Chapter IV: Part 4

"If you want an animal to love you, feed it." So that the host can stand a great deal of criticism. We should, however, take a hint from the Arabs, nor abuse the salt; it is almost worse than spilling it.

Lady Morgan described the cookery of France as being "the standard and gauge of modern civilization;" and when, during the peace which followed Waterloo, Brillat Savarin turned his thoughts to the æsthetics of the dinner-table, he probably added more largely to the health and happiness of the human race than any other known philanthropist. We must not forget what had gone before in the developments and refinements of the reigns of Louis XIV., XV., and the Regent; we must not forget the honour done to gastronomy by such statesmen as Colbert, such soldiers as Condé, nor by such a wit and beauty as Madame de Sevigné.

OF SOUPS.

"Oh, a splendid soup is the true pea-green,
I for it often call,
And up it comes, in a smart tureen,
When I dine in my banquet hall.
When a leg of mutton at home is boiled,
The liquor I always keep,
And in that liquor, before 't is spoiled,
A peck of peas I steep;
When boiled till tender they have been
I rub through a sieve the peas so green.

"Though the trouble the indolent may shock,
I rub with all my power,
And having returned them to the stock,
I stew them for an hour;
Of younger peas I take some more,
The mixture to improve,
Thrown in a little time before
The soup from the fire I move.
Then seldom a better soup is seen
Than the old familiar soup pea-green."

The best of this poetical recipe is that it is not only funny, but a capital formula.

"The giblet may tire, the gravy pall,
And the truth may lose its charm;
But the green pea triumphs over them all
And does not the slightest harm."

Some of us, however, prefer turtle. It would seem sometimes as if turtle soup were the synonym for a good dinner, and as if it dated back to the days of good Queen Bess. But fashion did not set its seal on turtle soup until about seventy years ago; as an entry in the "Gentleman's Magazine" mentions calipash and calipee as rarities. It is now inseparable from the Lord Mayor's dinner. When we notice ninety-nine recipes for soup in the latest French cookery book, and when we see the fate of a dinner made or marred by the first dish, we must concede that it will be a stumbling-block to the young housekeeper.

Add to that the curious fact that no Irishwoman can make a good soup until she has been taught by years of experience, and we have the first problem in the dangerous process of dinner-giving staring us in the face. A greasy, watery, ill-considered soup will take away the appetite of even a hungry man; while a delicate white or brown soup, or the _purées_ of peas and asparagus, may well whet the appetite of the most pampered _gourmet_.

The subject of soup-making may well be studied. A good soup is at once economical and healthful, and of the first importance in the construction of a dinner. Soup should be made the day before it is to be eaten, by boiling either a knuckle of veal for a white soup, three or four pounds of beef, with the bone well cracked, for a clear _consommé_, or by putting the bones of fish, chickens, and meat into water with salt and pepper, and thus making an economical soup, which may, however, be very good. The French put everything into the soup pot,--bones, scraps, pot liquor, the water in which onions have been boiled, in fact in which all vegetables including beans and potatoes have been boiled; even as a French writer says "rejected MSS. may be thrown into the soup pot;" and the result in France is always good. It is to be observed that every soup should be allowed to cool, and all the fat should be skimmed off, so that the residuum may be as clear as wine.

Delicate soups, clear _consommé_, and white soups _à la Reine_, are great favourites in America, but in England they make a strong, savoury article, which they call gravy soup. It is well to know how to prepare this, as it makes a variety.

Cut two pounds of beef from the neck into dice, and fry until
brown. Break small two or three pounds of bones, and fry
lightly. Bones from which streaked bacon has been cut make an
excellent addition, but too many must not be used, lest the
soup be salt. Slice and fry brown a pound of onions, put them
with the meat and bones and three quarts of cold water into
the soup pot; let it boil up, and having skimmed add two large
turnips, a carrot cut in slices, a small bundle of sweet
herbs, and a half a dozen pepper-corns. Let the soup boil
gently for four or five hours, and about one hour before it is
finished add a little piece of celery, or celery-seed tied in
muslin. This is a most delicious flavour. When done, strain
the soup and set it away for a night to get cold. Remove the
fat and next day let it boil up, stirring in two spoonfuls of
corn starch, moistened with cold water. Season with salt and
pepper to taste, not too salt; add forcemeat balls to the
soup, and you have a whole dinner in your soup.

An oxtail soup is made like the above, only adding the tail, which is divided into joints, which are fried brown. Then these joints should be boiled until the meat comes easily off the bones. When the soup is ready put in two lumps of sugar, a glass of port wine, and pour all into the tureen.

The Julienne soup, so delicious in summer, should be a nice clear stock, with the addition of prepared vegetables. Unless the cook can buy the excellent compressed vegetables which are to be had at the Italian warehouses, it is well to follow this order:--

Wash and scrape a large carrot, cut away all the yellow parts
from the middle, and slice the red outside. Take an equal
quantity of turnips and three small onions, cut in a similar
manner. Put them in a stewpan with two ounces of butter and a
pinch of powdered sugar, stir over the fire until a nice brown
colour, then add a quart of clear, well-flavoured stock, and
let all simmer together gently for three hours. When done,
skim the fat off very carefully, and ten minutes before
serving add a lettuce cut in shreds and blanched for a minute
in boiling water. Simmer for five minutes and the soup will be
ready. This is a most excellent soup if well made.

