EGGS A LA TRIPE.—Small Spanish onions are perhaps best for this dish, but ordinary onions can be used. Cut the onions cross-ways after peeling them, so that they fall in rings, and remove the white core. Two Spanish or half a dozen ordinary onions will be sufficient. Fry these rings of onions in butter till they are tender, without browning them. Take them out of the frying-pan and put them aside. Add a spoonful of flour to the frying-pan, and make a paste with the butter, and then add sufficient milk so that when it is boiled and stirred up it makes a thick sauce; add pepper and salt, a little lemon-juice, and a small quantity of grated nutmeg. Put back the rings of onions into this, and let them simmer gently. Take half a dozen hard-boiled eggs, cut the eggs in halves, remove the yolks, and cut the whites into rings, like the onions, mixing these white egg-rings with the onions and sauce; make the whole hot and serve on a dish, using the hard-boiled half-yolks to garnish; sprinkle a little chopped parsley over the whole, and serve.

EGG, FORCEMEAT OF, OR EGG BALLS.—Take three hard-boiled yolks of eggs, powder them, mix in a raw yolk, add a little pepper and salt, a small quantity of grated nutmeg, about a saltspoonful of finely chopped parsley, chopped up with a pinch of savoury herbs, or a pinch of dust from bottled savoury herbs, sifted from them, may be added instead. Roll these into balls not bigger than a very small marble, flour them, and throw them into boiling water till they are set.

In many parts of the Continent, hard-boiled yolks of eggs, served whole, are used as egg balls. A much cheaper way of making egg balls is as follows:—Beat up one egg, add a teaspoonful of chopped blanched parsley, some pepper and salt, and a very little grated nutmeg. Sift a bottle of ordinary mixed savoury herbs in a sieve, and take about half a saltspoonful of the dust and mix this with the egg, This will be found really better than using the herbs themselves. Now make some very fine bread-crumbs from stale bread, and mix this with the beaten-up egg till you make a sort of soft paste or dough; roll this into balls the size of a marble, flour them, and throw them into boiling water. The balls must be small or they will split in boiling.

EGGS AU GRATIN.—Make about half a pint of butter sauce, make it hot over the fire, and stir in about two ounces of Parmesan cheese, a quarter of a nutmeg grated, some white pepper, and the juice of half a lemon. Make this hot, and then add the yolks of four eggs. Stir it all up, and keep stirring very quickly till the mixture begins to thicken, when you must instantly remove it from the fire, but continue stirring for another minute. In the meantime have ready some hard-boiled eggs, cut these into slices, and make a circle of the bigger slices on a dish; then spread a layer of the mixture over the slices of egg, and place another layer on this smaller than the one below, then another layer of mixture, and so on with alternate layers till you pile it up in the shape of a pyramid. Spread a layer of the remainder of the mixture over the surface, and sprinkle some powdered light-coloured bread-raspings mixed with some grated Parmesan cheese over the whole; place the dish in the oven to get hot and to slightly brown, and then serve. Some fried bread cut into pretty shapes can be used to ornament the base.

EGGS AND SPINACH.—Make a thick puree of spinach; take some hard-boiled eggs, cut them in halves while hot, after removing the shells, and press each half a little way into the puree, so that the yellow yolk will be shown surrounded by the white ring. Be very careful not to smear the edge with the spinach.

N.B.—Sometimes eggs are poached and laid on the spinach whole.

EGGS AND TURNIP-TOPS.—Proceed exactly as above, using a puree of turnip-tops instead of spinach.

EGGS AND ASPARAGUS.—Have ready some of the green parts of asparagus, boiled tender, and cut up into little pieces an eighth of an inch long so that they look like peas. Beat up four eggs very thoroughly with some pepper and salt, and mix in the asparagus, only do not break the pieces of green. Melt a couple of ounces of butter in a small stew-pan, and as soon as it commences to froth pour in the beaten-up egg and asparagus; stir the mixture quickly over the fire, being careful to scrape the bottom of the saucepan. As soon as the mixture thickens pour it on some hot toast, and serve.

EGGS AND CELERY.—Have ready some stewed celery on toast. (See CELERY, STEWED.) Poach some eggs and place them on the top. Hard-boiled eggs, cut into slices, can be added to the celery instead of poached eggs.

When stewed celery is served as a course by itself, the addition of the eggs and plenty of bread make it a wholesome and satisfying meal.

EGG SALAD.—(See SALADS.)

EGG SANDWICHES.—(See SANDWICHES.)

EGG SAUCE.—(See SAUCES.)

EGG TOAST.—Beat up a couple of eggs, melt an ounce of butter in a saucepan, and add to it a little pepper and salt. As soon as the butter begins to froth, add the beaten-up egg and stir the mixture very quickly, and the moment it begins to thicken pour it over a slice of hot buttered toast.

EGGS A LA DAUPHINE.—Take ten hard-boiled eggs, cut them in halves and remove the yolks, and place the yolks in a basin with a piece of new bread, about as big as the fist, that has been soaked in some milk, or better still, cream; add a teaspoonful of chopped parsley, a quarter of a grated nutmeg, and two ounces of grated Parmesan cheese; rub the whole well together, and then add two whole eggs, well beaten up, to the mixture to moisten it. Next fill all these white cups of eggs with some of this mixture, place the eggs well together, and spread a thin layer of the mixture over the top; then take a smaller number of half-eggs, filled, and place on the top and make a pyramid, so that a single half-egg is at the top. You can place ten half-eggs at the bottom in one layer, six half-eggs on the top of these, spreading a thin layer of the mixture, then three half-eggs, one more layer of the mixture, and then one half-egg at the summit. This dish is sometimes ornamented by forcing hard-boiled yolks of eggs through a wire sieve. It falls like yellow vermicelli into threads. This dish should be placed in the oven, to be made quite hot, and some kind of white sauce should be poured round the edge.

EGGS AND BLACK BUTTER.—Fry some eggs, serve them up on a hot dish, and pour some black butter round the base. (See BLACK BUTTER SAUCE.)

EGGS AND GARLIC.—This is better adapted for an Italian than an English palate. Take half a dozen heads of garlic and fry them in a little butter in order to remove the rankness of flavour. Take them out and pound them in a mortar with rather more than a tablespoonful of oil; heat this on the fire in a stew-pan, after adding some pepper and salt. Beat up an egg, and stir this in with the oil and garlic till the mixture gets thick. Arrange some slices of hard-boiled eggs—four eggs would be sufficient—pour this mixture in the centre, and serve.

EGGS WITH MUSHROOMS.—Take half a pint of button mushrooms and, if fresh, peel them and throw them instantly into water made acid with lemon-juice, in order that they may not turn a bad colour. In the meantime slice up a good-sized Spanish onion, and fry the onion in a little butter. As soon as the onion is a little tender, chop up and add the mushrooms. Put all this into a stew-pan with a little butter sauce, or a little water can be added and then thickened with a little butter and flour. Let this simmer gently for nearly half an hour, add a little made mustard, pepper and salt and a dessertspoonful of vinegar. Before sending to table add half a dozen hard-boiled eggs; the whites should be cut into rings, and should be only put into the sauce long enough to get hot; the yolks should be kept separate, but must be warmed up in the sauce.

EGGS AND ONIONS.—Cut up a large Spanish onion in slices, and fry it in some butter till it is a light brown and tender, but do not let it burn; drain off the butter and put the fried onion on a dish; sprinkle some cayenne pepper and a little salt over the onions, and squeeze the juice of a whole lemon over them. Now poach some eggs and serve them on the top of the onion.

EGGS AND POTATOES.—Take the remains of some floury potatoes, beat up an egg, and mix the potato flour with the egg. You can also chop up very finely a small quantity of onion and parsley, and season with plenty of pepper and salt. The respective quantities of floury potatoes and beaten egg must be so regulated that you can roll the mixture into balls without their having any tendency to break. Make the balls big enough so that when you press them between the hands you can squeeze the ball into the shape of an ordinary egg, or you can mould them into this shape with a tablespoon. Now flour these imitation eggs in order to dry the surface, and then dip them into well-beaten-up egg and cover them with dried bread-crumbs, and fry them in a little butter or oil, or brown them in the oven, occasionally basting them with a little butter.

EGGS AND SAUCE ROBERT.—Take some hard-boiled eggs, cut them into quarters, and make them hot in some Sauce Robert—(see ROBERT SAUCE)—and serve with fried or toasted bread in a dish.

EGGS AND SORREL.—Make a thick puree of sorrel—(see SORREL SAUCE)—and serve some hard-boiled or poached eggs on the top.

EGGS, BROILED.—Cut a large slice of crumb of bread off a big loaf; toast it lightly, put some pieces of butter on it, and put it on a dish in front of the fire; then break some eggs carefully on to the toast, and let them set from the heat of the fire like a joint roasting; when the side nearest the fire gets set, it will be necessary to turn the dish round. When the whole has set, squeeze the juice of an orange over the eggs, and a little grated nutmeg may be added. The eggs and toast should be served in the same dish in which they are baked.

EGGS, BUTTERED.—Break some eggs into a flat dish, then take a little butter and make it hot in a frying-pan till it frizzles and begins to turn brown. Now pour this very hot butter, which is hotter than boiling water, over the eggs in the dish. Put the dish in the oven a short time, and finish off setting the yolks with a red-hot salamander.

