Helpful Culinary Hints
On Methods of Cooking
Water boiling slowly has the same temperature as when boiling rapidly, and will do just the same amount of work; there is, therefore, no object in wasting fuel to keep water boiling violently.
Stewing is the most economical method of cooking the cheaper and tougher cuts of meats, fowl, etc. This method consists in cooking the food a long time in sufficient water to cover it—at a temperature slightly below the boiling point.
Braising. In this method of cooking, drippings or fat salt pork are melted or tried out in the kettle and a bed of mixed vegetables, fine herbs and seasoning placed therein. The article being cooked is placed on this bed of vegetables, moisture is added and the meat cooked until tender at a low temperature. The last half hour of cooking the cover is removed, so that the meat may brown richly.
In broiling and grilling, the object is first to sear the surface over as quickly as possible, to retain the rich juices, then turn constantly until the food is richly browned. Pan-broiling is cooking the article in a greased, hissing-hot, cast-iron skillet, turning often and drawing off the fat as it dries out.
Sautéing is practically the same as pan-broiling, except that the fat is allowed to remain in the skillet. The article is cooked in a small amount of fat, browning the food on one side and then turning and browning on the other side.
Frying. While this term is sometimes used in the sense of sautéing it usually consists of cooking by means of immersion in deep, hot fat. When frying meats or fish it is best to keep them in a warm room a short time before cooking, then wipe dry as possible. As soon as the food has finished frying, it should be carefully removed from the fat and drained on brown paper.
Egging and Crumbing Food
Use for this dry bread crumbs, grated and sifted, crackers rolled and sifted, or soft stale bread broken in pieces and gently rubbed through croquette basket; the eggs should be broken into a shallow plate and slightly beaten with a fork to mix the white thoroughly. Dilute the eggs in the proportion of two tablespoons cold milk or water to every egg. The crumbs should be dusted on the board; the food to be fried should be lightly crumbed all over, then dipped into egg so as to cover the article entirely, then rolled again in bread crumbs. Sometimes, as in cooking fish, flour is used for the first coating in place of the crumbs, the article being then dipped into the egg mixture, then with crumbs and then fried.
Larding
Consists of introducing small strips of fat, salt pork or bacon through uncooked meat. To lard, introduce one end of the lardoon (the small strip of fat) into a larding needle and with the pointed end take up a stitch one-half inch deep and one-half inch wide. Draw the needle through carefully so that the ends of the lardoon may project evenly over the surface of the meat. Oftentimes, however, thin slices of fat, salt pork or bacon are placed over the meat as a substitute for larding, although it does not give quite the same delicious flavor or look so attractive.
Marinating
Consists of adding a pickle, composed of vinegar and oil, to the ingredients of some combination used in salad making.
Cleaning Cooking Utensils
For washing dishes and cleaning pots and pans use a solution made by dissolving a teaspoonful or so of Gold Dust Washing Powder in a dish-pan full of water. If the cooking utensils have become charred or stained in cooking, sprinkle some Polly Prim Cleaner on a damp cloth and rub utensil thoroughly. After scouring, rinse the article well in hot water, and wipe dry. Use Polly Prim Cleaner also, for cleaning cutlery and for keeping the refrigerator clean and sweet.
Hail! hail! the New Year, ring the bells
Till music echoes o’er the dells,
Play merry tunes, sing merry songs,
For joy to this New Year belongs.
—Raymond.
EDITOR’S NOTE:
This menu—the first of the year—has been prepared rather more elaborately than the customary Sunday menus, with the thought that it might serve also as suggestion for a New Year’s Dinner.
January First Sunday
Oysters on the Half Shell
Mangoes Salted Nuts Olives
Consommé Duchess—Imperial Sticks
Crab Meat in Timbale Cases
“Green” Goose Roasted—Potato and Nut Stuffing
Chantilly Apple Sauce
Onions au Gratin
Endive, Celery and Green Pepper Salad
Vanilla Ice Cream—Chocolate Sauce
Cocoanut Cubes—Chocolate Nut Cake
Fruit Raisins Nuts
Roquefort Cheese—Water Biscuit
Café Noir
OYSTERS ON THE HALF SHELL
3 dozen oysters.
