The American Frugal Housewife Part 6

MEAT CORNED, OR SALTED, HAMS, &C.

When you merely want to corn meat, you have nothing to do but to rub in salt plentifully, and let it set in the cellar a day or two. If you have provided more meat than you can use while it is good, it is well to corn it in season to save it. In summer, it will not keep well more than a day and a half; if you are compelled to keep it longer, be sure and rub in more salt, and keep it carefully covered from cellar-flies.

In winter, there is no difficulty in keeping a piece of corned beef a fortnight or more. Some people corn meat by throwing it into their beef barrel for a few days; but this method does not make it so sweet.

A little salt-petre rubbed in before you apply the common salt, makes the meat tender; but in summer it is not well to use it, because it prevents the other salt from impregnating; and the meat does not keep as well.

If you wish to salt fat pork, scald coa.r.s.e salt in water and skim it, till the salt will no longer melt in the water. Pack your pork down in tight layers; salt every layer; when the brine is cool, cover the pork with it, and keep a heavy stone on the top to keep the pork under brine. Look to it once in a while, for the first few weeks, and if the salt has all melted, throw in more. This brine, scalded and skimmed every time it is used, will continue good twenty years. The rind of the pork should be packed towards the edge of the barrel.

It is good economy to salt your own beef as well as pork. Six pounds of coa.r.s.e salt, eight ounces of brown sugar, a pint of mola.s.ses, and eight ounces of salt-petre, are enough to boil in four gallons of water. Skim it clean while boiling. Put it to the beef cold; have enough to cover it; and be careful your beef never floats on the top.

If it does not smell perfectly sweet, throw in more salt; if a sc.u.m rises upon it, scald and skim it again, and pour it on the beef when cold.

Legs of mutton are very good, cured in the same way as ham. Six pounds of salt, eight ounces of salt-petre, and five pints of mola.s.ses, will make pickle enough for one hundred weight. Small legs should be kept in pickle twelve or fifteen days; if large, four or five weeks are not too much. They should be hung up a day or two to dry, before they are smoked. Lay them in the oven, on crossed sticks, and make a fire at the entrance. Cobs, walnut-bark, or walnut-chips, are the best to use for smoking, on account of the sweet taste they give the meat. The smallest pieces should be smoked forty-eight hours, and large legs four or five days. Some people prefer the mutton boiled as soon as it is taken from the pickle, before it is smoked; others hang it up till it gets dry thoroughly, and eat it in thin slices, like hung beef.

When legs of meat are put in pickle, the thickest part of the leg should be placed uppermost, that is, standing upright, the same as the creature stood when living. The same rule should be observed when they are hung up to dry; it is essential in order to keep in the juices of the meat. Meat should be turned over once or twice during the process of smoking.

The old-fashioned way for curing hams is to rub them with salt very thoroughly, and let them lay twenty-four hours. To each ham allow two ounces of salt-petre, one quart of common salt and one quart of mola.s.ses. First baste them with mola.s.ses; next rub in the salt-petre; and, last of all, the common salt. They must be carefully turned and rubbed every day for six weeks; then hang them in a chimney, or smoke-house, four weeks.

They should be well covered up in paper bags, and put in a chest, or barrel, with layers of ashes, or charcoal, between. When you take out a ham to cut for use, be sure and put it away in a dark place, well covered up; especially in summer.

Some very experienced epicures and cooks, think the old-fashioned way of preparing bacon is troublesome and useless. They say that legs of pork placed upright in pickle, for four or five weeks, are just as nice as those rubbed with so much care. The pickle for pork and hung beef, should be stronger than for legs of mutton. Eight pounds of salt, ten ounces of salt-petre and five pints of mola.s.ses is enough for one hundred weight of meat; water enough to cover the meat well--probably, four or five gallons. Any one can prepare bacon, or dried beef, very easily, in a common oven, according to the above directions. The same pickle that answers for bacon is proper for neat's tongues. Pigs' tongues are very nice, prepared in the same way as neat's tongues; an abundance of them are sold for rein-deer's tongues, and, under that name, considered a wonderful luxury.

