The Book of Household Management Part 79

TO DRESS TRIPE.

677. INGREDIENTS.--Tripe, onion sauce, No. 484, milk and water.

_Mode_.--Ascertain that the tripe is quite fresh, and have it cleaned and dressed. Cut away the coa.r.s.est fat, and boil it in equal proportions of milk and water for 3/4 hour. Should the tripe be entirely undressed, more than double that time should be allowed for it. Have ready some onion sauce made by recipe No. 4S4, dish the tripe, smother it with the sauce, and the remainder send to table in a tureen.

_Time_.--1 hour: for undressed tripe, from 2-1/2 to 3 hours.

_Average cost_, 7d. per lb.

_Seasonable_ at any time.

_Note_.--Tripe may be dressed in a variety of ways: it may be cut in pieces and fried in batter, stewed in gravy with mushrooms, or cut into collops, sprinkled with minced onion and savoury herbs, and fried a nice brown in clarified b.u.t.ter.

BEEF CARVING.

AITCHBONE OF BEEF.

A boiled aitch-bone of beef is not a difficult joint to carve, as will be seen on reference to the accompanying engraving. By following with the knife the direction of the line from 1 to 2, nice slices will be easily cut. It may be necessary, as in a round of beef, to cut a thick slice off the outside before commencing to serve.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

BRISKET OF BEEF.

There is but little description necessary to add, to show the carving of a boiled brisket of beef, beyond the engraving here inserted. The only point to be observed is, that the joint should be cut evenly and firmly quite across the bones, so that, on its reappearance at table, it should not have a jagged and untidy look.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

RIBS OF BEEF.

This dish resembles the sirloin, except that it has no fillet or undercut. As explained in the recipes, the end piece is often cut off, salted and boiled. The mode of carving is similar to that of the sirloin, viz., in the direction of the dotted line from 1 to 2. This joint will be the more easily cut if the plan be pursued which is suggested in carving the sirloin; namely, the inserting of the knife immediately between the bone and the moat, before commencing to cut it into slices. All joints of roast beef should be cut in even and thin slices. Horseradish, finely sc.r.a.ped, may be served as a garnish; but horseradish sauce is preferable for eating with the beef.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

SIRLOIN OF BEEF.

This dish is served differently at various tables, some preferring it to come to table with the fillet, or, as it is usually called, the undercut, uppermost. The reverse way, as shown in the cut, is that most usually adopted. Still the undercut is best eaten when hot; consequently, the carver himself may raise the joint, and cut some slices from the under side, in the direction of from 1 to 2, as the fillet is very much preferred by some eaters. The upper part of the sirloin should be cut in the direction of the line from 5 to 6, and care should be taken to carve it evenly and in thin slices. It will be found a great a.s.sistance, in carving this joint well, if the knife be first inserted just above the bone at the bottom, and run sharply along between the bone and meat, and also to divide the meat from the bone in the same way at the side of the joint. The slices will then come away more readily.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Some carvers cut the upper side of the sirloin across, as shown by the line from 3 to 4; but this is a wasteful plan, and one not to be recommended. With the sirloin, very finely-sc.r.a.ped horseradish is usually served, and a little given, when liked, to each guest.

Horseradish sauce is preferable, however, for serving on the plate, although the sc.r.a.ped horseradish may still be used as a garnish.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

A ROUND OF BEEF.

A round of beef is not so easily carved as many other joints of beef, and to manage it properly, a thin-bladed and very sharp knife is necessary. Off the outside of the joint, at its top, a thick slice should first be cut, so as to leave the surface smooth; then thin and even slices should be cleverly carved in the direction of the line 1 to 2; and with each slice of the lean a delicate morsel of the fat should be served.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

BEEF TONGUE.

Pa.s.sing the knife down in the direction of from 1 to 2, a not too thin slice should be helped; and the carving of a tongue may be continued in this way until the best portions of the upper side are served. The fat which lies about the root of the tongue can be served by turning the tongue, and cutting in the direction of from 3 to 4.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

[Ill.u.s.tration]

CHAPTER XIV.

GENERAL OBSERVATIONS ON THE SHEEP AND LAMB.

