Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches Part 15

TO ROAST A MIDDLING OR SPRING PIECE OF PORK.

Make a force-meat of grated bread, and minced onion and sage, pepper, salt, and beaten yolk of egg; mix it well, and spread it all over the inside of the pork. Then roll up the meat, and with a sharp knife score it round in circles, rubbing powdered sage into the cuts. Tie a b.u.t.tered twine round the roll of meat so as to keep it together in every direction. Put a hook through one end, and roast the pork before a clear brisk fire, moistening the skin occasionally with b.u.t.ter. Or you may bake it in a Dutch oven. It is a good side dish. Thicken the gravy with a little flour, and flavour it with a gla.s.s of wine. Have currant jelly to eat with it.

It should be delicate young pork.

TO STEW PORK.

Take a nice piece of the fillet or leg of fresh pork; rub it with a little salt, and score the skin. Put it into a pot with sufficient water to cover it, and stew it gently for two hours or more, in proportion to its size. Then put into the same pot a dozen or more sweet potatoes, sc.r.a.ped, split, and cut in pieces.

Let the whole stew gently together for an hour and a half, or till all is thoroughly done, skimming it frequently. Serve up all together in a large dish.

This stew will be found very good. For sweet potatoes you may subst.i.tute white ones mixed with sliced turnips, or parsnips sc.r.a.ped or split.

TO BOIL CORNED PORK.

Take a nice piece of fresh pork, (the leg is the best,) rub it with salt, and let it lie in the salt two days. Boil it slowly in plenty of water, skimming it well. When the meat is about half done, you may put into the same pot a fine cabbage, washed clean and quartered. The pork and the cabbage should be thoroughly done, and tender throughout. Send them to table in separate dishes, having drained and squeezed all the water out of the cabbage. Take off the skin of the pork, and touch the outside at intervals with spots of cayenne pepper. Eat mustard with it.

Pork is never boiled unless corned or salted.

PICKLED PORK AND PEASE PUDDING.

Soak the pork all night in cold water, and wash and sc.r.a.pe it clean. Put it on early in the day, as it will take a long time to boil, and must boil slowly. Skim it frequently. Boil in a separate pot greens or cabbage to eat with it; also parsnips and potatoes.

Pease pudding is a frequent accompaniment to pickled pork, and is very generally liked. To make a small pudding, you must have ready a quart of dried split pease, which have been soaked all night in cold water. Tie them in a cloth, (leaving room for them to swell,) and boil them slowly till they are tender. Drain them, and rub them through a cullender or a sieve into a deep dish; season them with pepper and salt, and mix with them an ounce of b.u.t.ter, and two beaten eggs. Beat all well together till thoroughly mixed. Dip a clean cloth in hot water, sprinkle it with flour, and put the pudding into it. Tie it up very tightly, leaving a small s.p.a.ce between the mixture and the tying, (as the pudding will still swell a little,) and boil it an hour longer. Send it to table and eat it with the pork.

You may make a pease pudding in a plain and less delicate way, by simply seasoning the pease with pepper and salt, (having first soaked them well,) tying them in a cloth, and putting them to boil in the same pot with the pork, taking care to make the string very tight, so that the water may not get in. When all is done, and you turn out the pudding, cut it into thick slices and lay it round the pork.

Pickled pork is frequently accompanied by dried beans and hominy.

PORK AND BEANS.

Allow two pounds of pickled pork to two quarts of dried beans. If the meat is very salt put it in soak over night. Put the beans into a pot with cold water, and let them hang all night over the embers of the fire, or set them in the chimney corner, that they may warm as well as soak. Early in the morning rinse them through a cullender. Score the rind of the pork, (which should not be a very fat piece,) and put the meat into a clean pot with the beans, which must be seasoned with pepper. Let them boil slowly together for about two hours, and carefully remove all the sc.u.m and fat that rises to the top. Then take them out; lay the pork in a tin pan, and cover the meat with the beans, adding a very little water. Put it into an oven, and bake it four hours.

This is a homely dish, but is by many persons much liked. It is customary to bring it to table in the pan in which it is baked.

PORK STEAKS.

Pork steaks or chops should be taken from the neck, or the loin.

Cut them about half an inch thick, remove the skin, trim them neatly, and beat them. Season them with pepper, salt, and powdered sage-leaves or sweet marjoram, and broil them over a clear fire till quite done all through, turning them once. They require much longer broiling than beef-steaks of mutton chops. When you think they are nearly done, take up one on a plate and try it. If it is the least red inside, return it to the gridiron. Have ready a gravy made of the tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs, or any coa.r.s.e pieces of pork stewed in a little water with chopped onions and sage, and skimmed carefully. When all the essence is extracted, take out the bits of meat, &c., and serve up the gravy in a boat to eat with the steaks.

They should be accompanied with apple-sauce.

PORK CUTLETS.