EGGS, SCRAMBLED.—Scrambled eggs, when finished properly, should have the appearance of yellow and white streaks, distinct in colour, but yet all joined together in one mass. Melt a little butter in the frying-pan, break in some eggs, as if for frying; of course, the whites begin to set before the yolks. As soon as the whites are nearly but not quite set, stir the whole together till the whole mass sets. By this means you will get yellow and white streaks joined together. It is very important that you don't let the eggs get brown at the bottom; you will therefore require a perfectly clean frying-pan and not too fierce a fire.

EGGS IN SUNSHINE.—This is a name given to fried eggs with tomato served on the top. You want a dish that will stand the heat; consequently, take an oval baking-tin, or enamelled dish that you can put on the top of a shut-up stove. Melt a little butter in this, and as soon as it begins to frizzle break some eggs into the dish, and let them all set together. As soon as they are set, pour four or five tablespoonfuls of tomato conserve on the top; this is much better than tomato sauce, which contains vinegar. Or you can bake half a dozen ripe tomatoes in a tin in the oven, and place these on the top instead of the tomato conserve.

EGGS AND CUCUMBER.—Peel and slice up two or three little cucumbers of the size generally sold on a barrow at a penny each. Put these with two or three ounces of butter in a stew-pan, and three small onions about the size of the top of the thumb, chopped very fine; fry these and add a dessertspoonful of vinegar. When the cucumber is tender, and a little time has been allowed for the vinegar to evaporate, add six hard-boiled eggs, cut into slices; make these very hot and serve. Pepper and salt must be added.

EGGS WITH CHEESE.—Take a quarter of a pound of grated cheese (the cheese should be dry and white), melt this cheese gently in a stew-pan over the fire, with a little bit of butter about as big as the thumb, in order to assist the cheese in melting. Mix with it a brimming teaspoonful of chopped parsley, two or three tiny spring onions, chopped very fine, and about a quarter of a small grated nutmeg. When the cheese is melted, add six beaten-up eggs, and stir the whole together till they are set. Fried or toasted bread should be served round the edge of the dish.

LITTLE EGGS FOR GARNISHING.—This is a nice dish when you require a lot of white of eggs for other purposes, such as iceing a wedding-cake, or making light vanilla or almond biscuits.

Take six hard-boiled yolks, powder them, flavour with a little pepper and salt, and mix in three raw yolks; mix this well together, and roll them into shapes like very small sausages, pointed at each end like a foreign cigar. Flour these on the outside, and throw them into boiling water. These can be used for garnishing purposes for the vast majority of vegetarian dishes. They can be flavoured if wished with grated nutmeg, chopped parsley, and a few savoury herbs.

OMELETS.—It is a strange fact, but not the less true, that to get a well-made omelet in a private house in this country is the exception and not the rule. A few general remarks on making omelets will, we hope, not be out of place in writing a book on an exceptional style of cookery, in which omelets should play a most important part.

First of all, we require an omelet-pan, and for this purpose the cheaper the frying-pan the better. The best omelet-pan of all is a copper one, tinned inside. Copper conveys heat quicker than almost any other metal; consequently, if we use an ordinary frying-pan, the thinner it is the quicker will heat be conveyed.

It is very essential that the frying-pan be absolutely clean, and it will be found almost essential to reserve the omelet-pan for omelets only. A frying-pan that has cooked meat should not be used for the purpose; and although in vegetarian cookery a frying-pan has not been used in this manner, we should still avoid one in which onions or vegetables, or even black butter has been made. The inside of an omelet-pan should always look as if it had only just left the ironmonger's shop.

The next great question is, how much butter should be allowed for, say, six eggs? On this point the greatest authorities differ. We will first quote our authorities, and then attempt to give an explanation that reconciles the difference. A plain omelet may be roughly described as settings of eggs well beaten up by stirring them up in hot butter. One of the oldest cookery books we can call to mind is entitled "The Experienced English Housekeeper," by Elizabeth Raffald. The book, which was published in 1775, is dedicated to the Hon. Lady Elizabeth Warburton, whom the authoress formerly served. as housekeeper. The recipe is entitled "To make an amulet." The book states, "Put a quarter of a pound of butter into a frying-pan, break six eggs"; Francatelli also gives four ounces of butter to six eggs.

On the other hand, Soyer, the great cook, gives two ounces of butter to six eggs; so also does the equally great Louis Eustache Ude, cook to Louis XVI.

We may add that "Cassell's Dictionary of Cookery" recommended two ounces of butter to six eggs, whilst "Cassell's Shilling Cookery" recommends four eggs.

The probable reason why two such undoubtedly great authorities as Soyer and Francatelli should differ is that in making one kind of omelet you would use less butter than in making another. Francatelli wrote for what may be described as that "high class cooking suited for Pall Mall clubs," where no one better than himself knew how best to raise the jaded appetite of a wealthy epicure. Soyer's book was written for the people.

There are two kinds of omelets, one in which the egg is scarcely beaten at all, and in which, when cooked, the egg appears set in long streaks. There is also the richer omelet, which is sent to table more resembling a light pudding. For the former of these omelets, two ounces of butter will suffice for six eggs; for the latter of these you will require four ounces of butter, or else the omelet will be leathery. In Holland, Belgium, and Germany, and in country villages in France, the omelet is made, as a rule, with six eggs to two ounces of butter. It comes up like eggs that have been set. In the higher-class restaurants in Paris, like Bignon's, or the Cafe Anglais, the omelet is lighter, and probably about four ounces of butter would be used to six eggs.

This probably explains the different directions given in various cookery books for making omelets.

OMELET, PLAIN.—Melt four ounces of butter in a frying-pan, heat up six eggs till they froth; add a little pepper and salt, pour the beaten-up eggs into the frying-pan as soon as the butter begins to frizzle, and with a tablespoon keep scraping the bottom of the frying-pan in every part, not forgetting the edge. Gradually the mixture becomes lumpy; still go on scraping till about two-thirds or more are lumpy and the rest liquid. Now slacken the heat slightly by lifting the frying-pan from the fire, and push the omelet into half the frying-pan so that it is in the shape of a semicircle. By this time, probably, it will be nearly set. Take the frying-pan off the fire, and hold it in a slanting direction in front of the fire. When the whole is set, as it will quickly do, slide off the omelet from the frying-pan on to a hot dish with an egg-slice, and serve.

OMELET, PLAIN (ANOTHER WAY).—Put two ounces of butter into a frying-pan, break six eggs into a basin with a little pepper and salt, and beat them very slightly, so that the yolks and whites are quite mixed into one, but do not beat them more than you can help, and do not let the eggs froth. As soon as the butter frizzles, pour in the beaten eggs, scrape the frying-pan quickly with a spoon in every part till the mixture gets lumpy. Now slacken the heat if the fire is fierce, and let the mixture set in the frying-pan like a pancake. As soon as it is nearly set, with perhaps only a dessertspoonful of liquid left unset, turn the omelet over, one half on to the other half, in the shape of a semicircle, and bring the spoonful of unset fluid to join them over the edge. Slide off the omelet on to a hot dish with an egg-slice.

OMELET WITH FINE HERBS.—Chop up a dessertspoonful of parsley, and add a good pinch of powdered savoury herbs, add these with pepper and salt to the six beaten-up eggs in a basin. Beat up the eggs, either slightly or very thoroughly, according to whether you use two ounces of butter or four. Proceed in every respect, in making the omelet, as directed for plain omelet above.

OMELET WITH ONION.—Proceed exactly as in the above recipe, only adding to the chopped parsley a piece of onion or shallot about as big as the top of the thumb down to the first joint, also very finely chopped. When onion is used in making an omelet a little extra pepper should be added.

OMELET WITH CHEESE.—Proceed as if making an ordinary omelet, with four ounces of butter. Add to the six well beaten-up eggs about four ounces of grated Parmesan cheese; a small quantity of cream will be found a great improvement to this omelet. A little pepper and salt must, of course, be added as well.

POTATO OMELET.—Mix three ounces of a floury potato with six eggs, a little pepper and salt, and half a pint of milk, and make the milk boil and then stand for a couple of minutes before it is mixed with the eggs; pour this mixture into three or four ounces of butter, and proceed as in making an ordinary omelet.

POTATO OMELET, SWEET.—Proceed exactly as above, only instead of adding pepper and salt mix in a brimming tablespoonful of finely powdered sugar, the juice of a lemon, with half a grated nutmeg.

CHEESE SOUFFLE.—To make a small cheese souffle in a round cake-tin, proceed as follows:—Make the tin very hot in the oven. Put in about an ounce of butter, so as to make the tin oily in every part inside. The tin must be tilted so that the butter pours round the sides of the tin as well as the bottom. Take two eggs, separate the yolks from the whites, and beat the whites to a stiff froth; beat up the two yolks very thoroughly with a quarter of a pint of milk. Add to this two tablespoonfuls of grated Parmesan cheese; add this mixture to the beaten-up whites, and mix the whole carefully together. Now pour this mixture into the hot buttered tin, which should be five or six inches deep, and bake it in the oven. The mixture will rise to five or six times its original depth. As soon as it is done, run with the souffle from the oven door to the dining-room door. However quick you may be, the souffle will probably sink an inch on the way. Some cooks wrap hot flannel on the outside of the tin to keep up the heat. If you have a folded dinner napkin round the tin for appearance sake, as is usually the case, fold the napkin before you make the souffle, and make the napkin sufficiently big round that it can be dropped over the tin in an instant. The napkin should be pinned, and be quite half an inch in diameter bigger than the width of the tin. This is to save time. Delay in serving the souffle is fatal.

