Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches Part 2

Boil two quarts of milk with a quarter of a pound of sweet almonds, and two ounces of bitter ones, blanched and broken to pieces, and a large stick of cinnamon broken up. Stir in sugar enough to make it very sweet. When it has boiled strain it. Cut some thin slices of bread, and (having pared off the crust) toast them. Lay them in the bottom of a tureen, pour a little of the hot milk over them, and cover them close, that they may soak. Beat the yolks of five eggs very light Set the milk on hot coals, and add the eggs to it by degrees; stirring it all the time till it thickens. Then take it off instantly, lest it curdle, and pour it into the tureen, boiling hot, over the bread.

This will be still better if you cover the bottom with slices of baked apple.

RICH BROWN SOUP.

Take six pounds of the lean of fresh beef, cut from the bone.

Stick it over with four dozen cloves. Season it with a tea-spoonful of salt, a tea-spoonful of pepper, a tea-spoonful of mace, and a beaten nutmeg. Slice half a dozen onions; fry them in b.u.t.ter; chop them, and spread them over the meat after you have put it into the soup-pot. Pour in five quarts of water, and stew it slowly for five or six hours; skimming it well. When the meat has dissolved into shreds, strain it, and return the liquid to the pot. Then add a tumbler and a half, or six wine gla.s.ses of claret or port wine. Simmer it again slowly till dinner time. When the soup is reduced to three quarts, it is done enough. Put it into a tureen, and send it to table.

RICH WHITE SOUP.

Take a pair of large fat fowls. Cut them up. b.u.t.ter the inside of the soup-pot, and put in the pieces of fowl with two pounds of the lean of veal, cut into pieces, or with four calf's feet cut in half. Season them with a tea-spoonful of salt, a half tea-spoonful of cayenne pepper, and a dozen blades of mace. Cover them with water, and stew it slowly for an hour, skimming it well. Then take out the b.r.e.a.s.t.s and wings of the fowls, and having cut off the flesh, chop it fine. Keep the pot covered, and the veal and the remainder of the fowls still stewing.

Mix the chopped chicken with the grated crumb of about one quarter of a loaf of stale bread, (a six cent loaf,) having soaked the crumbs in a little warm milk. Have ready the yolks of four hard boiled eggs, a dozen sweet almonds, and half a dozen bitter ones blanched and broken small. Mix the egg and almonds with the chopped chicken and grated bread, and pound all in a mortar till it is well incorporated. Strain the soup from the meat and fowl, and stir this mixture into the liquid, after it has stewed till reduced to two quarts. Having boiled separately a quart of cream or rich milk, add it hot to the soup, a little at a time. Cover it, and let it simmer a few minutes longer. Then send it to table.

These two soups (the brown and the white) are suited to dinner parties.

MEG MERRILIES' SOUP.

Take four pounds of venison, or if you cannot procure venison you may subst.i.tute the lean of fresh beef or mutton. Season it with pepper and salt, put it into a large pot, (break the bones and lay them on the meat,) pour in four quarts of water, and boil it three hours, skimming it well. Then strain it, and put it into another pot.

Cut up a hare or a rabbit, a pair of partridges, and a pair of grouse; or one of each, with a pheasant, a woodc.o.c.k, or any other game that you can most easily obtain. Season them and put them into the soup. Add a dozen small onions, a couple of heads of celery cut small, and half a dozen sliced potatoes. Let the soup simmer till the game is sufficiently done, and all the vegetables tender.

This is the soup with which the gipsy, Meg Merrilies, regaled Dominie Sampson.

When game is used for soup, it must be newly killed, and quite fresh.

VENISON SOUP.

Take four pounds of freshly killed venison cut off from the bones, and one pound of ham in small slices. Add an onion minced, and black pepper to your taste. Put only as much water as will cover it, and stew it gently for an hour, keeping the pot closely covered. Then skim it well, and pour in a quart of boiling water.

