis Browne (Cassell & Co.):—"When there are children in the family it is a good plan, whatever they may have for breakfast, to let them begin the meal either with oatmeal porridge or bread-and-milk. Porridge is wholesome and nourishing, and will help to make them strong and hearty. Even grown-up people frequently enjoy a small portion of porridge served with treacle and milk. Oatmeal is either 'coarse,' 'medium,' or 'fine.' Individual taste must determine which of these three varieties shall be chosen. Scotch people generally prefer the coarsest kind. The ordinary way of making porridge is the following—Put as much water as is likely to be required into a saucepan with a sprinkling of salt, and let the water boil. Half a pint of water will make a single plateful of porridge. Take a knife (a 'spurtle' is the proper utensil) in the right hand, and some Scotch, or coarse, oatmeal in the left hand, and sprinkle the meal in gradually, stirring it briskly all the time; if any lumps form draw them to the side of the pan and crush them out. When the porridge is sufficiently thick (the degree of thickness must be regulated by individual taste), draw the pan back a little, put on the lid, and let the contents simmer gently till wanted; if it can have two hours' simmering, all the better; but in hundreds of families in Scotland and the North of England it is served when it has boiled for ten minutes or a quarter of an hour; less oatmeal is required when it can boil a long time, because the simmering swells the oatmeal, and so makes it go twice as far. During the boiling the porridge must be stirred frequently to keep it from sticking to the saucepan and burning, but each time this is done the lid must be put on again. When it is done enough it should be poured into a basin or upon a plate, and served hot with sugar or treacle and milk or cream. The very best method that can be adopted for making porridge is to soak the coarse Scotch oatmeal in water for twelve hours, or more (if the porridge is wanted for breakfast it may be put into a pie-dish over night, and left till morning). As soon as the fire is lighted in the morning it should be placed on it, stirred occasionally, kept covered, and boiled as long as possible, although it may be served when it has boiled for twenty minutes. When thus prepared it will be almost like a delicate jelly, and acceptable to the most fastidious palate. The proportions for porridge made in this way are a heaped tablespoonful of coarse oatmeal to a pint of water.

"It is scarcely necessary to give directions for making—

"BREAD AND MILK, for everyone knows how this should be done. It may be said that the preparation has a better appearance if the bread is cut very small before the boiling milk is poured on it, and also that the addition of a small pinch of salt takes away the insipidity. Rigid economists sometimes swell the bread with boiling water, then drain this off and pour milk in its place. This, however, is almost a pity, for milk is so very good for children; and though recklessness is seldom to be recommended, a mother might well be advised to be reckless about the amount of her milk bill, provided always that the quantity of milk be not wasted, and that the children have it."

MILK PORRIDGE.—Take a tablespoonful of oatmeal and mix it up in a cup with a little cold milk till it is quite smooth, in a similar way as you would mix ordinary flour and milk in making batter. Next put a pint of milk on to boil, and as soon as it boils mix in the oatmeal and milk, and let it boil for about a quarter of an hour, taking care to keep stirring it the whole time. The fire should not be too fierce, as the milk is very apt to burn. Flavour this with either salt or sugar.

RICE AND BARLEY PORRIDGE.—Take a quarter of a pound of rice and a quarter of a pound of Scotch barley and wash them very thoroughly. The most perfect way of washing barley and rice is to throw them into boiling water, let them boil for five or ten minutes, and then strain them off. By this means the dirty outside is dissolved. Next boil the rice and barley gently for three or four hours, strain them off, and boil them up again in a little milk for a short time before they are wanted. It will often be found best to boil the barley for a couple of hours and then add the rice. A little cream is a very great improvement. The porridge can be flavoured with pepper and salt, but is very nice with brown sugar, treacle, or jam, and when cold forms an agreeable accompaniment to stewed fruit.

WHOLE-MEAL PORRIDGE.—Boil a quart of water and gradually stir in about half a pound of whole-meal; let it boil for about a quarter of an hour, and serve. Cold milk should accompany this porridge.

LENTIL PORRIDGE.—To every quart of water add about six tablespoonfuls of lentil flour; let the whole boil for about a quarter of an hour, and flavour with pepper and salt.