2 lemons cut in quarters.
Salt, pepper, Tobasco, horseradish and Tomato catsup.
Process: If possible, have the little Blue Points. Open, loosen, and leave them on the lower shell. Fill soup plates with shaved ice and arrange shell on ice having the small end of shells point toward center of the plate. Wash lemons, cut in quarters, remove seeds and serve one-quarter in center of each plate. Garnish with sprays of parsley arranged between the shells. Pass remaining ingredients on a small silver tray, or a cocktail dressing may be made and served in a small glass dish and passed to each guest.
CONSOMMÉ DUCHESS
Consommé served with a meringue, prepared as follows: Beat the whites of eggs very stiff and drop by heaping tablespoonsful into milk heated to the scalding point in a shallow vessel (a dripping pan is the best), using care that milk does not scorch. Turn each spoonful, allowing it to cook, until it sets. Place one of these individual meringues on the top of each service of consommé, and sprinkle with finely chopped parsley. Serve with Imperial Sticks.
IMPERIAL STICKS
Cut stale bread in one-third inch slices, remove the crusts. Spread thinly with butter. Cut slices in one-third inch strips, put on a tin sheet and bake until a delicate brown in a hot oven. Pile “log cabin” fashion on a plate covered with a doily, or serve two sticks on plate by the side of cup in which soup is served.
CRAB MEAT IN TIMBALE CASES
8 Timbale cases.
2 cups crab meat.
3 tablespoons butter.
3 tablespoons flour.
Yolks 2 eggs.
1 tablespoon onion finely chopped.
Salt, pepper, paprika.
Few grains each cayenne, mustard and nutmeg.
2 cups hot thin cream.
Process: Melt butter in a sauce pan, add onion and cook five minutes without browning, stirring constantly. Add flour and stir until well blended. Add hot cream gradually, continue stirring, add seasoning to taste. Remove from range and add egg yolks slightly beaten. Reheat crab meat in sauce (over hot water). Serve in Swedish Timbales.
SWEDISH TIMBALES
1 cup flour.
½ teaspoon salt.
1 teaspoon sugar.
1 egg.
2/3 cup milk.
1 tablespoon olive oil.
Process: Mix and sift flour, salt and sugar, add milk slowly, stirring constantly, add well beaten egg and olive oil. Mixture should be very smooth, strain and let stand over night. Heat a timbale iron in hot Cottolene, drain and dip iron into batter, (having batter in a small pitcher), place in hot Cottolene and fry until crisp and delicately browned. Remove from iron and invert on brown paper. These dainty cases are for all kinds of creamed mixtures. They are used instead of patty shells or croustades.
ROAST GOOSE
PREPARING THE GOOSE FOR THE OVEN
Singe, and remove all pin feathers. Before drawing the bird give it a thorough scrubbing with a brush, in a warm Fairy soap solution. This is very necessary for it cleans off all dirt that becomes mixed with the oily secretions, and opens and cleanses the pores that the oil may be more readily extracted. Draw and remove everything that can be taken out, then rinse thoroughly and wipe inside and out, with a clean crash towel; sprinkle the inside lightly with salt, pepper, and powdered sage. (The latter may be omitted.)
Stuff with the following mixture and truss as turkey.
POTATO AND NUT STUFFING
(For Roast Goose or Duck)
4 cups hot mashed potatoes.
2½ tablespoons finely chopped onion or chives.
1 cup English Walnut meats chopped moderately.
½ teaspoon paprika.
1¼ teaspoon salt.
½ cup cream.
2 tablespoons butter.
Yolks of 2 eggs.
1 teaspoon sweet herbs if the flavor is desired.
Process: Mix the ingredients in the order given and fill the body of the goose.