OMELET SOUFFLE, SWEET.—In making an omelet souffle, sweet, you can proceed in exactly the same manner as making a cheese souffle, with the exception that you add two tablespoonfuls of powdered sugar instead of two tablespoonfuls of grated cheese. The omelet will, however, require flavouring of some kind, the two most delicate being vanilla and orange-flower water. You can flavour it with lemon by rubbing a few lumps of sugar on the outside of a lemon, and then pounding this with the powdered sugar. It must be pounded very thoroughly and mixed very carefully, or else one part of the omelet will taste stronger of lemon than the other. Some powdered sugar should be shaken over the top of the souffle just before serving.

OMELET SOUFFLE (ANOTHER WAY).—When a souffle is made on a larger scale, and served up on a flat dish, it is best to proceed as follows:—Take six ounces of powdered sugar, and mix them with six yolks of eggs and a dessertspoonful of flour and a pinch of salt. To this must be added whatever flavouring is used, such as vanilla. This is all mixed together till it is perfectly smooth. Next beat the six whites to a very stiff froth; mix this in with the batter lightly, put two ounces of butter into an omelet-pan, and as soon as the butter begins to frizzle pour in the mixture. As it begins to set round the edges, turn it over and heap it up in the middle, and then slide the omelet off on to a plated-edged baking dish, which must be well buttered. Put it in the oven for about a quarter of an hour, to let it rise, shake some powdered sugar over the top, and serve very quickly.

OMELET, SWEET.—Make an ordinary plain omelet with six eggs and either two or four ounces of butter, as directed for making omelet, plain. Instead of adding pepper and salt to the beaten-up eggs, add one or two tablespoonfuls of finely powdered sugar. At the last moment, sprinkle a little powdered sugar over the omelet, and just glaze the sugar with a red-hot salamander.

OMELET WITH JAM.—Make a plain sweet omelet as directed above, adding rather less sugar—about half. If you make the omelet with two ounces of butter, and turn it over, put a couple of tablespoonfuls of jam on the omelet, and turn the half over the jam. It is best to put the jam in the oven for a minute or two to take the chill off.

If you make the omelet with four ounces of butter, you must put the jam by the side of the omelet and let the thin part of the omelet cover it. Of course, the question what jam is best for sweet omelet is purely a matter of taste. Most good judges consider that apricot jam is the best, and if the sweet omelet itself be flavoured with a little essence of vanilla, the result is generally considered one of the nicest sweets that can be sent to table. Strawberry jam, especially if some of the strawberries are whole, is also very nice. The objection to raspberry jam is the pips.

A most delicious omelet can be made by chopping up some preserved slices of pine-apple, and placing this in the omelet, and making the pine-apple syrup hot and pouring it round the base. Red-currant jelly, black-currant jam, and plum jam can all be used. One of the cheapest and, in the opinion of many, the best sweet omelets can be made with six eggs, two ounces of butter, and three or four tablespoonfuls of orange marmalade. In this case it will cost no more to rub a few lumps of sugar on the outside of an orange, and pound these with the powdered sugar you use to sweeten the omelet. If the marmalade is liquid, as it often is, one or two tablespoonfuls of the juice can be poured round the edge of the omelet.

OMELET AU RHUM.—As a rule, spirits are not allowed in vegetarian cookery. An omelet au rhum is simply a sweet omelet, plain, with plenty of powdered sugar sprinkled over the top, with some rum ignited poured over it just before it is sent to table. The way to ignite the rum is to fill a large spoon, like a gravy-spoon, and hold a lighted wooden taper (not wax; it tastes) underneath the spoon till the rum lights. The dish should be hot. It may be a consolation to teetotallers to reflect that the fact of burning the rum causes all the alcohol to evaporate, and there is nothing left but the flavour.

OMELET AU KIRSCH.—Proceed as above, substituting Kirschenwasser for Rum.

OMELET, VEGETABLE.—A plain omelet can also be served with any puree of vegetables, so that we can have—Asparagus Omelet, Artichoke Omelet, French Bean Omelet, Celery Omelet, Spinach Omelet, Mushroom Omelet, Tomato Omelet, &c.



CHAPTER V.

SALADS AND SANDWICHES.

SALADS AND SANDWICHES.—Probably the most patriotic Englishman will admit that, on the subject of salads, we can learn something from the French. During the last half-century a great improvement has taken place on this point in this country. Many years ago it was the fashion to dress an English lettuce, resembling in shape an old umbrella, with a mixture of brown sugar, milk, mustard, and even anchovy and Worcester sauce, and then add a few drops of oil, as if it were some dangerous poison, like prussic acid, not to be tampered with lightly. The old-fashioned lettuces were so hard and crisp that it was difficult to chew them without making a noise somewhat similar to walking on a shingly beach. In modern days, however, we have arrived at a stage of civilisation in which, as a rule, we use soft French lettuces instead of the hard gingham-shaped vegetables which somehow or other our grandfathers ate for supper with a whole lobster, seasoned with about half a pint of vinegar, and then slept none the worse for the performance. The first point for consideration, if we wish to have a good salad, is to have the lettuces crisp and dry. Old-fashioned French cookery-books direct that the lettuce should never be washed. The stalks should be cut off, the outside leaves removed and thrown away, and the lettuce itself should then be pulled in pieces with the fingers, and each piece wiped with a clean cloth. This is not always practicable, but the principle remains the same. You can wash the lettuce leaves without bruising them. You can dry them by shaking them up lightly in a large clean cloth, and you can spread them out and let them get dry an hour or two before they are dressed.

Another important point to be borne in mind is that a salad should never be dressed till just before it is wanted to be eaten. If by chance you put by the remains of a dressed salad, it is good for nothing the next morning. Finally, the oil must be pure olive oil of the best quality, and to ensure this it should bear the name of some well-known firm. A good deal of the oil sold simply as salad oil, bearing no name, is adulterated, sometimes with cotton-seed oil.

SALAD, FRENCH LETTUCE, PLAIN.—Clean one or more French lettuces (throw away all the leaves that are decayed or bruised), place these in a salad-bowl, and, supposing we have sufficient for two persons, dress the salad as follows:—Put a saltspoonful of salt and half a saltspoonful of pepper into a tablespoon. Fill the tablespoon up with oil, stir the pepper and salt up with a fork, and pour it over the lettuce. Now add another tablespoonful of oil, and then toss the lettuce leaves lightly together with a spoon and fork. Allow one tablespoonful of oil to each person. This salad would suffice for two. Be sure and mix the lettuce and oil well together before you add any vinegar. The reason of this is that if you add the vinegar first it would soak into the lettuce leaves, making one part more acid than another. Having well mixed up the lettuce and oil, add half a tablespoonful of vinegar. Mix it once more, and the salad is dressed.

In France they always add to the lettuce, before it is dressed, two or three finely chopped fresh tarragon leaves. Dried tarragon can be used, but it is not equal to fresh. If you have no tarragon it is a great improvement to use tarragon vinegar instead of ordinary vinegar. Tarragon vinegar is sold by all grocers at sixpence per bottle.

It is also often customary to rub the salad-bowl with a bead of garlic, or rub a piece of crust of bread with garlic, and toss this piece of crust up with the salad after it has been dressed. Garlic should never be chopped up, but only used as stated above.

A good French salad is also always decorated with one or more hard-boiled eggs, cut into quarters, longways. These are placed on the top of the lettuce.

SALAD, ENGLISH, LETTUCE.—The ordinary English salad is made either with French or English lettuces, and is generally dressed as follows:—One or two tablespoonfuls of cream or milk, a teaspoonful of made mustard, two tablespoonfuls of vinegar, pepper, and salt. There are many people still living in remote parts of the country who prefer this style of dressing.

SALAD, ENGLISH, MIXED.—The old-fashioned English mixed salad generally consisted of English lettuce cut up into strips crossways, to which was added mustard and cress, boiled beetroot, chopped celery, spring onions, radishes, and watercress. It is by no means a bad mixture when dressed with oil, and, of course, it can be dressed it a l'Anglaise. It makes an excellent accompaniment to a huge hunk of cheese, a crusty loaf, a good appetite, and a better digestion.

SALAD, MAYONNAISE.—This is generally considered the king of salads, and it can be made an exceedingly pretty-looking dish, Take two or more French lettuces, clean and dry them as directed above, and take the small heart of one lettuce about the size of a small walnut, uncut from the stalk, so that you can stand it upright in the middle of the salad, raised above the surface. Arrange all the softer parts of the leaves on the top of the salad so as to make as much as possible a smooth surface. Make some Mayonnaise sauce, thick enough to be spread like butter, and mask this little mound and all the surface of the middle of the salad round it with a thin layer of the sauce, so that it looks like the top of a mould of solid custard. Ornament the edge of the salad with hard-boiled eggs cut in quarters, and place between the quarters slices of pickled gherkins and stoned olives. Take a small teaspoonful of French capers, dry them on a cloth, and sprinkle a few of them about an inch apart on the white surface. Next chop up, very finely, about half a teaspoonful of parsley, and see that this doesn't stick together in lumps. Place this on the end of a knife and flip the knife so that the little green specks of parsley fall on the white surface. Next take about half a saltspoonful of finely crumbled bread, and shake these in a saucer with one or two drops of cochineal. This will colour them a bright red, and they will have all the appearance of lobster-coral. Place these red bread-crumbs on the end of a knife and let them fall over the white surface like the parsley. The little red and green specks on the white background make the dish look exceedingly pretty. Before mixing the salad all together add a tablespoonful of tarragon vinegar or lemon-juice.