Cut them from the leg, and remove the skin; trim them and beat them, and sprinkle on salt and pepper. Prepare some beaten egg in a pan; and on a flat dish a mixture of bread-crumbs, minced onion, and sage. Put some lard or drippings into a frying-pan over the fire; and when it boils, put in the cutlets; having dipped every one first in the egg, and then in the seasoning. Fry them twenty or thirty minutes, turning them often. After you have taken them out of the frying-pan, skim the gravy, dredge in a little flour, give it one boil, and then pour it on the dish round the cutlets.

Have apple-sauce to eat with them.

Pork cutlets prepared in this manner may be stewed instead of being fried. Add to them a little water, and stew them slowly till thoroughly done, keeping them closely covered except when you remove the lid to skim them.

PORK PIE.

Take the lean of a leg or loin of fresh pork, and season it with pepper, salt, and nutmeg. Cover the bottom and sides of a deep dish, with, a good paste, made with a pound of b.u.t.ter to two pounds of flour, and rolled out thick. Put in a layer of pork, and then a layer of pippin apples, pared, cored, and cut small. Strew over the apples sufficient sugar to make them very sweet. Then place another layer of pork, and so on till the dish is full. Pour in half a pint or more of water, or of white wine. Cover the pie with a thick lid of paste, and notch and ornament it according to your taste.

Set it in a brisk oven, and bake it well.

HAM PIE.

Cover the sides and bottom of a dish with a good pasts rolled out thick. Have ready some slices of cold boiled ham, about half an inch thick, some eggs boiled hard and sliced, and a large young fowl cleaned and Cut up. Put a layer of ham at the bottom, then the fowl, then the eggs, and then another layer of ham. Shake on some pepper, and pour in some water, or what will be much better, some veal gravy. Cover the pie with a crust, notch and ornament it, and bake it well.

Some mushrooms will greatly improve it.

Small b.u.t.ton mushrooms will keep very well in a bottle of sweet oil--first peeling the skin, and cutting off the stalks.

HAM SANDWICHES

Cut some thin slices of bread very neatly, having slightly b.u.t.tered them; and, if you choose, spread on a very little mustard. Have ready some very thin slices of cold boiled ham, and lay one between two slices of bread. You may either roll them up, or lay them flat on the plates. They are used at supper, or at luncheon.

You may subst.i.tute for the ham, cold smoked tongue, shred or grated.

BROILED HAM.

Cut the ham into very thin slices, (the thinner the better.) Soak them in hot water at least half an hour, (a whole hour is better,) to draw out some of the salt; changing the water several times, and always pouring it on scalding hot. This process will not only extract the superfluous salt (which would otherwise ooze out in broiling and remain sticking about the surface of the meat) but it makes the ham more tender and mellow. After soaking, dry the slices in a cloth, and then heat your gridiron, and broil them over a clear fire.

If you have cold boiled ham, it is better for broiling than that which is raw; and being boiled, will require no soaking before you put it on the gridiron.

If you wish to serve up eggs with the ham, put some lard into a very clean frying-pan, and make it boiling hot. Break the eggs separately into a saucer, that in case a bad one should be among them it may not mix with the rest. Slip each egg gently into the frying-pan. Do not turn them while they are frying, but keep pouring some of the hot lard over them with an iron spoon; this will do them sufficiently on the upper side. They will be done enough in about three minutes; the white must retain its transparency so that the yolk will be seen through it. When done, take them up with a tin slice, drain off the lard, and if any part of the white is discoloured or ragged, trim it off. Lay a fried egg upon each slice of the broiled ham, and send them to table hot.

This is a much nicer way than the common practice of frying the ham or bacon with the eggs. Some persons broil or fry the ham without eggs, and send it to table cut into little slips or mouthfuls.

To curl small pieces of ham for garnishing, slice as thin as possible some that has been boiled or parboiled. The pieces should be about two inches square. Roll it up round little wooden skewers, and put it into a cheese toaster, or into a tin oven, and set it before the fire for eight or ten minutes. When it is done, slip out the skewers.

TO BOIL A HAM.

Hams should always be soaked in water previous to boiling, to draw out a portion of the salt, and to make them tender. They will soften more easily if soaked in lukewarm water. If it is a new ham, and not very salt or hard, you need not put it in water till the evening before you intend to cook it. An older one will require twenty-four hours' soaking; and one that is very old and hard should be kept in soak two or three days, frequently changing the water, which must be soft. Soak it in a tub, and keep it well covered. When you take it out of the water to prepare it for boiling, sc.r.a.pe and trim it nicely, and pare off all the bad looking parts.

Early in the morning put it into a large pot or kettle with plenty of cold water. Place it over a slow fire that it may heat gradually; it should not come to a boil in less than an hour and a half, or two hours. When it boils, quicken the fire, and skim the pot carefully. Then simmer it gently four or fire hours or more, according to its size. A ham weighing fifteen pounds should simmer five hours after it has come to a boil. Keep the pot well skimmed.