ROASTING THE BIRD
After trussing, place the goose on a rack in a dripping pan, sprinkle with salt, cover the breast with thin slices of fat salt pork, and place in the oven. Cook three-quarters of an hour, basting often with the fat in the pan. Then remove pan from oven and drain off all the fat. Remove the slices of pork and sprinkle again with salt and dredge with flour and return to oven. When the flour is delicately browned, add one cup of boiling water and baste often; add more water when necessary. Sprinkle lightly with salt and again dredge with flour. Cook until tender, from one and one-half to three hours, according to the age of the bird. If you have a very young goose it is infinitely better to steam or braise it until tender, then dredge it with salt and flour and brown it richly in the oven. Serve on a bed of cress, garnish with Baked Snow or Jonathan apples.
CHANTILLY APPLE SAUCE (WITH HORSERADISH)
Pare, core and cut in quarters, five medium-sized Greenings. Cook with very little water; when quite dry, rub through a fine purée strainer. To the pulp add one-half cup granulated sugar, five tablespoons grated horseradish, then fold in an equal quantity of whipped cream. Serve at once with roast goose, ducks or goslings.
ONIONS AU GRATIN
Cook one quart of uniform-sized, silver-skinned onions in boiling salted water. When quite tender, drain and turn into a baking dish; cover with Cream Sauce (see Page 151), sprinkle the top with fine buttered cracker crumbs and finish cooking. Brown crumbs delicately.
ENDIVE, CELERY AND GREEN PEPPER SALAD
Select crisp, well-bleached heads of endive, separate the leaves, keeping the green leaves separate from the bleached; wash and dry. Dispose the leaves on individual plates of ample size. Arrange the green leaves first, then the bleached leaves until a nest has been formed; fill the centers with the hearts of celery cut in one-half inch pieces. Cut a slice from the stem end of crisp red and green peppers, remove the seeds and veins and cut in the thinnest shreds possible, using the shears. Strew these shreds over each portion and, just before serving, marinate each with French Dressing.
VANILLA ICE CREAM
¾ cup sugar.
1/3 cup water.
1 quart cream.
1½ tablespoons vanilla.
Process: Make a syrup by boiling sugar and water three minutes. Cool slightly and add to cream, add vanilla and freeze in the usual way. Pack in a brick-shape mold. Bury in salt and ice, let stand several hours. Remove from mold to serving platter and pour around each portion Hot Chocolate Sauce.
HOT CHOCOLATE SAUCE
Melt two squares chocolate in a sauce-pan, add one cup sugar, one tablespoon butter and two-thirds cup boiling water. Simmer fifteen minutes. Cool slightly and add three-fourths teaspoon vanilla.
COCOANUT CUBES
Use recipe for Bride’s Cake (see recipe on Page 175). Bake in a sheet. When cool cut in two-inch cubes and cover each cube with Boiled Frosting; sprinkle thickly with fresh grated cocoanut.
CHOCOLATE NUT CAKE
1/3 cup Cottolene.
2 cups sugar.
4 eggs.
1 cup milk.
21/3 cups flour.
4 teaspoons baking powder.
¼ teaspoon salt.
2 squares chocolate melted.
¾ cup English walnut meats broken in pieces.
½ teaspoon vanilla.
Process: Cream Cottolene, add gradually one cup sugar, stirring constantly. Beat egg yolks thick and light, add gradually remaining cup of sugar; combine mixtures. Add melted chocolate. Mix and sift flour, baking powder and salt; add to first mixture alternately with milk. Add nut meats and vanilla, then cut and fold in the whites of eggs beaten stiff. Turn into a well-greased tube pan and bake forty-five minutes in a moderate oven. Cool and spread with boiled frosting.
January Second Sunday
Consommé with Egg Balls
Celery Olives
Breaded Sea Bass—Sauce Tartare
Norwegian Potatoes Stewed Tomatoes
Cabbage Relish
Lemon Pie Cheese
Café Noir
CONSOMMÉ WITH EGG BALLS
To six cups of hot Consommé add egg balls, serving three or four in each portion.
EGG BALLS
1 hard cooked egg.
1/8 teaspoon salt.
Few grains pepper.
Few drops onion juice.
1 teaspoon thick cream.
¼ teaspoon finely chopped parsley.