HOMINY.—Take a teacupful of hominy, wash it in several waters and rub it well between the hands, and throw away the grains that float on the top, the same as you do with split peas, pour the water off the top, then strain it off, and put it in a basin with a quart of water, and cover the basin over with a cloth; put it by to soak overnight, should it be required for breakfast in the morning. The next day put it in an enamelled stew-pan with about a teaspoonful of salt, and let it simmer gently over the fire, taking care that it does not burn. It is best to butter the bottom of the saucepan, or if you have a small plate that will just go inside you will find this a great protection. Let it simmer gently for rather more than an hour. Stir it well up and flavour it with either sugar or salt, and let it be eaten with cold milk poured on it on the plate, or with a little butter.

* * * * *

The hominy should simmer until it absorbs all the water in which it is boiled. As a rule a good teacupful will absorb a quart.

HOMINY, FRIED.—This is made from the remains of cold boiled hominy. When cold it will be a firm jelly. Cut the cold hominy into slices, flour them, egg and bread-crumb them, and then plunge them into some smoking hot oil till they are of a nice bright golden colour. They are very nice eaten with lemon-juice and sugar, or they can be served with orange marmalade.

FRUMENTY.—Take a quarter of a pint of wheat, wash it thoroughly, and let it soak for twelve hours or more in water. Strain it off and boil it in some milk till it is tender, but do not let it get pulpy. As soon as it is tender add a quart of milk, flavoured with a little cinnamon, three ounces of sugar, three ounces of carefully washed grocer's currants, and let it boil for a quarter of an hour. Beat up three yolks of eggs in a tureen, and gradually add the mixture. It must not be added to the eggs in a boiling state or else they will curdle. A wineglassful of brandy is a great improvement, but is not absolutely necessary. The wheat takes a long time to get tender, probably four hours.

SAGO PORRIDGE.—Wash the sago in cold water and boil it in some water, allowing about two tablespoonfuls to every pint; add pepper and salt and let cold milk be served with the porridge.

MILK TOAST.—This is a very useful way of using up stale bread. Toast the bread a light brown, and if by chance any part gets black scrape it gently off. Butter the toast slightly, lay the toast on the bottom of a soup-plate, and pour some boiling milk over it. Very little butter should be used, and children often prefer a thin layer of marmalade to butter.



CHAPTER IV.

EGGS (SAVOURY) AND OMELETS.

EGGS, PLAIN BOILED.—There is an old saying that there is reason in the roasting of eggs. This certainly applies equally to the more common process of boiling them. There are few breakfast delicacies more popular than a new-laid egg. There are few breakfast indelicacies more revolting than the doubtful egg which makes its appearance from time to time, and which may be classed under the general heading of "Shop 'uns." It is a sad and melancholy reflection that these more than doubtful "shop 'uns" were all once new-laid. It is impossible to draw any hard-and-fast line to say at what exact period an egg ceases to be fit for boiling. There is an old tradition, the truth of which we do not endorse, that eggs may arrive at a period when, though they are not fit to be boiled, fried, poached, or hard-boiled, they are still good enough for puddings and pastry. There is no doubt that many good puddings are spoilt because cooks imagine they can use up doubtful eggs.

When eggs are more than doubtful, they are often bought up by the smaller pastry-cooks in cheap and poor neighbourhoods of our large towns, such as the East-End of London. These eggs are called "spot eggs," and are sold at thirty and forty a shilling. They utilise them as follows: They hold the egg up in front of a bright gas-light, when the small black spot can be clearly seen. This black spot is kept at the lowest point of the egg, i.e., the egg is held so that this black spot is at the bottom. The upper part of the egg is then broken and poured off, the black spot being retained. The moment the smallest streak proceeds from this black spot the pouring-off process is stopped. Of course, the black part is all thrown away, the stench from it being almost intolerable, containing, as it does, sulphuretted hydrogen. We mention the fact for what it is worth. It would be a bold man who tried to lay down any law as to where waste ceases and the use of wrongful material commences. Everything depends upon the circumstances of the case in question. We fear there are many thousands, hundreds of thousands, in this great city of London, whose everyday life more or less compares with that of a shipwrecked crew. They "fain would fill their belly with the husks that the swine do eat, but no man gives unto them." There is this to be said in favour of vegetarian diet—that, were it universal, grinding poverty would be banished from the earth. We must not cry out too soon about using what some men call bad material. Lord Byron, when he was starving after shipwreck, was glad to make a meal off the paws of his favourite dog, which had been thrown away when the carcase had been used on a former occasion.