678. OF ALL WILD or DOMESTICATED ANIMALS, the sheep is, without exception, the most useful to man as a food, and the most necessary to his health and comfort; for it not only supplies him with the lightest and most nutritious of meats, but, in the absence of the cow, its udder yields him milk, cream, and a sound though inferior cheese; while from its fat he obtains light, and from its fleece broadcloth, kerseymere, blankets, gloves, and hose. Its bones when burnt make an animal charcoal--ivory black--to polish his boots, and when powdered, a manure for the cultivation of his wheat; the skin, either split or whole, is made into a mat for his carriage, a housing for his horse, or a lining for his hat, and many other useful purposes besides, being extensively employed in the manufacture of parchment; and finally, when oppressed by care and sorrow, the harmonious strains that carry such soothing contentment to the heart, are elicited from the musical strings, prepared almost exclusively from the intestines of the sheep.

679. THIS VALUABLE ANIMAL, of which England is estimated to maintain an average stock of 32,000,000, belongs to the cla.s.s already indicated under the ox,--the _Mammalia_; to the order of _Rumenantia_, or cud-chewing animal; to the tribe of _Capridae_, or horned quadrupeds; and the genus _Ovis_, or the "sheep." The sheep may be either with or without horns; when present, however, they have always this peculiarity, that they spring from a triangular base, are spiral in form, and lateral, at the side of the head, in situation. The fleece of the sheep is of two sorts, either short and harsh, or soft and woolly; the wool always preponderating in an exact ratio to the care, attention, and amount of domestication bestowed on the animal. The generic peculiarities of the sheep are the triangular and spiral form of the horns, always larger in the male when present, but absent in the most cultivated species; having sinuses at the base of all the toes of the four feet, with two rudimentary hoofs on the fore legs, two inguinal teats to the udder, with a short tail in the wild breed, but of varying length in the domesticated; have no incisor teeth in the upper jaw, but in their place a hard elastic cushion along the margin of the gum, on which the animal nips and breaks the herbage on which it feeds; in the lower jaw there are eight incisor teeth and six molars on each side of both jaws, making in all 32 teeth. The fleece consists of two coats, one to keep the animal warm, the other to carry off the water without wetting the skin. The first is of wool, the weight and fineness of which depend on the quality of the pasture and the care bestowed on the flock; the other of hair, that pierces the wool and overlaps it, and is in excess in exact proportion to the badness of the keep and inattention with which the animal is treated.

680. THE GREAT OBJECT OF THE GRAZIER is to procure an animal that will yield the greatest pecuniary return in the shortest time; or, in other words, soonest convert gra.s.s and turnips into good mutton and fine fleece. All sheep will not do this alike; some, like men, are so restless and irritable, that no system of feeding, however good, will develop their frames or make them fat. The system adopted by the breeder to obtain a valuable animal for the butcher, is to enlarge the capacity and functions of the digestive organs, and reduce those of the head and chest, or the mental and respiratory organs. In the first place, the mind should be tranquillized, and those s.p.a.ces that can never produce animal fibre curtailed, and greater room afforded, as in the abdomen, for those that can. And as nothing militates against the fattening process so much as restlessness, the chief wish of the grazier is to find a dull, indolent sheep, one who, instead of frisking himself, leaping his wattles, or even condescending to notice the b.u.t.ting gambols of his silly companions, silently fills his paunch with pasture, and then seeking a shady nook, indolently and luxuriously chows his cud with closed eyes and blissful satisfaction, only rising when his delicious repast is ended, to proceed silently and without emotion to repeat the pleasing process of laying in more provender, and then returning to his dreamy siesta to renew the delightful task of rumination. Such animals are said to have a _lymphatic_ temperament, and are of so kindly a nature, that on good pasturage they may be said to grow daily. The Leicestershire breed is the best example of this lymphatic and contented animal, and the active Orkney, who is half goat in his habits, of the restless and unprofitable. The rich pasture of our midland counties would take years in making the wiry Orkney fat and profitable, while one day's fatigue in climbing rocks after a coa.r.s.e and scanty herbage would probably cause the actual death of the pampered and short-winded Leicester.