Process: Mash yolk, rub through a sieve, add finely chopped white, seasonings, parsley and cream. Moisten with some of the yolk of a raw egg until of the consistency to handle. Shape with the hands in tiny balls and poach two minutes in boiling water or a little consommé. Remove with skimmer. Serve at once.
BREADED SEA BASS
Remove the skin from a sea bass, bone and cut fillets in pieces for serving. Rub over with the cut side of a lemon, sprinkle with salt, pepper, dredge with flour. Dip in egg (diluted with two tablespoons cold water) then in fine cracker crumbs; repeat. Place in croquette basket and fry in deep, hot Cottolene. Drain, arrange on hot serving platter. Garnish with Norwegian Potatoes, parsley and slices of lemon. Serve Sauce Tartare in a sauce boat.
(For recipe for Sauce Tartare see page 84.)
NORWEGIAN POTATOES
Wash, scrub and pare six medium size potatoes. Cook in boiling salted water until tender. Drain, pass through ricer. Add six anchovies drained from the oil in bottle and cut in one-fourth inch pieces, one-half teaspoon finely chopped parsley, one-half teaspoon French mustard, salt if necessary, one-eighth teaspoon pepper, a few grains nutmeg, two tablespoons butter, and yolks two eggs slightly beaten. Beat thoroughly, place on range and cook slowly three minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from range, spread mixture on plate to cool, then mold like small eggs. Roll in crumbs, egg and crumbs. Arrange in croquette basket and fry a golden brown in deep, hot Cottolene.
STEWED TOMATOES
To one can of hot tomatoes add two-thirds cup toasted bread crumbs. Season with salt, few drops Tobasco sauce, two tablespoons sugar, and one-fourth cup butter. Heat to boiling point and turn into hot serving dish.
CABBAGE RELISH
Chop crisp, white cabbage very fine (there should be two cups). Chop one green pepper and one medium-sized Bermuda onion the same. Mix well and season with one teaspoon salt, one-eighth teaspoon black pepper, one teaspoon celery seed and three tablespoons sugar. Dilute one-fourth cup vinegar with two tablespoons cold water; add to relish. Chill and serve in crisp lettuce leaves.
LEMON PIE
¾ cup sugar.
1 cup boiling water.
2 tablespoons cornstarch.
2 tablespoons flour.
2 egg yolks slightly beaten.
4 tablespoons lemon juice.
Grated rind one lemon.
1 teaspoon butter.
Few grains salt.
Process: Mix sugar, cornstarch, flour and salt, add boiling water gradually, stirring constantly. Cook over hot water until mixture thickens; continue stirring. Add lemon juice, rind, butter, and egg yolks. Line a pie pan with Rich Paste, wet edges, and lay around a rim of pastry one inch wide; flute edge. Cool mixture and turn in lined pan. Bake in a moderate oven until crust is well browned. Remove from oven, cool slightly, spread with meringue, return to oven to bake and brown meringue.
MERINGUE
Whites 2 eggs.
2 tablespoons powdered sugar.
¼ teaspoon lemon or orange extract.
Process: Beat whites until stiff and dry; add sugar by the teaspoonful; continue beating. Add flavoring, drop by drop. Spread unevenly over pie and bake fifteen minutes in a slow oven; brown the last five minutes of baking.
CAFÉ NOIR (AFTER-DINNER COFFEE)
To prepare after-dinner coffee, use twice the quantity of coffee or half the quantity of water, given in recipe for Boiled Coffee (see Page 30). This coffee may be prepared in the Percolator, following the directions given in the foregoing. Milk or cream is not served with black coffee. Serve in hot after-dinner coffee cups, with or without cut loaf sugar.
January Third Sunday
Noodle Soup
Boiled Beef—Horseradish Sauce
Baked Potatoes
Macaroni with Tomato Sauce
Chiffonade Salad
Steamed Cottage Pudding
Banana Sauce
Coffee Tea
NOODLE SOUP
2 quarts Chicken Consommé.
1 teaspoon finely chopped parsley.
1 recipe noodles cut very fine (see below).