Add a head of celery cut into small pieces, and half a dozen blades of mace. Boil it gently two hours and a half. Then put in a quarter of a pound of b.u.t.ter, divided into small pieces and rolled in flour, and half a pint of port or Madeira wine. Let it boil a quarter of an hour longer, and then send it to table with the meat in it.

HARE OR RABBIT SOUP.

Take a large newly killed hare, or two rabbits; cut them up and wash the pieces. Save all the blood, (which adds much to the flavour of the hare,) and strain it through a sieve. Put the pieces into a soup-pot with four whole onions stuck with a few cloves, four or five blades of mace, a head of celery cut small, and a bunch of parsley with a large sprig of sweet marjoram and one of sweet basil, all tied together. Salt and cayenne to your taste. Pour in three quarts of water, and stew it gently an hour and a half. Then put in the strained blood and simmer it for another hour, at least. Do not let it actually boil, as that will cause the blood to curdle. Then strain it, and pound half the meat in a mortar, and stir it into the soup to thicken it, and cut the remainder of the meat into small mouthfuls. Stir in, at the last, a jill or two gla.s.ses of red wine, and a large table-spoonful of currant jelly. Boil it slowly a few minutes longer, and then put it into your tureen. It will be much improved by the addition of about a dozen and a half small force-meat b.a.l.l.s, about the size of a nutmeg. This soup will require cooking at least four hours.

Partridge, pheasant, or grouse soup may be made in a similar manner.

If you have any clear gravy soup, you may cut up the hare, season it as above, and put it into a jug or jar well covered, and set in boiling water till the meat is tender. Then put it into the gravy soup, add the wine, and let it come to a boil. Send it to table with the pieces of the hare in the soup.

When hare soup is made in this last manner, omit using the blood.

MULLAGATAWNY SOUP, AS MADE IN INDIA.

Take a quarter of an ounce of China turmeric, the third of an ounce of ca.s.sia, three drachms of black pepper, two drachms of cayenne pepper, and an ounce of coriander seeds. These must all be pounded fine in a mortar, and well mixed and sifted. They will make sufficient curry powder for the following quant.i.ty of soup:

Take two large fowls, or three pounds of the lean of veal. Cut the flesh entirely from the bones in small pieces, and put it into a stew-pan with two quarts of water. Let it boil slowly for half an hour, skimming it well. Prepare four large onions, minced and fried in two ounces of b.u.t.ter. Add to them the curry powder and moisten the whole with broth from the stew-pan, mixed with a little rice flour. When thoroughly mixed, stir the seasoning into the soup, and simmer it till it is as smooth and thick as cream, and till the chicken or veal is perfectly tender. Then stir into it the juice of a lemon; and five minutes after take up the soup, with the meat in it, and serve it in the tureen.

Send to table separately, boiled rice on a hot-water dish to keep it warm, The rice is to be put into the plates of soup by those who eat it.

To boil rice for this soup in the East India fashion:--Pick and wash half a pound in warm water. Put it into a sauce-pan. Pour two quarts of boiling water over it, and cover the pan closely. Set it in a warm place by the fire, to cook gradually in the hot water.

In an hour pour off all the water, and setting the pan on hot coals, stir up and toss the rice with a fork, so as to separate the grains, and to dry without hardening it. Do not use a spoon, as that will not loosen the grains sufficiently.

MOCK TURTLE OR CALF'S HEAD SOUP.

This soup will require eight hours to prepare. Take a large calf's head, and having cleaned, washed, and soaked it, put it into a pot with a knuckle of veal, and the hock of a ham, or a few slices of bacon; but previously cut off and reserve enough of the veal to make two dozen small force-meat b.a.l.l.s. Put the head and the other meat into as much water as will cover it very well, so that it may not be necessary to replenish it: this soup being always made very rich. Let it boil slowly four hours, skimming it carefully. As soon as no more sc.u.m rises, put in six potatoes, and three turnips, all sliced thin; with equal proportions of parsley, sweet marjoram and sweet basil, chopped fine; and pepper and salt to your taste.