The simplest way of boiling eggs is to place them at starting in boiling water, and boil them from three to three and a half to four minutes, according to whether they are liked very lightly boiled, medium, or well-set.

The egg saucepan should be small, so that when the eggs are first plunged in it takes the water off the boil for a few seconds, otherwise the eggs are likely to crack. This applies more particularly to French eggs, which have thin, brittle shells containing an excess of lime, probably due to the large quantity of chalk which is the distinguishing feature of the soil in the Pas de Calais, which is the chief neighbourhood from which French eggs are imported.

Over a million eggs are imported from France to England every day, notwithstanding the fact that thousands are kept awake by the crying of their neighbours' fowls.

There is a strange delusion among Londoners that an egg is not good if it is milky. This, of course, is never met with in London, for the simple reason that a milky egg means, as a rule, than it has not been laid more than a few hours. For this reason eggs literally hot from the nest are not suitable for making puddings or even omelets. Eggs that have been kept one or two days will be found to answer better, as they possess more binding properties.

There is an old-fashioned idea that the best way to boil an egg is to place it in the saucepan in cold water, to put the saucepan on the fire, and as soon as the water boils the egg is done. A very little reflection will show that this entirely depends upon the size of the saucepan and the fierceness of the fire. If the saucepan were the size of the egg, the water would boil before the egg was hot through; on the other hand, no one could place an egg in the copper on this principle and then light the copper fire.

Eggs are best boiled in the dining-room on the fire, or in an ornamental egg-boiler. By this means we get the eggs hot, an occurrence almost unknown in large hotels and big establishments.

EGGS, TO BREAK.—Whenever you break eggs, never mind what quantity, always break each egg separately into a cup first; see that it is good, and then throw it into a basin with the rest. One bad egg would spoil fifty. Supposing you have a dozen or two dozen new-laid eggs just taken from the nest, it is not an uncommon thing to have one that has been overlooked for weeks, and which may be a half-hatched mass of putrefaction.

EGGS, FRIED.—The first point is to have a clean frying-pan, which is an article of kitchen furniture very rarely indeed met with in this country. For frying eggs, and for making omelets, it is essential that the frying-pan should never be used for other purposes.

If you think your frying-pan is perfectly clean, warm it in front of the fire for half a minute, put a clean white cloth over the top of the finger, and then rub the inside of the frying-pan.

To fry eggs properly, very little butter will be required; a little olive-oil will answer the same purpose. If you have too much "fat," the white of the eggs are apt to develop into big bubbles or blisters. Another point is, you do not want too fierce a fire. Fry them very slowly. Some cooks will almost burn the bottom of the egg before the upper part is set. As soon as the white is set round the edge, you will often find the yolk not set at all, surrounded by a rim of semi-transparent "albumen." When this is the case, it is very often a good plan to take the frying-pan off the fire (we are presuming the stove is a shut-up one), and place it in the oven for a minute or so, leaving the oven door open. By this means the heat of the oven will set the upper part of the eggs, and there is no danger of the bottom part being burnt.

There is a great art in taking fried eggs out of a frying-pan and serving them on a dish. Fried eggs, to look nice, should have the yolk in the centre, surrounded by a ring of white, perfectly round, rather more than an inch in breadth.

Take an egg-slice in the left hand, slide it under each egg separately, so that the yolk gets well into the middle of the slice. Now take a knife in the right hand and trim off the superfluous white. By this means you will be able to do it neatly. The part trimmed away is virtually refuse. Of course, you do not throw away more than is necessary, but take care that the white rim round the yolk is of uniform breadth. Most cooks take the egg out with their right hand, and attempt to trim it with the left; the result is about as neat as what would happen were you to attempt to write a letter with your left hand in a hurry.