Process: Cook fowl same as for Boiled Fowl (do not tie in cheese cloth). Drain fowl from stock, and strain. When cold, remove fat, and clear. Reheat, add noodles, and simmer twenty minutes. Sprinkle with parsley and serve very hot.
NOODLES
1 egg.
½ teaspoon salt.
Flour.
Few grains nutmeg.
Process: Beat egg slightly, add seasonings, add flour enough to make a stiff dough. Knead on a floured board until smooth and elastic. Roll out on a sheet as thin as paper, cover and let stand for half an hour. Roll loosely and cut the desired width, either in threads or ribbons, unroll and scatter over board; let lay half an hour. Cook in boiling, salted water fifteen minutes, drain and add to soup. Noodles may be cooked in Consommé twenty minutes but the soup will not be as clear as when noodles are cooked previously.
BOILED BEEF
Have five pounds of beef, cut from the face of the rump. Wipe meat, sprinkle with salt, pepper, and dredge with flour. Brown richly in an iron skillet in some of its own fat tried out, turning often. Remove to kettle and cover with boiling water. Add one tablespoon salt, one-half teaspoon peppercorns, a bit of bay leaf, one carrot sliced, one turnip sliced, and one-half onion sliced. Add two sprays each of parsley and thyme and one of marjoram. Cover and heat to boiling point. Skim when necessary. Reduce heat and simmer until meat is tender (four or five hours). Remove to serving platter. Strain stock and use for soup or sauces. Serve meat with hot Horseradish Sauce. (For recipe see page 51.)
MACARONI WITH TOMATO SAUCE
Cook one cup macaroni, broken in inch pieces, in boiling salted water twenty minutes. Drain, and pour over cold water to separate pieces. Mix with one and one-half cups Tomato Sauce. Add one-half cup grated cheese. Turn into a buttered baking dish, cover with buttered crumbs, bake twenty minutes in a hot oven.
TOMATO SAUCE
1 half can tomatoes.
1/8 teaspoon soda.
1 teaspoon sugar.
6 peppercorns.
2 cloves.
Slice onion.
Bit of bay leaf.
½ teaspoon salt.
Few grains cayenne.
4 tablespoons butter.
3 tablespoons flour.
1 cup Brown Stock.
Process: Heat tomatoes to boiling point; add soda and the seven ingredients following. Cook twenty minutes. Rub through a purée strainer, add stock. Brown butter in a sauce-pan, add flour and continue browning, stirring constantly. Add hot tomato mixture slowly, mix well, and pour over Macaroni.
CHIFFONADE SALAD
Cut the hearts of celery in one-inch pieces, cut pieces in straws to fill one cup. Remove the pulp from grape fruit, leaving each half-section in its original shape. There should be one cup. Peel and chill four medium-sized tomatoes (Southern or hot-house at this season), cut in slices. Cut the bleached leaves of Chicory in pieces for serving, arrange in nests on serving dish, and arrange other ingredients in separate mounds in the nests. Marinate with French Dressing, and garnish each with chopped parsley, green and red sweet peppers cut in thread-like strips, and sprays of pepper-grass or parsley. Pass Mayonnaise Dressing.
STEAMED COTTAGE PUDDING
3 tablespoons Cottolene.
1 cup sugar.
2 eggs.
1 cup milk.
2 cups flour.
3 teaspoons baking powder.
¼ teaspoon salt.
Process: Cream Cottolene, add sugar gradually, stirring constantly, add yolks of eggs beaten very light. Mix and sift flour, baking powder and salt, add to first mixture alternately with milk; cut and fold in the stiffly beaten whites of eggs. Turn in a well-buttered tube mold, and steam one and one-half hours. Serve with Vanilla, Strawberry, or Banana Sauce.
BANANA SAUCE
1 cup water.
½ cup sugar.
Pulp 3 bananas.
3 tablespoons lemon juice.
2 eggs well beaten.
Few grains salt.
Few gratings lemon rind.
Process: Make a syrup by boiling water and sugar ten minutes. Rub bananas through a sieve, add remaining ingredients and beat until well blended and light. Pour on hot syrup slowly, beating constantly. Serve hot. Pulp of peaches or apricots may be used in place of bananas.