TOMATO SALAD.—For making tomato salad you require red, ripe tomatoes; the smoother they are the better, but the chief points are—very ripe and very red. Never use those pink, crinkly tomatoes which look something like milk stained with plum juice. If tomatoes are picked unripe, and then allowed to ripen afterwards, they become rotten and worthless. Slice up half a dozen or more tomatoes—sometimes it will be necessary to remove the core and pips, sometimes not; add a little oil, a little vinegar, and some pepper and salt. Tomato salad is one of the few that are very nice without any oil at all. Of course, this is a matter of taste. Some persons slice up a few onions and add to the tomatoes. In addition to this you can add some slices of cold potatoes. In this latter case, heap the potatoes up in the middle of the dish in the shape of a dome sprinkle some chopped parsley over the potatoes, put a border of sliced onion round the base, and then a border of sliced tomato outside that. This makes the dish look pretty.

Many persons rub the dish or salad-bowl with a bead of garlic. This is quite sufficient to flavour the salad; but never chop garlic for salads.

EGG SALAD.—Egg salad consists of an ordinary salad made with French lettuces, with an extra quantity of hard-boiled eggs. If you want to make the salad look very pretty on the top, cut up the lettuces and dress them with oil and vinegar in the ordinary way. Make the tops of the lettuces (which should be placed in a round salad-bowl) as smooth as you can without pressing them down unnecessarily. Now take six hard-boiled eggs, separate the yolks from the whites, powder the yolks, and chop up the whites small. Sprinkle a ring of yellow round the edge of the salad-bowl, say an inch in width, then put a ring of white round, and place the remainder of yolk in the middle, almost up to the centre. Have the centre about two inches in diameter. We now have a yellow centre surrounded by a broad white rim (as, of course, there is more white than yellow), and an outside yellow ring, which meets the white china bowl. Reserve about a teaspoonful of pieces of finely chopped white, and put them in a saucer, with a few drops of cochineal, and shake them. This turns them a bright red. Sprinkle these red specks very sparingly on the white, and take about half a teaspoonful of chopped blanched parsley, and sprinkle these green specks on the yellow. This makes the dish look pretty.

GERMAN SALAD.—German salad is made from cold boiled vegetables chopped up. In Germany, it is made, according to English ideas, from every vegetable you have ever heard of, mixed with a number of vegetables you have never heard of. In England it can be made by chopping up boiled carrot, turnip, cabbage, cauliflower, potato, French beans, Brussels sprouts (whole), celery, raw onion, raw apple, &c. In fact, in making this vegetable salad the motto should be "the more the merrier." In addition to this you will find that they add what is known as sauer kraut. This latter is not adapted, as a rule, to English palates. The salad is mixed with oil and vinegar in the ordinary way, the Germans adding much more vinegar than we should care for in this country. The salad is decorated at the finish with boiled beet-root. It is very pretty to cut the beet-root into triangles, the base of the triangle touching the edge of the salad-bowl, the point of the triangle pointing inwards. Gut a star out of a good slice of beet-root, and place it in the centre of the bowl; sprinkle a little chopped blanched parsley over the surface of the mixed vegetables.

ENDIVE SALAD.—Endives come into season long before lettuces, and are much used abroad for making salads. The drawback to endive is that it is tough, and the simple remedy is to boil it. Take three or four white-heart endives, throw them into boiling water slightly salted. When they get tender take them out and instantly throw them into cold water, by which means you preserve their colour. When quite cold, take them out again, drain them, dry them thoroughly, and pull them to pieces with the fingers. Now place them in a salad-bowl, keeping the whitest part as much as possible at the top. Place some hard-boiled eggs round the edge, and sprinkle a little chopped blanched parsley over the white endive. You can, if you like, put a few spikes of red beet-root between the quarters of eggs.

It is a great improvement to rub the salad-bowl with a bead of garlic, or you can rub a crust of bread with a bead of garlic, and toss this lightly about in the salad when you mix it.

SALSIFY SALAD.—Boiled salsify makes a very delicious salad. Take some white salsify, scrape it, and instantly throw it into vinegar and water, by which means you will keep it a pure white. Then, when you have all ready, throw it into boiling water, slightly salted, boil it till it is tender, throw it into cold water, and when cold take it out, drain it and dry it, cut it up into small half-inch pieces (or put it in whole, in sticks, into a salad-bowl), sprinkle a little chopped blanched parsley over the top, dress in the ordinary way with oil and white French vinegar, and be sure to use white pepper, not black, if white wine vinegar is objected to, the juice of a hard fresh lemon is equally good, if not better.

POTATO SALAD.—Potato salad is generally made from the remains of cold boiled potatoes. Of course, potatoes can be boiled on purpose, in which case they should be allowed to get cold in the water in which they were boiled. New potatoes are far better for the purpose than old. Cut the potatoes into slices, and place them in a salad-bowl with a little finely chopped blanched parsley. You can also add some finely chopped onion or shallot. If you do not add these you can rub the bowl with a bead of garlic. Sprinkle some more chopped parsley over the top of the salad and ornament the edge of the bowl with some thin slices of pickled gherkins. A few stoned olives can also be added. Dress the salad with oil and vinegar in the ordinary way.

ASPARAGUS SALAD.—Cold asparagus makes a most delicious salad. It is needless, perhaps, to say it is made from cold boiled asparagus. The best dressing for asparagus salad is somewhat peculiar, and is made as follows:—Take, say, an ounce of butter, put it in a saucer, and melt it in the oven till it is like oil. Now mix in a teaspoonful of made mustard, some pepper, salt, and a dessertspoonful of vinegar. Stir it all together, and as it gets cold it will begin to get thick. Dip all the green part of the asparagus in this, and lay the heads gently, without breaking them, in a vegetable dish, with the white stalk resting on the edge of the dish, and the green part in the middle. Let the salad get perfectly cold, and then serve. Of course, the sauce clings to the asparagus. The asparagus is eaten with the fingers like hot asparagus—a custom now generally recognised.

ARTICHOKE SALAD.—This applies to French artichokes, not Jerusalem. In France, artichokes are often served raw for breakfast, on a plate, with a little heap of chopped raw onion and another heap of chopped capers or parsley. The Frenchman mixes a little oil or vinegar on his plate, adding the onion, &c., according to his taste. The leaves are pulled off one by one, the white stalk part dipped in this dressing, and then eaten, by being drawn through the teeth. The artichoke bottom is reserved for the finish as a bon bouche, something like a schoolboy who will eat all the pastry round a jam tart, leaving the centre for the finale.

BEET-ROOT SALAD.—In boiling beet-roots be careful not to break them, or else they will bleed and lose their colour. When the beet-root is boiled and cold, peel it, and cut it into thin slices. It can be dressed with oil and vinegar, or vinegar only, adding pepper and salt. Some persons dress beet-root with a salad-dressing in which cream is used instead of oil; but never use cream and oil. To mix cream and oil is like mixing bacon with butter.

CUCUMBER SALAD.—Peel a cucumber and cut it into slices as thin as possible. We might almost add, thinner if possible. Mix it with a little salt, and let it stand, tossing the cucumber about every now and then. By this means you extract all the water from the cucumber. Drain off this water, and add plenty of oil to the cucumber, and then mix it so that every slice comes in contact with the oil. Now add a little pepper, and a very little vinegar, and mix it thoroughly. If you add vinegar to cucumber before the oil some of the slices will taste like sour pickle, as the vinegar soaks into the cucumber. Cucumber should be always served very cold, and is best placed in an ice-chest for an hour before serving. Some people put a piece of ice on the top of the cucumber.

FRENCH BEAN SALAD.—Cold boiled French beans make a very nice salad. A little chopped parsley should be mixed with them, and the salad-bowl can be rubbed with a bead of garlic. Some people soak the beans in vinegar first, and then add oil. This would suit a German palate. A better plan is to add the oil first, with pepper and salt, mix all well together, and then add the vinegar.

BEAN SALAD.—Cold boiled broad beans make a very nice salad. Rub off the skins so that only the green part is put in the salad-bowl. Rub the bowl with garlic, add a little chopped parsley, then oil, pepper and salt, mix well, and add vinegar last of all.

HARICOT BEAN SALAD.—This can be made from cold, boiled, dried white haricot beans. Add plenty of chopped parsley, rub the bowl with garlic, mix oil, pepper and salt first, vinegar afterwards.

* * * * *

The nicest haricot bean salad is made from the fresh green beans met with abroad. They can be obtained in this country in tins, and a delicious salad can be had at a moment's notice by opening a tin, straining off the liquor, and drying the little green beans, which are very soft and tender, and dressing them with oil and vinegar, in the ordinary way. A little chopped parsley, or garlic flavouring by rubbing the bowl, can be added or not, according to taste.

CELERY AND BEET-ROOT SALAD.—A mixture of celery and beet-root makes a very nice winter salad. The beet-root, of course, is boiled, and the celery generally sliced up thin in a raw state. It is a great improvement to boil the celery till it is nearly tender. By this means you improve the salad, and the celery assists in making vegetarian stock.

WATER-CRESS.—Water-cress is sometimes mixed with other salad, but when eaten alone requires no dressing, but only a little salt.

DANDELION LEAF SALAD.—Considering that the root of the dandelion is so largely used in medicine for making taraxacum, it is to be regretted that the leaves of the plant are not utilised in this country as they are abroad for making salad. These leaves can be obtained in London at a few shops in the French colony of Soho. The leaves are washed, dried, placed in a salad-bowl, and dressed with oil and vinegar in the ordinary way.