An hour before you send the meat to table, make about two dozen small force-meat b.a.l.l.s of minced veal and beef-suet in equal quant.i.ties, seasoned with pepper and salt; sweet herbs, grated lemon-peel, and powdered nutmeg and mace. Add some beaten yolk of egg to make all these ingredients stick together. Flour the b.a.l.l.s very well, and fry them in b.u.t.ter. Before you put them into the soup, take out the head, and the other meat. Cut the meat from the head in small pieces, and return it to the soup. When the soup is nearly done, stir in half a pint of Madeira. Have ready at least a dozen egg-b.a.l.l.s made of the yolks of hard-boiled eggs, grated or pounded in a mortar, and mixed with a little flour and sufficient raw yolk of egg to bind them. Make them up into the form and size of boy's marbles. Throw them into the soup at the last, and also squeeze in the juice of a lemon. Let it get another slow boil, and then put it into the tureen.

We omit a receipt for _real_ turtle soup, as when that very expensive, complicated, and difficult dish is prepared in a private family, it is advisable to hire a first-rate cook for the express purpose.

An easy way is to get it ready made, in any quant.i.ty you please, from a turtle-soup house.

OX TAIL SOUP

Three ox tails will make a large tureen full of soup. Desire the butcher to divide them at the joints. Rub them with salt, and put them to soak in warm water, while you prepare the vegetables. Put into a large pot or stew-pan four onions peeled and quartered, a bunch of parsley, two sliced carrots, two sliced turnips, and two dozen pepper corns. Then put in the tails, and pour on three quarts of water.

Cover the pot, and set it on hot coals by the side of the fire.

Keep it gently simmering for about three hours, supplying it well with fresh hot coals. Skim it carefully. When the meat is quite tender, and falls from the bones, strain the soup into another pot, and add to it a spoonful of mushroom catchup, and two spoonfuls of b.u.t.ter rubbed in flour.

You may thicken it also with the pulp of a dozen onions first fried soft, and then rubbed through a cullender. After it is thickened, let it just boil up, and then send it to table, with small squares of toasted bread in the tureen.

OCHRA SOUP.

Take a large slice of ham (cold boiled ham is best) and two pounds of the lean of fresh beef; cut all the meat into small pieces. Add a quarter of a pound of b.u.t.ter slightly melted; twelve large tomatas pared and cut small; five dozen ochras cut into slices not thicker than a cent; and salt and cayenne pepper to your taste.

Put all these ingredients into a pot; cover them with boiling water, and let them stew slowly for an hour. Then add three quarts of _hot_ water, and increase the heat so as to make the soup boil. Skim it well, and stir it frequently with a wooden or silver spoon.

Boil it till the tomatas are all to pieces, and the ochras entirely dissolved. Strain it, and then serve it up with toasted bread cut into dice, put in after it comes out of the pot.

This soup will be improved by a pint of sh.e.l.led Lima beans, boiled by themselves, and put into the tureen just before you send it to table.

BEAN SOUP.

Put two quarts of dried white beans into soak the night before you make the soup, which should be put on as early in the day as possible.

Take five pounds of the lean of fresh beef--the coa.r.s.e pieces will do. Cut them up, and put them into your soup-pot with the bones belonging to them, (which should be broken to pieces,) and a pound of bacon cut very small. If you have the remains of a piece of beef that has been roasted the day before, and so much under-done that the juices remain in it, you may put it into the pot, and its bones along with it. Season the meat with pepper and salt, and pour on it six quarts of water. As soon as it boils take off the sc.u.m, and put in the beans (having first drained them) and a head of celery cut small, or a table-spoonful of pounded celery-seed.

Boil it slowly till the meat is done to shreds, and the beans all dissolved. Then strain it through a cullender into the tureen, and put into it small squares of toasted bread with the crust cut off.

Some prefer it with the beans boiled soft, but not quite dissolved. In this case, do not strain it; but take out the meat and bones with a fork before you send it to table.