January Fourth Sunday
Corn Chowder
Crisp Soda Crackers
Ox Joints en Casserole
Boiled Rice Parsnips Sautéd in Butter
Cheese and Pimento Salad
Ambrosia Anise Wafers
Coffee
CORN CHOWDER
2 cups cooked corn cut from cob, or
1 can of corn.
1 cup salt pork cubes.
1 cup potatoes cut in cubes.
½ onion sliced.
3 cups water.
2 cups scalded milk.
1 tablespoon butter.
1 tablespoon flour.
2/3 cup cracker crumbs.
Salt, Pepper.
Process: Cut salt pork in one-fourth inch cubes and try out in a frying pan; add onion, and cook until yellow. Pare and cut potatoes in one-half inch cubes, parboil five minutes. Add to onion, with corn and water; cover and cook twenty minutes or until potatoes are soft. Melt butter in a sauce-pan, add flour, stir to a smooth paste, pour some of the milk on slowly, stirring constantly. Combine mixtures; add crumbs and seasonings. Serve for dinner in cups or in small “nappies.”
OX JOINTS EN CASSEROLE
Separate ox-tails at joints, parboil five minutes; then rinse thoroughly. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, and dredge with flour. Melt one-fourth cup butter in frying pan, add three slices onion and joints, sauté until joints are well browned. Remove joints and onion; to fat add one-fourth cup flour, brown slightly, stirring constantly. Add slowly two cups of Brown Stock, or water and a large can of tomatoes. Add one-half tablespoon salt and one-fourth teaspoon pepper. Turn into an earthen casserole, or Dutch oven, cover, place in oven and simmer slowly three to four hours. Add more moisture if necessary. Remove joints, strain liquor, return joints to liquor, add one cup each carrot and turnip cut in straws and parboiled in boiling, salted water ten minutes, and set in oven to complete cooking. Serve in Casserole or in a deep platter surrounded with a border of boiled rice.
BOILED RICE
Wash one cup of rice, drain and add slowly to three quarts boiling salted water so as not to stop water boiling. Boil rapidly until rice is tender (twenty to twenty-five minutes). Drain in a sieve, pour over cold water to separate kernels. Turn into double boiler, and cover with a crash towel; keep hot over hot water.
PARSNIPS SAUTÉD IN BUTTER
Wash parsnips, cover with boiling water, add salt to season. Cook until tender—thirty-five to fifty minutes. Drain and cover quickly with cold water; rub off skins with the hands. Cut in one-fourth inch slices, sprinkle with salt, pepper; dip in flour and sauté a golden brown in hot butter. Brown on one side, then turn and brown on the other.
CHEESE AND PIMENTO SALAD
Mix two cream cheeses with one-half cup finely chopped pimentos. (Drain pimentos from liquor in can, and dry them on crash towel.) Add one tablespoon finely chopped chives or onion, one-half teaspoon finely chopped parsley, season with salt and cayenne. Moisten with thick cream, and pack solidly in prepared green pepper-cups. Set aside in a cold place for several hours. With a sharp knife cut in thin slices crosswise. Arrange two slices on crisp lettuce leaves; serve with French Dressing.
AMBROSIA
6 sweet Florida oranges.
1 cocoanut grated.
4 plantains (red bananas).
1/3 cup fine table Sherry wine.
¼ cup lemon juice.
Bar sugar.
Process: Peel the oranges, separate the sections, remove the tough membrane and seeds. Dispose a layer of orange pulp in bottom of shallow, glass, serving-dish, sprinkle with wine and lemon juice and sugar, strew with cocoanut and a layer of thinly sliced banana. Repeat until all ingredients are used, having a thick layer of cocoanut on top. The fruit should be piled in cone shape. Chill and serve with dainty cakes, macaroons, Anise wafers, etc.
ANISE SEED WAFERS
1/3 cup Cottolene.
1 cup granulated sugar.
3 eggs.
2 cups flour.
3 teaspoons anise seed.
¼ teaspoon nutmeg.
½ teaspoon salt.