681. THE MORE REMOVED FROM THE NATURE of the animal is the food on which it lives, the more difficult is the process of a.s.similation, and the more complex the chain of digestive organs; for it must be evident to all, that the same apparatus that converts _flesh_ into _flesh_, is hardly calculated to trans.m.u.te _gra.s.s_ into flesh. As the process of digestion in carnivorous animals is extremely simple, these organs are found to be remarkably short, seldom exceeding the length of the animal's body; while, where digestion is more difficult, from the una.s.similating nature of the aliment, as in the ruminant order, the alimentary ca.n.a.l, as is the case with the sheep, is _twenty-seven times the length of the body._ The digestive organ in all ruminant animals consists of _four stomachs_, or, rather, a capacious pouch, divided by doorways and valves into four compartments, called, in their order of position, the Paunch, the Reticulum, the Omasum, and the Abomasum. When the sheep nibbles the gra.s.s, and is ignorantly supposed to be eating, he is, in fact, only preparing the raw material of his meal, in reality only mowing the pasture, which, as he collects, is swallowed instantly, pa.s.sing into the first receptacle, the _paunch_, where it is surrounded by a quant.i.ty of warm saliva, in which the herbage undergoes a process of maceration or softening, till the animal having filled this compartment, the contents pa.s.s through a valve into the second or smaller bag,--the _reticulum_, where, having again filled the paunch with a reserve, the sheep lies down and commences that singular process of chewing the cud, or, in other words, masticating the food he has collected. By the operation of a certain set of muscles, a small quant.i.ty of this softened food from the _reticulum_, or second bag, is pa.s.sed into the mouth, which it now becomes the pleasure of the sheep to grind under his molar teeth into a soft smooth pulp, the operation being further a.s.sisted by a flow of saliva, answering the double purpose of increasing the flavour of the aliment and promoting the solvency of the ma.s.s. Having completely comminuted and blended this mouthful, it is swallowed a second time; but instead of returning to the paunch or reticulum, it pa.s.ses through another valve into a side cavity,--the _omasum_, where, after a maceration in more saliva for some hours, it glides by the same contrivance into the fourth pouch,--the _abomasum_, an apartment in all respects a.n.a.logous to the ordinary stomach of animals, and where the process of digestion, begun and carried on in the previous three, is here consummated, and the nutrient principle, by means of the bile, eliminated from the digested aliment. Such is the process of digestion in sheep and oxen.

682. NO OTHER ANIMAL, even of the same order, possesses in so remarkable a degree the power of converting pasture into flesh as the Leicestershire sheep; the South Down and Cheviot, the two next breeds in quality, are, in consequence of the greater vivacity of the animal's nature, not equal to it in that respect, though in both the brain and chest are kept subservient to the greater capacity of the organs of digestion. Besides the advantage of increased bulk and finer fleeces, the breeder seeks to obtain an augmented deposit of tissue in those parts of the carcase most esteemed as food, or, what are called in the trade "prime joints;" and so far has this been effected, that the comparative weight of the hind quarters over the fore has become a test of quality in the breed, the butchers in some markets charging twopence a pound more for that portion of the sheep. Indeed, so superior are the hind quarters of mutton now regarded, that very many of the West-end butchers never deal in any other part of the sheep.

683. THE DIFFERENCE IN THE QUALITY OF THE FLESH in various breeds is a well-established fact, not alone in flavour, but also in tenderness; and that the nature of the pasture on which the sheep is fed influences the flavour of the meat, is equally certain, and shown in the estimation in which those flocks are held which have grazed on the thymy heath of Bamstead in Suss.e.x. It is also a well-established truth, that the _larger_ the frame of the animal, the _coa.r.s.er_ is the meat, and that _small bones_ are both guarantees for the fineness of the breed and the delicacy of the flesh. The s.e.x too has much to do in determining the quality of the meat; in the males, the lean is closer in fibre, deeper in colour, harder in texture, less juicy, and freer from fat, than in the female, and is consequently tougher and more difficult of digestion; but probably age, and the character of the pasturage on which they are reared, has, more than any other cause, an influence on the quality and tenderness of the meat.