Very often the appearance of fried eggs is improved by sprinkling over them a few specks of chopped parsley.

In placing fried eggs on toast, place the slice over the toast and draw the slice away. Do not push the egg on; you may break it.

EGGS, POACHED.—The best kitchen implement to use for poaching eggs is a good large frying-pan. The mistake is to let the water boil; it should only just simmer. You should avoid having the white of the egg set too hard. We should endeavour to have the eggs look as white as possible. In order to insure this, put a few drops of vinegar or lemon-juice into the water, break the eggs separately into a clip, and then turn them very gently into the hot water. When they are set fairly firm take them out with an egg-slice, using the left hand as before, and trim them with the right. It is not necessary, in poached eggs, to have a clear yolk surrounded with a white uniform ring. Poached eggs often look best when the yolk reposes in a sort of pillow-case of white. Before putting them on toast or spinach, &c., be very careful to drain off the water; this is particularly important when the water is acid, especially with vinegar.

EGGS, HARD-BOILED.—Place the eggs in cold water, bring the water to boiling point, and let them boil for ten minutes; if the hard-boiled eggs are wanted hot, put them in cold water for half a minute, in order that you may remove the shells without burning your fingers. If the eggs are required cold, it is best not to remove the shells till just before they are wanted; but if they have to be served cold, similar to what we meet with at railway refreshment-rooms, let them be served cold, whole. If you cut a hard-boiled egg the yolk very soon gets discoloured and brown round the edge, shrivels up, and becomes most unappetising in appearance.

EGGS, CURRIED.—Take some hard-boiled eggs, cut them in halves (remove the half-yolks), and cut them into rings. Place all these rings round the edge of the dish, and pile the white rings up to make a sort of border; pour some thick curry sauce in the middle, place the half-yolks at equal distances apart, on the white round the edge, and sprinkle a few specks of green parsley round the edge on the whites; this will give the dish a pretty appearance.

EGGS, DEVILLED.—Take, say, half a dozen eggs, boil them hard, remove the shells while hot, cut them in halves, scoop out the yolk, and cut a tiny piece off the bottom of each white cup, so that it will stand upright—a la Columbus. Next take all the yolks, and put them in a basin, and pound them with a little butter till you get a thick squash; add some cayenne pepper, according to taste, a little white pepper, a little salt, and a few drops of chilli-vinegar or ordinary vinegar; you can also add a little finely chopped parsley—say a teaspoonful. Fill each cup with some of this mixture, and as there will be more than enough to fill them, owing to the butter, bring them to a point, like a cone. Devilled eggs are best served cold, in which case they look best placed on a silver or ordinary dish, the bottom of which is covered with green parsley; the white looks best on a green bed. Some cooks chop up the little bits of white cut off from the bottom of the cups, divide them into two portions, and colour one half pink by shaking them in a saucer with a few drops of cochineal. These white and pink specks are then sprinkled over the parsley.

N.B.—In an ordinary way devilled eggs require anchovy sauce to be mixed with the yolks, but anchovy sauce is not allowed in vegetarian cookery.

EGGS A LA BONNE FEMME.—Proceed exactly as in making devilled eggs, till you place the yolks in the basin; then add to these yolks, while hot, a little dissolved butter, and small pieces of chopped cold boiled carrot, turnip, celery, and beet-root; season with white pepper and salt, and mix well together. Add also a suspicion of nutmeg and a little lemon-juice. Fill the cups with this while the mixture is moist, as when the butter gets cold the mixture gets firm. If you use chopped beet-root as well as other vegetables, it is best to fill half the cups with half the mixture before any beetroot is added, then add the beet-root and stir the mixture well up and it will turn a bright red. Now fill the remaining half of the cups, and place them on the dish containing the parsley, alternately. The red contrasts prettily with the light yellowish white of the first half. Do not colour the white specks with cochineal, as this is a different shade of red from the beet-root. You can chop up the white and sprinkle it over the parsley with a little chopped beet-root as well.