Flour.
Process: Cream Cottolene, add sugar gradually, add egg yolks, one at a time, beating constantly. Beat whites of eggs stiff, add to first mixture alternately with flour mixed and sifted with anise seed, nutmeg and salt. Add just enough extra flour to dough to roll very thin. Shape with small, fluted cutter, and bake in a quick oven.
January Fifth Sunday
Oysters on the Half Shell
Consommé with Rice Balls
Braised Beef Tongue—Savory Sauce
Baked Potatoes Bermuda Onions, Butter Sauce
Creamed Celery
Florida Salad
Yankee Plum Pudding—Vanilla Sauce
Coffee
OYSTERS ON THE HALF SHELL
(For recipe see Page 14.) Serve small cress or cucumber sandwiches with this course.
CONSOMMÉ WITH RICE BALLS
To six cups of hot Consommé, (for recipe see Page 149), add Rice Balls.
RICE BALLS
1 cup cold, cooked rice.
2 tablespoons flour.
1 teaspoon grated onion.
1 teaspoon finely chopped parsley.
1 egg slightly beaten.
Salt, pepper, cayenne.
Process: Warm rice slightly and rub through a sieve, add flour, seasonings, and bind together with egg. Measure mixture by the teaspoonful. Roll in small balls. Poach until firm on outside in boiling salted water. Remove with skimmer and drop into clear, hot soup.
BRAISED BEEF TONGUE
Order a fresh tongue. Wash and put tongue in a kettle, cover with boiling water; cook slowly two to three hours. Remove tongue from water, peel off skin, and trim off roots. Place in Dutch oven or deep earthen dish, and surround with one-half cup each carrot, turnip, celery and onion, cut in half-inch dice, one green pepper (seeds and veins removed) cut in shreds, and two sprays parsley. Pour over one quart of Brown Sauce seasoned with one-half tablespoon Worcestershire sauce. (Stock in which tongue was cooked may be used for making sauce.) Cover closely and simmer slowly (do not allow sauce to boil) two hours or until tongue is tender. Serve on hot platter. Surround with sauce.
BAKED POTATOES
(For recipe see Page 140.)
BERMUDA ONIONS WITH BUTTER SAUCE
Peel the desired number of Bermuda onions. Cover with boiling water. Heat to boiling point, boil five minutes, drain; repeat. Then cover with boiling salted water, and cook until tender (from forty-five minutes to one hour). Drain well. Dot over with bits of butter, finely chopped parsley, and pepper. Serve hot.
CREAMED CELERY
Wash, scrape and cut celery in one-half inch pieces. Cook in boiling salted water until tender; drain. (There should be two cups.) Cut a slice from the stem end of one green or red pepper, remove the seeds and veins. Parboil pepper eight minutes; drain and chop half the pepper fine. Add to celery, and reheat in one cup of White Sauce.
FLORIDA SALAD
Remove the peel from six large Florida Navel oranges. Separate the sections, and peel off the membrane, keeping the pulp in its original shape. Cut each section crosswise once. Dispose the orange cubes equally in nests of lettuce-heart leaves. Arrange the halves of English walnuts over these and marinate with French Dressing, using lemon and orange juice, also some of the fine orange pulp, in place of vinegar. Sprinkle with paprika.
YANKEE PLUM PUDDING
2/3 cup Cottolene.
1 cup N. O. molasses.
3 cups flour.
1½ teaspoons soda.
1 teaspoon cinnamon.
½ teaspoon cloves.
½ teaspoon nutmeg.
½ teaspoon salt.
1 cup sweet milk.
1 cup seeded shredded raisins.
1 cup English Walnut meats broken in pieces.
Process: Cream Cottolene, add molasses; mix and sift flour, soda, spices and salt; add alternately with milk, reserving enough flour to dredge raisins and nut meats; mix well and turn in buttered molds. Steam three hours. Serve with Brandy or Vanilla Sauce. (For recipe Vanilla Sauce see Page 136.)
BOILED COFFEE
1 cup medium ground coffee.
White 1 egg.
6 cups boiling water.
1 cup cold water.