684. THE NUMEROUS VARIETIES of sheep inhabiting the different regions of the earth have been reduced by Cuvier to three, or at most four, species: the _Ovis Amman_, or the Argali, the presumed parent stock of all the rest; the _Ovis Tragelaphus_, the bearded sheep of Africa; the _Ovis Musmon_, the Musmon of Southern Europe; and the _Ovis Montana_, the Mouflon of America; though it is believed by many naturalists that this last is so nearly identical with the Indian Argali as to be undeserving a separate place. It is still a controversy to which of these three we are indebted for the many breeds of modern domestication; the Argali, however, by general belief, has been considered as the most _probable_ progenitor of the present varieties.

685. THE EFFECTS PRODUCED BY CHANGE OF CLIMATE, accident, and other causes, must have been great to accomplish so complete a physical alteration as the primitive Argali must have undergone before the Musmon, or Mouflon of Corsica, the _immediate_ progenitor of all our European breeds, a.s.sumed his present appearance. The Argali is about a fifth larger in size than the ordinary English sheep, and being a native of a tropical clime, his fleece is of hair instead of wool, and of a warm reddish brown, approaching to yellow; a thick mane of darker hair, about seven inches long, commences from two long tufts at the angle of the jaws, and, running _under_ the throat and neck, descends down the chest, dividing, at the fore fork, into two parts, one running down the front of each leg, as low as the shank. The horns, unlike the character of the order generally, have a quadrangular base, and, sweeping inwards, terminate in a sharp point. The tail, about seven inches long, ends in a tuft of stiff hairs. From this remarkable m.u.f.fler-looking beard, the French have given the species the name of _Mouflon a manchettes_. From the primitive stock _eleven_ varieties have been reared in this country, of the domesticated sheep, each supposed by their advocates to possess some one or more special qualities. These eleven, embracing the Shetland or Orkney; the Dun-woolled; Black-faced, or heath-bred; the Moorland, or Devonshire; the Cheviot; the Horned, of Norfolk the Ryeland; South-Down; the Merino; the Old Leicester, and the Teeswater, or New Leicester, have of late years been epitomized; and, for all useful and practical purposes, reduced to the following four orders:--

686. THE SOUTH-DOWN, the LEICESTER, the BLACK-FACED, and the CHEVIOT.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SOUTH-DOWN RAM.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: SOUTH-DOWN EWE.]

687. SOUTH-DOWNS.--It appears, as far as our investigation can trace the fact, that from the very earliest epoch of agricultural history in England, the breezy range of light chalky hills running through the south-west and south of Suss.e.x and Hampshire, and known as the South-Downs, has been famous for a superior race of sheep; and we find the Romans early established mills and a cloth-factory at Winchester, where they may be said to terminate, which rose to such estimation, from the fineness of the wool and texture of the cloth, that the produce was kept as only worthy to clothe emperors. From this, it may be inferred that sheep have always been indigenous to this hilly tract. Though boasting so remote a reputation, it is comparatively within late years that the improvement and present state of perfection of this breed has been effected, the South-Down new ranking, for symmetry of shape, const.i.tution, and early maturity, with any stock in the kingdom. The South-Down has no horns, is covered with a fine wool from two to three inches long, has a small head, and legs and face of a grey colour. It is, however, considered deficient in depth and breadth of chest. A marked peculiarity of this breed is that its hind quarters stand higher than the fore, the quarters weighing from fifteen to eighteen pounds.

[Ill.u.s.tration: LEICESTER RAM.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: LEICESTER EWE.]

688. THE LEICESTER.--It was not till the year 1755 that Mr. Robert Bakewell directed his attention to the improvement of his stock of sheep, and ultimately effected that change in the character of his flock which has brought the breed to hold so prominent a place. The Leicester is regarded as the largest example of the improved breeds, very productive, and yielding a good fleece. He has a small head, covered with short white hairs, a clean muzzle, an open countenance, full eye, long thin ear, tapering neck, well-arched ribs, and straight back. The meat is indifferent, its flavour not being so good as that of the South-Down, and there is a very large proportion of fat. Average weight of carcase from 90 to 100 lbs.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HEATH RAM.]