CAULIFLOWER SALAD.—The remains of a cold boiled cauliflower makes a very good salad if only the white part be used. It can be mixed with remains of cold potatoes, some chopped blanched parsley should be sprinkled over the top, and it can be dressed with oil and vinegar in the ordinary way; or it can be served up with a sauce made from oiled butter similar to that described for dressing cold asparagus.

MUSTARD AND CRESS.—This is somewhat similar to watercress. When served alone it is generally dipped in salt and eaten with bread-and-butter, but it is very useful to mix with other kinds of salad.

HOP SALAD.—In Germany a very nice salad is made from young hops, which are grown very extensively in America and Germany, as English brewers are well aware. The hops are picked when quite young, before they get leafy; they are then boiled till nearly tender. They can be dressed in the English fashion with oil and vinegar, or in the German fashion with vinegar and sugar.

ONION SALAD.—Few people are aware of what an excellent salad can be made from the remains of cold boiled Spanish onions. Spanish onions can generally be bought at a penny a pound. They are mild in flavour, very wholesome, and contain a great deal of nourishment. Take a couple of cold boiled Spanish onions, pull them into leaves after they are quite dry, and dress them with a very little oil and vinegar.

ITALIAN SALAD.—This is a very delicious salad, met with in Italy. It consists of a great variety of boiled vegetables, which are placed in a mould and served in aspic jelly. This latter, however, is not allowed in vegetarian cookery. A very good imitation, however, can be made as follows:—First take as many cold vegetables as you can, consisting of new potatoes, sliced, and cut up with a cutter into pretty-looking shapes. You can also take green peas, asparagus tops, cold boiled cauliflower, French beans, beet-root, &c. These vegetables should be dressed with a little oil, tarragon vinegar, pepper and salt, and can be placed in a mould or plain round basin. This basin can now be filled up with a little water thickened with corn-flour, hot. When it is cold, it can be turned out and sent to table in the shape of a mould.

MELON SALAD.—Melon is sometimes served abroad as a salad, and a slice of melon is often sent to table at the commencement of dinner, to be eaten with a little salt, cayenne pepper, and sometimes oil and vinegar.

SALADS, SWEET.—Apples, oranges, currants, pine-apple, and bananas are sometimes served as salads with syrup and sugar. They make a very nice mixture, or can be served separately. When preserved pine-apples in tins are used for the purpose, the syrup in the tin should be used for dressing the salad. Whole ripe strawberries are a great improvement, as also a wineglassful of brandy and a lump of ice.

SANDWICHES.—There is an art in cutting sandwiches—a fact which persons in the habit of frequenting railway restaurants will hardly realise. A tinned loaf is best for the purpose if we wish to avoid waste. The great thing is to have the two slices of bread to fit together neatly, and there is no occasion to cut off the crusts when made from a well-rasped tin loaf. First cut off the crust from the top of the loaf, which, of course, must be used for some other purpose. The best use for this top slice is to toast it lightly on the crumby side, and cut it up into little pieces to be served with soup. Next take the loaf, cut off one thin slice, evenly, and let it fall on its back on the board you are using. Now butter very slightly the upper surface. Next butter the top of the loaf, cut another thin slice, and, of course, these two pieces of bread will be perfectly level, and, if the two buttered sides be placed together, will fit round the edge exactly.

TOMATO SANDWICHES.—Cut some very ripe red tomatoes into thin slices, and cut them parallel with the core, as otherwise you will get them in rings from which the core will drop out. Sprinkle some thin slices of bread-and-butter with mustard and cress, dip the slices of tomato into a dressing made with a little oil, pepper, and salt, well mixed up. Put these between the bread-and-butter, and cut them into squares or triangles with a very sharp knife. These sandwiches are very cool and refreshing, and make a most agreeable supper after a hot and crowded ball-room. If you wish to have them look pretty, pile them up in the centre of a silver dish, and place a few ripe red tomatoes round the base on some bright green parsley. Place the dish in an ice-chest for an hour before it is eaten.

MUSTARD AND CRESS SANDWICHES.—Place well-washed and dried mustard and cress between two slices of bread-and-butter, and trim the edges. It is best to pepper and salt the bread-and-butter first. Pile up the sandwiches on a silver dish, and sprinkle some loose mustard and cress round the base.

EGG SANDWICHES.—Cut some hard-boiled eggs into very thin slices; season them with pepper and salt, and place them between two slices of thin bread-and-butter; cut the sandwiches into triangles or squares, pile them up in a silver dish, place plenty of fresh green parsley round the base of the dish, and place some hard-boiled eggs, cut in halves, on the parsley, which will show what the sandwiches are composed of.

INDIAN SANDWICHES.—These are exactly similar to the above, with the addition that the slices of hard-boiled eggs are seasoned with a little curry-powder. If hard-boiled eggs in halves are placed round the base of the dish, each half-egg should be sprinkled with curry-powder in order to show what the sandwiches are.

MUSHROOM SANDWICHES.—Take a pint of fresh button mushrooms, peel them, and throw them into lemon-juice and water, in order to preserve their colour; or else take the contents of a tin of mushrooms, chop them up and stew them in a frying-pan very gently with a little butter, pepper, salt, a pinch of thyme, and the juice of a whole lemon to every pint of mushrooms. When tender, rub the mixture through a wise sieve while the butter is warm and the mixture moist. Add a teaspoonful of finely chopped blanched parsley, spread this mixture while still warm on a thin slice of bread, and cover it over with another thin slice of bread, and press the two slices of bread together. When the mixture gets quite cold, the butter will set and the sandwiches get quite firm. The bread need not be buttered, as the mixture contains butter enough. Pile these sandwiches up on a silver dish, surround the dish with plenty of fresh parsley, and place a few fresh mushrooms whole, stalk and all, round them, as if they are growing out of the parsley.

CHEESE SANDWICHES.—Oil a little butter, add some pepper and salt, and a spoonful of made mustard and a pinch of cayenne pepper. When this mixture is nearly cold, use it for buttering some thin slices of bread, and, before it is quite cold, sprinkle them with some grated Parmesan cheese. Put the two slices of bread together and press them, and, when cold,. cut them into squares or triangles. Place plenty of fresh green parsley round the dish, and, if you are using hard-boiled eggs for other purposes, take the end of the white of egg, which has a little cup in it not much bigger than the top of the finger, and put a little heap of Parmesan cheese in each cup. Place a few of these round the base of the dish, on the parsley, in order to show what the sandwiches are composed of.

CREAM-CHEESE SANDWICHES.—Chop up some of the white part of a head of celery very fine, and pound it in a mortar with a little butter; season it with some salt. Use this mixture and butter some thin slices of bread, place a thin slice of cream cheese between these slices, cut the sandwiches into squares or triangles with a very sharp knife, and pile the sandwiches up on a silver dish. Surround the dish with parsley, and place a few slices of cream-cheese, cut round the size of a halfpenny, round the base, stick a little piece of the yellowish-white leaves of the heart of celery in each piece.



CHAPTER VI.

SAVOURY DISHES.

MUSHROOMS.

In many parts of the country mushrooms grow so plentifully that their cost may be considered almost nothing. On the other hand, if they have to be bought fresh, at certain seasons of the year they are very expensive, while tinned mushrooms, which can always be depended upon, cannot be regarded in any other light than that of a luxury.

When mushrooms can be gathered in the fields like black-berries they are a great boon to vegetarians. Of course, great care must be taken that only genuine mushrooms are picked, as there have been some terrible instances of poisoning from fungi being gathered by mistake, as many Cockney tourists know to their cost. As a rule, in England all mushrooms bought in markets can be depended upon. In France, where mushrooms are very plentiful, an inspector is appointed in every market, and no mushrooms are allowed to be sold unless they have first received his sanction. This is a wise precaution in the right direction.

One important word of warning before leaving the subject. Mushrooms should be eaten freshly gathered, and, if allowed to get stale, those which were perfectly wholesome when fresh picked become absolutely poisonous. The symptoms are somewhat similar to narcotic poisoning. This particularly applies to the larger and coarser kind that give out black juice.

MUSHROOMS, PLAIN, GRILLED.—The larger kinds of mushrooms are best for the purpose. The flat mushrooms should be washed, dried, and peeled. They are then cooked slowly over a clear fire, and a small wire gridiron, like those sold at a penny or twopence each, is better adapted for the purpose than the ordinary gridiron used for grilling steak. The gridiron should be kept high above the fire. The mushrooms should be dipped in oil, or oiled butter, and care should be taken that they do not stick to the bars. They should be served very hot, with pepper and salt and a squeeze of lemon-juice.

MUSHROOMS, FRIED.—When mushrooms are very small they are more easily fried than grilled. They should be washed, dried and peeled, placed in a frying-pan, with a little butter, pepper and salt, and cooked till tender. They are very nice served on toast, and the butter in which they are cooked can be poured on the toast first, and the mushrooms arranged on the top afterwards. A squeeze of lemon-juice is an improvement.