Neat's tongue should be boiled full three hours. If it has been in salt long, it is well to soak it over night in cold water. Put it in to boil when the water is cold. If you boil it in a small pot, it is well to change the water, when it has boiled an hour and a half; the fresh water should boil before the half-cooked tongue is put in again.

It is nicer for being kept in a cool place a day or two after being boiled. Nearly the same rules apply to salt beef. A six pound piece of corned beef should boil full three hours; and salt beef should be boiled four hours.

The saltier meat is, the longer it should be boiled. If very salt, it is well to put it in soak over night; change the water while cooking; and observe the same rules as in boiling tongue. If it is intended to be eaten when cold, it is a good plan to put it between clean boards, and press it down with heavy weights for a day or two. A small leg of bacon should be boiled three hours; ten pounds four hours; twelve pounds five hours. All meat should boil moderately; furious boiling injures the flavor.

Buffalo's tongue should soak a day and a night, and boil as much as six hours.

CHOICE OF MEAT.

If people wish to be economical, they should take some pains to ascertain what are the cheapest pieces of meat to buy; not merely those which are cheapest in price, but those which go farthest when cooked. That part of mutton called the rack, which consists of the neck, and a few of the rib bones below, is cheap food. It is not more than four or five cents a pound; and four pounds will make a dinner for six people. The neck, cut into pieces, and boiled slowly an hour and a quarter, in little more than water enough to cover it, makes very nice broth. A great spoonful of rice should be washed and thrown in with the meat. About twenty minutes before it is done, put in a little thickening, and season with salt, pepper, and sifted summer-savory, or sage. The bones below the neck, broiled, make a good mutton chop. If your family be small, a rack of mutton will make you two dinners,--broth once, and mutton chop with a few slices of salt pork, for another; if your family consist of six or seven, you can have two dishes for a dinner. If you boil the whole rack for broth, there will be some left for mince meat.

Liver is usually much despised; but when well cooked, it is very palatable; and it is the cheapest of all animal food. Veal liver is by some considered the best. Veal liver is usually two cents a pound; beef liver is one cent. After you have fried a few slices of salt pork, put the liver in while the fat is very hot, and cook it through thoroughly. If you doubt whether it be done, cut into a slice, and see whether it has turned entirely brown, without any red stripe in the middle. Season it with pepper and salt, and b.u.t.ter, if you live on a farm, and have b.u.t.ter in plenty. It should not be cooked on furiously hot coals, as it is very apt to scorch. Sprinkle in a little flour, stir it, and pour in boiling water to make gravy, just as you would for fried meat. Some think liver is better dipped in sifted Indian meal before it is fried. It is good broiled and b.u.t.tered like a steak.

It should be cut into slices about as thick as are cut for steaks.

The heart, liver, &c. of a pig is good fried; so is that of a lamb.

The latter is commonly called lamb-fry; and a dinner may be bought for six or eight cents. Be sure and ask for the sweet-bread; for butchers are extremely apt to reserve it for their own use; and therefore lamb-fry is almost always sold without it. Fry five or six slices of salt pork; after it is taken out, put in your lamb-fry while the fat is hot. Do it thoroughly; but be careful the fire is not too furious, as it is apt to scorch. Take a large handful of parsley, see that it is washed clean, cut it up pretty fine; then pour a little boiling water into the fat in which your dinner has been fried, and let the parsley cook in it a minute or two; then take it out in a spoon, and lay it over your slices of meat. Some people, who like thick gravies, shake in a little flour into the spider, before pouring in the boiling water.

Bones from which roasting pieces have been cut, may be bought in the market for ten or twelve cents, from which a very rich soup may be made, besides skimming off fat for shortening. If the bones left from the rump be bought, they will be found full of marrow, and will give more than a pint of good shortening, without injuring the richness of the soup. The richest piece of beef for a soup is the leg and the shin of beef; the leg is on the hind quarter, and the shin is on the fore quarter. The leg rand, that is, the thick part of the leg above the bony parts, is very nice for mince pies. Some people have an objection to these parts of beef, thinking they must be stringy; but, if boiled _very tender_, the sinews are not perceived, and add, in fact, to the richness of a soup.