Process: Scald a granite-ware coffeepot. Beat egg slightly and dilute with one-half cup cold water, add to coffee and mix thoroughly. Turn into coffeepot and add boiling water, stir well. Place on range; let boil five minutes. If not boiled sufficiently, coffee will not be clear; if boiled too long, the tannic acid will be extracted, causing serious gastric trouble. Stuff the spout of pot with soft paper to prevent the escape of aroma. Stir down, pour off one cup to clear the spout of grounds, return to pot. Add remaining half-cup cold water to complete the clearing process. Place pot on back of range for ten minutes, where coffee will not boil. Serve immediately. If coffee must be kept longer, drain from the grounds and keep just below boiling point.
Variety’s the very spice of life,
That gives it all its flavor.
—Cowper.
February First Sunday
Grape-Fruit Cocktails
Tomato Bouillon
Lake Trout Baked in Paper Bag
Sauce à l’Italienne
French Fried Potatoes Brussels Sprouts
French Endive—French Dressing
Eggless Rice Pudding—Hard Sauce
Coffee
GRAPE-FRUIT COCKTAIL
Select heavy grape-fruit (weight means more pulp than rind). Chill, cut in halves, and remove the sections of pulp, preserving the shape of sections if possible. Remove the skins from Malaga grapes, cut in halves lengthwise, remove seeds (there should be equal quantity of both grape-fruit pulp and prepared grapes). Reserve the juice. Chill fruit thoroughly, serve in tall stem glasses, add a little juice, sprinkle each with a tablespoon bar sugar, and just before serving pour over each portion one tablespoon Sloe Gin or “Sweet” Sherry Wine.
TOMATO BOUILLON
To five cups of Standard Broth add one cup of thick tomato purée. Reheat and serve in bouillon cups.
STANDARD BROTH
(Beef, Veal, Lamb, Chicken or Game)
4 pounds meat.
1 pound marrow bone.
2½ quarts cold water.
½ teaspoon peppercorns.
4 cloves.
1 spray marjoram.
2 sprays thyme.
2 sprays parsley.
½ bay leaf.
¼ cup each diced carrot, onion, and celery.
½ tablespoon salt.
Process: Remove meat from bone and cut in inch cubes; brown richly one third of meat in some of the marrow taken from bone. Cover remainder of meat with cold water, let stand thirty minutes, then add browned meat and rinse the pan in which meat was browned with some of the water. Bring to boiling point and skim. Reduce heat and boil gently five hours; stock should be reduced to three pints. Add seasonings the last hour of cooking. Strain, cool, remove fat, and clear.
LAKE TROUT BAKED IN PAPER BAG
Clean a four-pound lake trout. Sprinkle inside with salt and pepper. Fill with stuffing (recipe next page); sew. Spread with soft butter, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Lay fish carefully in a well greased paper bag, add one-fourth cup white wine, one-half onion finely chopped, six fresh (or ten canned) mushrooms, cut in small pieces, and one-fourth cup water. Press air from bag, fold open end over three times, fold sides and corners close to fish, first moistening the bag on corners and edges; lay in a dripping-pan and place in a hot oven. When bag is browned evenly (not burned) reduce heat, and bake fish one hour. (Bag will brown in ten minutes.) Remove from bag to serving platter and pour contents of bag over fish. Serve with the following sauce:
SAUCE À L’ITALIENNE
2½ tablespoons butter.
2 tablespoons finely chopped onion.
2 tablespoons finely chopped carrot.
2 tablespoons finely chopped lean uncooked ham.
½ teaspoon peppercorns.
3 cloves.
2 sprays marjoram.
3 tablespoons flour.
1 cup Brown Stock.
1¼ cups white wine.
1 clove garlic.
2 teaspoons finely chopped parsley.
Process: Brown butter in a sauce-pan, add onion, carrot, ham, peppercorns, cloves and marjoram, and cook five minutes. Add flour and stir until flour is well browned; add gradually stock and wine, strain, add garlic and simmer five minutes. Remove garlic and pour around Baked Lake Trout. Sprinkle with parsley.