MUSHROOMS AU GRATIN.—This is a very delicious dish, and is often served as an entree at first-class dinners. They are made from what are known as cup mushrooms. It is best to pick mushrooms, as far as possible, the same size, the cup being about two inches in diameter. Peel the mushrooms very carefully, without breaking them, cut out the stalks close down with a spoon, scoop out the inside of the cup, so as to make it hollow. Now peel the stalks and chop them up with all the scooped part of the mushroom, with, supposing we are making ten cups, a piece of onion as big as the top of the thumb down to the first joint. To this add a brimming teaspoonful of chopped parsley, or even a little more, a saltspoonful of dried thyme, or half this quantity of fresh thyme. Fry all this in a frying-pan, in a little butter. The aroma is delicious. Then add sufficient dried bread-crumbs that have been rubbed through a wire sieve to make the whole into a moist paste, fill each of the cups with this mixture so that the top is as convex as the cup of the mushroom, having first seasoned the mixture with a little pepper, salt, and lemon-juice. Shake some fine bread-raspings over the top so as to make them of a nice golden-brown colour, pour a little drop of oil into a baking-tin, place the mushrooms in it, and bake them gently in an oven till the cup part of the mushroom becomes soft and tender, but take care they do not cook till they break. Now take them out carefully with an egg-slice, and place them on a dish—a silver dish is best for the purpose-and place some nice, crisp, fried parsley round the edge.

MUSHROOMS A LA BORDELAISE.—This, as the name implies, is a French recipe. It consists of ordinary grilled mushrooms, served in a sauce composed of oil or oiled butter, chopped up with parsley and garlic, thickened with the yolks of eggs.

MUSHROOMS A LA PROVENCALE.—This is an Italian recipe. You must first wash, peel, and dry the mushrooms, and then soak them for some time in what is called a marinade, which is another word for pickle, of oil mixed with chopped garlic, pepper, and salt. They are then stewed in oil with plenty of chopped parsley over rather a brisk fire. Squeeze, a little lemon-juice over them and serve them in a dish surrounded with a little fried or toasted bread.

MUSHROOM FORCEMEAT.—The mushrooms after being cleaned should be chopped up and fried in a little butter; lemon-juice should be added before they are chopped in order to preserve their colour. One or two hard-boiled yolks of eggs can be added to the mixture, and the whole rubbed through a wire sieve while hot. When the mixture is hot it should be moist, but, of course, when it gets cold, owing to the butter it will be hard. This mushroom forcemeat can be used for a variety of purposes.

MUSHROOM PIE.—Wash, dry, and peel some mushrooms, and cut them into slices with an equal quantity of cut-up potatoes. Bake these in a pie, having first moistened the potatoes and mushrooms in a little butter. Add pepper and salt and a small pinch of thyme. Cover them with a little water and put some paste over the dish in the ordinary way. It is a great improvement, after the pie is baked, to pour in some essence of mushrooms made from stewing the stalks and peelings in a little water. A single onion should be put in with them.

MUSHROOM PIE, COLD.—Prepare the mushrooms, potatoes, and essence of mushroom as directed above, adding a little chopped parsley. Bake all these in the dish before you cover with paste, add also an extra seasoning of pepper. When the mushrooms and potatoes are perfectly tender, strain off all the juice or gravy, and thicken it with corn-flour; put this back in the pie-dish and mix all well together, and pile it up in the middle of the dish so that the centre is raised above the edge. Let this get quite cold, then cover it with puff-paste, and as soon as the pastry is done take it out of the oven and let the pie get cold. This can now be cut in slices.

MUSHROOM PUDDING.—Make a mixture of mushrooms, potatoes, &c., exactly similar to that for making a pie. Place this in a basin with only sufficient water to moisten the ingredients, cover the basin with bread-crumbs soaked in milk, and steam the basin in the ordinary way.

TOMATOES, GRILLED.—What is necessary is a clear fire and a gridiron in which the bars are not too far apart. The disputed point is, should the tomatoes be grilled whole or cut in half? This may be considered a matter of taste, but personally we prefer them grilled whole. Moisten the tomato in a little oil or oiled butter, and grill them carefully, as they are apt to break. Grilled tomatoes are very nice with plain boiled macaroni, or can be served up on boiled rice.

TOMATOES, BAKED.—Place the tomatoes in a tin with a little butter, and occasionally baste them with the butter. When they are tender, they can be served either plain or with boiled macaroni or rice. The butter and juice in the tin should be poured over them.

TOMATOES, FRIED.—Place the tomatoes in a frying-pan with a little butter, and fry them until they are tender. Pour the contents of the frying-pan over them, serve plain, or with macaroni or rice.

TOMATOES, STEWED.—Take half a dozen good-sized tomatoes, and chop up very finely one onion about the same size as the tomatoes. Moisten the bottom of a stew-pan with a little butter, and sprinkle the chopped onion over the tomatoes. Add a dessertspoonful of water; place the lid on the stewpan, which ought to fit tightly. It is best to put a weight on the lid of the stew-pan, such as a flat-iron. Place the stew-pan on the fire, and let them steam till they are tender. They are cooked this way in Spain and Portugal, and very often chopped garlic is used instead of onion.

TOMATOES AU GRATIN.—Take a dozen ripe tomatoes, cut off the stalks, and squeeze out time juice and pips. Next take a few mushrooms and make a mixture exactly similar to that which was used to fill the inside of Mushrooms au gratin. Fill each tomato with some of this mixture, so that it assumes its original shape and tight skin. The top or hole where the stalk was cut out will probably be about the size of a shilling or halfpenny. Shake some bright-coloured bread raspings over this spot without letting them fall on the red tomato. In order to do this, cut a round hole the right size in a stiff piece of paper. Place the tomatoes in a stew-pan or a baking-dish in the oven, moistened with a little oil. The oil should be about the eighth of an inch deep. Stew or bake the tomatoes till they are tender, and then take them out carefully with an egg-slice, and serve them surrounded with fried parsley. If placed in a silver dish this has a very pretty appearance.

TOMATO PIE.—Slice up an equal number of ripe tomatoes and potatoes. Place them in a pie-dish with enough oiled butter to moisten them. Add a brimming teaspoonful of chopped parsley, a pinch of thyme, pepper, and salts and, if possible, a few peeled mushrooms, which will be found to be a very great improvement. Cover the pie with paste, and bake in the oven.

TOMATO PIE (ANOTHER WAY).—Proceed as in making an ordinary potato pie. Add a small bottle of tomato conserve, cover with paste, and bake in the ordinary way.

POTATO PIE.—Peel and slice up some potatoes as thin as possible. At the same time slice up some onions. If Spanish onions are used allow equal quantities of potatoes and onions, but if ordinary onions are used allow only half this quantity. Place a layer of sliced onion and sliced potato alternately. Add some pepper, salt, and sufficient butter to moisten the potato and butter before any water is added. Pour in some water and add a teaspoonful of chopped parsley, cover the pie with paste, and bake in the ordinary way.

POTATO PIE (ANOTHER WAY).—Butter a shallow pie-dish rather thickly. Line the edges with a good crust, and then fill the pie with mashed potatoes seasoned with pepper, salt, and grated nutmeg. Lay over them some small lumps of butter, hard-boiled eggs, blanched almonds, sliced dates, sliced lemon and candied peel. Cover the dish with pastry and bake the pie in a well-heated oven for half an hour or more, according to the size of the pie.

PUMPKIN PIE.—Peel a ripe pumpkin and chip off the rind or skin, halve it, and take out the seed and fluffy part in the centre, which throw away. Cut the pumpkin into small, thin slices, fill a pie-dish therewith, add to it half a teaspoonful of allspice and a tablespoonful of sugar, with a small quantity of water. Cover with a nice light paste and bake in the ordinary way. Pumpkin pie is greatly unproved by being eaten with Devonshire cream and sugar. An equal quantity of apples with the pumpkin will make a still more delicious pie.

PUMPKIN PUDDING.—Take a large pumpkin, pare it, and remove the seeds. Cut half of it into thin slices, and boil these gently in water until they are quite soft, then rub them through a fine sieve with the back of a wooden spoon. Measure the pulp, and with each pint put four ounces of butter and a large nutmeg, grated. Stir the mixture briskly for a minute or two, then add the third of a pint of hot milk and four well-beaten eggs. Pour the pudding into a buttered dish, and bake in a moderate oven for about an hour. Sugar may be added to taste.

POTATO CHEESECAKE.—(See CHEESECAKES.)

CHEESE WITH FRIED BREAD.—Take some stale bread, and cut it into strips about three inches long and one wide and one inch thick. Fry the bread in some butter or oil till it is a nice bright golden colour. Spread a layer of made mustard over the strips of fried bread, and then cover them with grated Parmesan cheese, pile them up on a dish, and place them in the oven. As soon as the cheese begins to melt serve them very hot.

CHEESE, SAVOURY.—Take equal quantities of grated Parmesan cheese, butter, and flour; add a little salt and cayenne pepper, make these into a paste with some water, roll out the paste thin till it is about a quarter of an inch thick; cut it into strips and bake them in the oven till they are a nice brown, and serve hot.

CHEESE SOUFFLE.—(See OMELETS.)

CHEESE PUDDING.—Mix half a pound of grated Parmesan cheese with four eggs, well beaten up; mix in also two ounces of butter, which should be first beaten to a cream, add half a pint of milk and pour the mixture into a well-buttered pie-dish, sprinkle some grated Parmesan cheese over the top, and bake in the oven for about half an hour. The pudding will be lighter if two of the whites of eggs are beaten to a stiff froth. The edge of the pie-dish can be lined with puff-paste.

CHEESE RAMEQUINS.—Put half a pound of grated Parmesan cheese in a stew-pan with a quarter of a pound of butter and a quarter of a pint of water; add a little pepper and salt, and as much flour as will make the whole into a thick paste. Mix up with the paste as many well-beaten-up eggs as will make the paste not too liquid to be moulded into a shape. The eggs should be beaten till they froth. Now, with a tablespoon, mould this mixture into shapes like a meringue or egg; place these on a buttered tin and bake them till they are a nice brown colour.