The thick part of a thin flank is the most profitable part in the whole ox to buy. It is not so handsome in appearance as some other pieces, but it is thick meat, with very little bone, and is usually two cents less in the pound than more fashionable pieces. It is good for roasting, and particularly for corning and salting. The navel end of the brisket is one of the best pieces for salting or corning, and is very good for roasting.

The rattle rand is the very best piece for corning, or salting.

A bullock's heart is very profitable to use as a steak. Broiled just like beef. There are usually five pounds in a heart, and it can be bought for twenty-five cents. Some people stuff and roast it.

The chuck, between the neck and the shoulder, is a very good piece for roasting,--for steaks, or for salting. Indeed, it is good for almost anything; and it is cheap, being from four to five cents a pound.

The richest, tenderest, and most delicate piece of beef for roasting, or for steak, is the rump and the last cut of the sirloin. It is peculiarly appropriate for an invalid, as it is lighter food than any other beef.

But if economy be consulted instead of luxury, the round will be bought in preference to the rump. It is heartier food, and, of course, less can be eaten; and it is cheaper in price.

The shoulder of veal is the most economical for roasting or boiling.

It is always cheap, let veal bear what price it may. Two dinners may be made from it; the shoulder roasted, and the knuckle cut off to be boiled with a bit of pork and greens, or to be made into soup.

The breast of veal is a favorite piece, and is sold high.

The hind-quarter of veal and the loin make two good roasting pieces.

The leg is usually stuffed. The line has the kidney upon it; the fore-quarter has the brisket on it. This is a sweet and delicate morsel; for this reason some people prefer the fore-quarter to any other part.

Always buy a shoulder of pork for economy, for roasting, or coming to boil. Cut off the leg to be boiled. Many people buy the upper part of the spare-rib of pork thinking it the most genteel; but the lower part of the spare-rib toward the neck is much more sweet and juicy, and there is more meat in proportion to the bone.

The breast, or shoulder, of mutton are both nice, either for roasting, boiling or broth. The breast is richer than the shoulder. It is more economical to buy a fore-quarter of mutton than a hind-quarter; there is usually two cents difference per pound. The neck of fat mutton makes a good steak for broiling.

Lamb brings the same price, either fore-quarter or hind-quarter; therefore it is more profitable to buy a hind-quarter than a fore-quarter; especially as its own fat will cook it, and there is no need of pork or b.u.t.ter in addition. Either part is good for roasting or boiling. The loin of lamb is suitable for roasting, and is the most profitable for a small family. The leg is more suitable for boiling than for anything else; the shoulder and breast are peculiarly suitable for broth.

The part that in lamb is called the loin, in mutton is called the chop. Mutton chop is considered very good for broiling.

Pig's head is a profitable thing to buy. It is despised, because it is cheap; but when well cooked it is delicious. Well cleaned, the tip of the snout chopped off, and put in brine a week, it is very good for boiling: the cheeks, in particular, are very sweet; they are better than any other pieces of pork to bake with beans. The head is likewise very good baked about an hour and a half. It tastes like roast pork, and yields abundance of sweet fat, for shortening.

COMMON COOKING.

It is necessary to be very careful of fresh meat in the summer season.

The moment it is brought into the house, it should be carefully covered from the flies, and put in the coldest place in the cellar.

If it consist of pieces, they should be spread out separate from each other, on a large dish, and covered. If you are not to cook it soon, it is well to sprinkle salt on it. The kidney, and fat flabby parts, should be raised up above the lean, by a skewer, or stick, and a little salt strewn in. If you have to keep it over night, it should be looked to the last thing when you go to bed; and if there is danger, it should be scalded.

VEAL.

Veal should boil about an hour, if a neck-piece; if the meat comes from a thicker, more solid part, it should boil longer. No directions about these things will supply the place of judgment and experience.

Both mutton and veal are better for being boiled with a small piece of salt pork. Veal broth is very good.

Veal soup should be slowly stewed for two hours. Seasoned the same as above. Some people like a little sifted summer-savory.