CHEESE, STEWED.—When the remains of cheese have got very dry it is a good plan to use it up in the shape of stewed cheese. Break up the cheese and put it in a small stew-pan with about a quarter its weight of butter; add a little milk, and let the cheese stew gently till it is dissolved. At the finish, and when you have removed it from the fire, add a well-beaten-up egg. This can be served on toast, or it can be poured on to a dish and pieces of toasted bread stuck in it.

CHEESE STRAWS.—Mix equal quantities of grated Parmesan cheese, grated bread-crumbs that have been rubbed through a wire sieve, butter, and flour; add a little cayenne and grated nutmeg. Make it into a thick paste, roll it out very thin, cut it into strips, and bake for a few minutes in a fierce oven.

CHEESE, TOASTED.—This is best done in a Dutch oven, so that when one side is toasted you can turn the oven and toast the back; as soon as the cheese begins to melt it is done. As it gets cold very quickly, and when cold gets hard, it is best served on hot-water plates.

CHEESE, DEVILLED.—Chop up some hot pickles, add some cayenne pepper and mustard. Melt some cheese in a stew-pan with a little butter, mix in the pickles, and serve on toast.

WELSH RAREBIT.—Toast a large slice of bread; in the meantime melt some cheese in the saucepan with a little butter. When the cheese is melted it will be found that a good deal of oiled butter floats on the top. Pour this over the dry toast first, and then pour the melted cheese afterwards. Some persons add a teaspoonful of Worcester sauce to the cheese, and others a tablespoonful of good old Burton ale over the top.

AYOLI.—This is a dish almost peculiar to the South of France. Soak some crusts of bread in water, squeeze them dry, and add two cloves of garlic chopped fine, six blanched almonds, also chopped very fine, and a yolk of an egg; mix up the whole into a smooth paste with a little oil.

PUMPKIN A LA PARMESANE.—Cut a large pumpkin into square pieces and boil them for about a quarter of an hour in salt and water, and take them out, drain them, and put them in a stew-pan with a little butter, salt, and grated nutmeg; fry them, sprinkle them with a little Parmesan cheese, and bake them for a short time in the oven till the cheese begins to melt, and then serve. This is an Italian recipe.

ZUCCHETTI FARCIS.—Take some very small gourds or pumpkins, boil them for about a quarter of an hour in salt and water, and then fill them with a forcemeat made as follows: Take some crumb of bread and soak it in milk, squeeze it and add the yolks of two hard-boiled eggs and two raw yolks; chop up very finely half a dozen blanched almonds with a couple of cloves; add two ounces of grated Parmesan cheese, and a little salt and grated nutmeg. Stew these gourds in butter and serve them with white sauce.

STUFFED ONIONS (ITALIAN FASHION).—Parboil some large onions, stamp out the core after they have been allowed to get quite cold in a little water; fill the inside with forcemeat similar to the above; fry then), squeeze the juice of a lemon over them, with a little pepper.

POLENTA.—Polenta is made from ground Indian corn, and is seen in Italian shop-windows in the form of a yellow powder; it is made into a paste with boiling water, sprinkled with Parmesan cheese, and baked in the oven.

PIROSKI SERNIKIS.—This dish is met with in Poland, and is made by mixing up two pounds of cream-cheese, three-quarters of a pound of fine bread-crumbs that have been rubbed through a wire sieve, six eggs well beaten up; add a little cream or milk, four ounces of washed grocer's currants, one ounce of sugar, half a grated nutmeg; and when the whole is thoroughly mixed add as much flour as is necessary to make the whole into a paste that can be rolled into balls. These balls should not be much bigger than a walnut. Flour them, and then flatten them into little cakes and fry them a nice brown in some butter.

Of course, a smaller quantity can be made by using these ingredients in proportion.

NALESNIKIS (POLISH PANCAKES).—Take eight eggs and beat them up very thoroughly with about a pint and a half of milk, or still better, cream, two ounces of butter that has been oiled, half a grated nutmeg, and about a dozen lumps of sugar that have been rubbed on the outside of a lemon; mix in sufficient flour—about three-quarters of a pound will be required—to make the whole into a very smooth batter. Melt a little butter in a frying-pan, pour it all over the pan, and when it frizzles, pour in some of the batter, and sprinkle over a few currants; when the pancake is fried, shake some powdered sugar over it, roll it up like an ordinary pancake, and serve hot.

FRITTERS.

BATTER FOR SAVOURY FRITTERS.—Put six ounces of flour into a basin, with a pinch of salt, the yolk of one egg, and a quarter of a pint of warm water. Work this round and round with a wooden spoon till it is perfectly smooth and looks like thick cream. About half an hour before the batter is wanted for use whip the white of one egg to a stiff froth and mix it lightly in.

MUSHROOM FRITTERS.—Make some mushroom forcemeat; let it get quite cold on a dish about a quarter of an inch thick. Cut out some small rounds, about the size of a penny-piece. They fry better if slightly oval. Have ready some thick batter (See BATTER). Have also ready in a saucepan some boiling oil, which should be heated to about 350 degrees. Place a frying-basket in the saucepan, flour the rounds of mushroom forcemeat so as to make them perfectly dry on the outside. Dip these pieces into the batter and throw them into the boiling oil. The great heat of the oil will set the batter before the mushroom force-meat has time to melt. Directly the batter is a nice light-brown colour, lift them out of the boiling oil with the frying-basket, and throw them on to a cloth to drain. Break off the outside pieces of batter, and serve the fritters on a neatly folded napkin on a dish surrounded by fried parsley.

The beauty of these fritters is that when they are eaten the inside is moist, owing, of course, to the heat having melted the forcemeat.

TOMATO FRITTERS.—Make some mushroom forcemeat and spread it out as thin as possible. Take some ripe tomatoes, cut them in slices, dip the slice in vinegar, drain it and pepper it, and then wrap this thin slice of tomato in a layer of mushroom forcemeat. Bring the edges together, flour it, dip it into batter (see BATTER), and throw it into boiling oil as in making mushroom fritters (see MUSHROOM FRITTERS).

IMITATION GAME FRITTERS.—Make some mushroom force-meat as directed under the heading "Mushroom Forcemeat," with the addition of, when you fry the mushrooms, chop up and fry with them two heads of garlic, and add a saltspoonful of aromatic flavouring herbs. (These, are sold in bottles by all grocers under the name of "Herbaceous Mixture.") Then proceed exactly as if you were making mushroom fritters (see MUSHROOM FRITTERS).

HOMINY FRITTERS.—These are made from remains of cold boiled hominy, cut in thin slices, which must be dipped in batter and fried in boiling oil.

CHEESE FRITTERS.—Pound some dry cheese, or take about three ounces of Parmesan cheese, and mix it with a few bread-crumbs, a piece of butter, a pinch of cayenne pepper, and the yolk of an egg, till the whole becomes a thick paste. Roll the mixture into very small balls, flatten them, flour them, dip them into batter, and throw them into boiling oil in the ordinary way. Put them in the oven for five minutes before serving them.

SAGE AND ONION FRITTERS.—Make some ordinary sage and onion stuffing, allowing one fresh sage leaf or two dried to each parboiled onion; add pepper and salt and dried breadcrumbs. Now moisten the whole with clarified butter, till the mixture becomes a moist pulp. When it begins to get cold and sets, roll it into small balls, the size of a very small walnut, flatten these and let them get quite cold, then flour them, dip them into batter, and throw them into boiling oil; remove them with the frying-basket, and serve with fried parsley.

SPINACH FRITTERS.—Make a little thick puree of spinach, add a pinch of savoury herbs containing marjoram; mix in a little clarified butter and one or two lumps of sugar rubbed on the outside of a lemon, as well as a little grated nutmeg. Roll the mixture into very small ball; or else they will break, flatten them, flour them, dip them into batter, and throw them into boiling oil, and serve immediately.

FRITTERS, SWEET.—In making sweet fritters, the same kind of batter will do as we used for making savoury fritters, though many cooks add a little powdered sugar. The same principles hold good. The oil must be heated to a temperature of 350 degrees, and a frying-basket must be used. Instead of flouring the substances employed to make them dry, before being dipped into the batter, which is an essential point in making fritters, we must use finely powdered sugar, and it will be found a saving of both time and trouble to buy pounded sugar for the purpose. It is sold by grocers under the name of castor sugar. We cannot make this at home in a pestle and mortar to the same degree of fineness any more than we could grind our own flour. We cannot compete with machinery.

APPLE FRITTERS.—Peel some apples, cut them in slices across the core, and stamp out the core. It is customary, where wine, &c., is not objected to, to soak these rings of apples for several hours in a mixture of brandy, grated lemon or orange peel and sugar, or better still, to rub some lumps of sugar on the outside of a lemon or orange and dissolve this in the brandy. Of course, brandy is not necessary, but the custom is worth mentioning. The rings of apple can be soaked for some time in syrup flavoured this way. They must then be made dry by being dipped in powdered sugar, then dipped into batter and thrown, one at a time, into a saucepan containing smoking hot oil in which a wire frying-basket has been placed. Directly the fritters are a nice brown, take them out, break off the rough pieces, shake some finely powdered sugar over them, pile them up on a dish, and serve.

APRICOT FRITTERS.—These can be made from fresh apricots or tinned ones, not too ripe; if they break they are not fitted. When made from fresh apricots they should be peeled, cut in halves, the round end removed, dipped in powdered sugar, then dipped in batter, thrown into boiling oil, and finished like apple fritters. Some persons soak the apricots in brandy.

BANANA FRITTERS.—Banana fritters can be made from the bananas as sold in this country, and it is a mistake to think that when they are black outside they are bad. When in this state they are sometimes sold as cheap as six a penny. Peel the bananas, cut them into slices half an inch thick, dip them into finely powdered sugar and then into batter, and finish as directed in apple fritters.

Some persons soak the slices of banana in maraschino.

CUSTARD FRITTERS.—Take half a pint of cream in which some cinnamon and lemon have been boiled, add to this five yolks of eggs, a little flour, and about three ounces of sugar. Put this into a pie-dish, well buttered, and steam it till the custard becomes quite set; then let it get cold, and cut it into slices about half an inch thick and an inch and a half long, sprinkle each piece with a little powdered cinnamon, and make it quite dry with some powdered sugar. Then dip each piece into batter, throw them one by one into boiling oil, and finish as directed for apple fritters.

ALMOND FRITTERS, CHOCOLATE FRITTERS, COFFEE FRITTERS, VANILLA FRITTERS, &c.—These fritters are made exactly in the same way as custard fritters, only substituting powdered chocolate, pounded almonds, essence of coffee, or essence of vanilla, for the powdered cinnamon.

FRANGIPANE FRITTERS.—Make a Frangipane cream by mixing eggs with a little cold potato, butter, sugar, and powdered ratafias, the proportion being a quarter of a pound of butter, four eggs, six ounces of sugar, one cold floury potato, and a quarter of a pound of ratafias. Bake or steam this until it is set, and proceed as in custard fritters. Many persons add the flavouring of a little rum.

PEACH FRITTERS.—These are made exactly similar to apricot fritters, bearing in mind that if they are made from tinned peaches only the firm pieces, and not pulpy ones, must be used for the purpose. Proceed exactly as directed for apricot fritters.

If any liqueur is used, noyeau is best adapted for the purpose.

POTATO FRITTERS.—Mix up some floury potato with a quarter of a pound of butter, a well-beaten-up egg, and three ounces of sugar, some of which has been rubbed on the outside of a lemon. The addition of a little cream is a great improvement. Roll the mixture into small balls and flour them; they are then fried just as they are, without being dipped into batter.

PINE-APPLE FRITTERS.—These can be made from fresh pine-apples or tinned. They should be cut into slices like apple fritters if the pine-apple is small, but if the pine-apple is large they can be cut into strips three inches long and one wide and half an inch thick. These must be dipped in powdered sugar, then into batter, and finished as directed for apple fritters.

If any liqueur is used, maraschino is best adapted to the purpose.

ORANGE FRITTERS.—Only first-class oranges are adapted for this purpose. Thick-skinned and woolly oranges are no use. Peel a thin-skinned ripe orange, divide each orange into about six pieces, soak these in a syrup flavoured with sugar rubbed on the outside of an orange, and if liqueur is used make the syrup with brandy. After they have soaked some time, remove any pips, dip each piece into hatter, and proceed as directed for apple fritters.

CREAM FRITTERS.—Rub some lumps of sugar on the outside of an orange, pound them, and mix with a little cream; take some small pieces of stale white cake, such as Madeira cake or what the French call brioche. Soak these pieces of stale cake, which must be cut small and thin, or they will break, in the orange-flavoured cream, dry each piece in some finely-powdered sugar, dip it into batter, and proceed as directed for making apple fritters.

GERMAN FRITTERS.—Take some small stale pieces of cake, and soak them in a little milk or cream flavoured with essence of vanilla and sweetened with a little sugar. Take them out, and let them get a little dry on the outside, then dip them in a well-beaten-up egg, cover them with bread-crumbs, and fry a nice golden-brown colour.

RICE AND GINGER FRITTERS.—Boil a small quantity of rice in milk and add some preserved ginger chopped small, some sugar, and one or more eggs, sufficient to set the mixture when baked in a pie-dish. Bake till set, then cut into slices about two inches long, an inch wide, and half an inch thick; dry these pieces with powdered sugar, dip into batter, and finish as directed for making apple fritters.

RICE FRITTERS.—A variety of fritters could be made from a small baked rice pudding, flavoured with various kinds of essences, spices, orange marmalade, peach marmalade, fresh lime marmalade, apricot jam, &c., proceeding exactly as directed above.



CHAPTER VII.

VEGETABLES.

SUBSTANTIAL VEGETABLES.

Vegetables may be roughly divided into two classes—those that may be called substantial and which are adapted to form a meal in themselves, and those of a lighter kind, which cannot be said to make a sufficient repast unless eaten with bread.

Potatoes were first introduced into this country about 400 years ago, tobacco being introduced about the same period, and we cannot disguise the fact that there are many who regard the latter as the greater blessing of the two. If Sir Henry Thompson is right in stating that tobacco is the great ally of temperance, there may be some ground for this opinion.

Potatoes form an important article of food for the body, while, whatever effect tobacco may have upon the thinking powers of mankind, it is almost the only product of the vegetable kingdom that is absolutely uneatable even when placed within the reach of those in the last stage of starvation.

In some parts, especially in Ireland, potatoes form almost the only food of the population, just as rice does in hotter climates, and when the crop fails famine ensues. When potatoes form the only kind of food, a very large quantity has to be eaten by a hard-working man in order for him to receive sufficient nourishment to keep his body healthy, the amount required being not less than ten pounds per day. If, on the other hand, a certain amount of fat or oil of some kind be mixed with them, a far less quantity will suffice. Hence we find in Ireland that, wherever it is possible, either some kind of oily fish, such as herring, is taken with them, or, which is much more to the point with vegetarians, a certain quantity of fat is obtained in the shape of milk.

It must also be remembered that four pounds of raw potatoes contain only one pound of solid food, the remaining three pounds being water. It is important, for those who first commence a vegetarian diet, to remember that vegetables like peas, haricot beans, and lentils are far superior to potatoes so far as nourishment is concerned, for many are apt to jump to the conclusion that potatoes are the very best substitute for bread and milk. So, too, is oatmeal. A Scotchman requires a far less quantity of oatmeal to sustain life than an Irishman does potatoes; hence it is a very important point to remember that, if we depend upon potatoes to any great extent for our daily food, we should cook them in such a manner as to entail as little waste as possible. We will now try and explain, as briefly as possible, the best method of serving.

POTATOES, PLAIN BOILED.—The best method of having potatoes, if we wish to study economy, is to boil them in their jackets, as it is generally admitted that the most nourishing part is that which lies nearest to the skin. There are many houses in the country where an inexperienced cook will peel, say four pounds of potatoes, and throw the peel into the pig-tub, where the pig gets a better meal than the family.

When potatoes are boiled in their skins, they should be thoroughly washed and scrubbed with a hard brush. Old potatoes should be put into cold water, and when the water boils the time should a good deal depend upon the size of the potatoes. When the potatoes are large, the chief principle to be borne in mind is, do not let them boil too quickly or cook too quickly. We must avoid having the outside pulpy while the inside is hard. The water, which should be slightly salted, should more than cover them, and, if the potatoes are very large, directly the water comes to the boil it is a good plan to throw in a little cold water to take it off the boil. It is quite impossible to lay down any exact law in regard to boiling potatoes. We cannot do more than give general principles which can only be carried out by cooks who possess a little common sense.

Small new potatoes are an extreme in one direction. They should be thrown into boiling water, and are generally cooked in about ten minutes or a quarter of an hour. Large old potatoes should be put into cold water and, as we have stated, the water should not be allowed to boil too soon, and it will take very often an hour to boil them properly. Between these two extremes there is a gradually ascending scale which must be left to the judgment of the cook. It is as impossible to lay down any hard-and-fast line with regard to time in boiling potatoes as it would be to say at what exact point in the thermometer between freezing and 80 degrees in the shade a man should put on his top coat.

If we may be allowed the expression, "old new" potatoes should be thrown into neither boiling water nor cold water, but lukewarm water. Again, in boiling potatoes, especially in the case of old ones, some little allowance must be made for the time of year. In winter, they require longer time, and we may here mention the fact that it is very important that potatoes, after they are dug, should not be left out of doors and exposed to a hard frost, as in this case a chemical change takes place in which the starch is converted into sugar.

When potatoes are boiled in their jackets sufficiently, which fact is generally tested by sticking a steel fork into them, they should be strained off, and allowed to get dry for a few minutes in the saucepan, which should be removed from the fire, as at times the potatoes are apt to stick and burn.

When large potatoes are peeled before they are boiled, we should endeavour to send them to table floury, and this is often said to be the test of a really good cook. After the water has been strained off from the potatoes, a dry cloth should be placed under the lid of the saucepan, and the lid should only be placed half on, i.e., it should not be fitted down tight. It is also as well to give the saucepan now and then a shake, but do not overdo the shaking and break them. About five or ten minutes is generally sufficient.

POTATOES, STEAMED.—Potatoes can be steamed in their jackets, and it is a more economical method than peeling. It should be remembered, however, that steam is hotter than boiling water. If plain water is underneath and boils furiously, and the steam is well shut in, they will cook very quickly; but if, as is generally the case, something else is in the saucepan under the steamer, boiling gently, this does not apply. We refer to the ordinary steamer met with in private houses, and not to the ones used in the large hotels and restaurants.