Mock-turtle soup is easily made:--

Boil the bones of the head three hours, add a piece of gravy
meat cut in dice and fried brown, three onions sliced and
fried brown, a carrot, a turnip, celery, and a small bundle of
sweet herbs; boil gently for three hours and take off the fat.
When it is ready to be served add a glass of sherry and slices
of lemon. The various parts of a calf's-head can be cooked and
used as forcemeat balls, and made to look exactly like turtle.
This soup is found canned and is almost as good as the real
article.

Dried-pea soup, _crème d'asperge_, and bean soup, in fact all the _purées_, are very healthful and elegant soups. The _purée_ is the mashed mass of pea or bean, which is added to the stock.

Boil a pint of large peas in a quart of water with a sprig of
parsley or mint, and a dozen or so of green onions. When the
peas are done strain and rub them through a sieve, put the
_purée_ back into the liquor the peas were boiled in, add a
pint of good veal or beef broth, a lump of sugar, and pepper
and salt to taste. Let the soup get thoroughly hot without
boiling, stir in an ounce of good butter, and the soup is
ready.

A plain but quick and delicious soup may be made by using a can of corn, with a small piece of pork. This warmed up quickly, with a little milk added, is very good.

As for a _crème d'asperge_, it is better to employ a _chef_ to teach the new cook.

Mulligatawny soup is a visitor from India. It should not be too strong of curry powder for the average taste. The stock should be made of chicken or veal, or the liquor in which chickens have been boiled.

Slice and fry in butter six large onions, add four sharp, sour
apples, cored and quartered, but not peeled. Let them boil in
a little of the stock until quite tender, then mix with them a
quarter of a pound of flour, and a small teaspoonful of curry
powder. Take a quart of the stock and when the soup has boiled
skim it; let it simmer for half an hour, then carefully take
off all the fat, strain the soup, and rub the onions through a
sieve. When ready to heat the soup for the dinner-table add
any pieces of meat or chicken cut into small, delicate shapes.
When these have been boiled together for ten minutes the soup
will be ready; salt to taste. Boiled rice should be sent in on
a separate dish.

Sorrel soup is a great favourite with the French people. We do not make enough of sorrel in this country; it adds an excellent flavour.

Carefully wash a pound of sorrel, and having picked, cut it in
shreds, put it into a stewpan with two ounces of fresh butter
and stir it over the fire for ten minutes. Stir in an ounce of
flour, mix well together and add a pint and a half of good
white stock made as for veal broth. Let it simmer for half an
hour. Having skimmed the soup, stir in the yolks of three eggs
beaten up in half a pint of milk or cream. Stir in a little
pat of butter, and when dissolved pour the whole over thin
pieces of toasted bread into the tureen.

With the large family of the broths every housewife should become acquainted. They are invaluable for the sick, especially broths of chicken and mutton. For veal broth the following is an elaborate, but excellent recipe:

Get three or four pounds of scrag, or a knuckle of veal,
chopped into small pieces, also a ham bone, or slice of ham,
and cover with water; let it boil up, skim it until no more
rises. Put in four or five onions, a turnip, and later a bit
of celery or celery seed tied in muslin, a little salt, and
white pepper. Let it boil gently for four hours; strain the
gravy and having taken off all the fat return the residue to
the pot and let it boil; then slightly thicken with corn
flour, about one teaspoonful to a quart of soup; let it simmer
before serving. Three pounds of veal should make two quarts of
good soup.

A sheep's-head soup is famous all over Scotland and is made as follows:--

Get the head of a sheep with the skin on, soak it in tepid
water, take out the tongue and brains, break all the thin
bones inside the cheek, and carefully wash it in several
waters; put it on in a quart of water with a teaspoonful of
salt and let it boil ten minutes. Pour away this water and put
two quarts more with one pound of a scrag of mutton; add, cut
up, six onions, two turnips, two carrots, a sprig of parsley,
and season with pepper and salt. Let it boil gently for four
or five hours, when the head and neck will not be too much
cooked for the family dinner, and may be served either with
parsley or onion sauce. It is a most savoury morsel. Strain
the soup, and let it cool so as to remove every particle of
fat. Rub the vegetables through a sieve to a fine _purée_. Mix
a tablespoonful of flour in a quarter of a pint of milk; make
the soup boil up and stir it in with the vegetables.

Have the tongue boiled until it is very tender, skin and trim
it, have the brains also well cooked, and chop and pound them
very fine with the tongue, mix them with an equal weight of
sifted bread-crumbs, a tablespoonful of chopped green
parsley, pepper, salt, and egg, and if necessary a small
quantity of flour to enable you to roll the mixture into
little balls. Put an ounce of butter into a small frying-pan
and fry the balls until a nice brown, lay them on paper before
the fire to drain away all the fat, and put them into the soup
after it is poured into the tureen. Scald and chop some green
parsley and serve separately on a plate.

Thackeray thought so much of a boiled sheep's head that he made it the point of one of his humorous poems.

"By that grand vow that bound thee
Forever to my side,
And by the ring that made thee
My darling and my bride!
Thou wilt not fail or falter
But bend thee to the task--
A boiled sheep's head on Sunday
Is all the boon I ask!"

In France, cabbage is much used in soup.

"Ha, what is this that rises to my touch
So like a cushion--can it be a cabbage?
It is, it is, that deeply inspired flower
Which boys do flout us with, but yet--I love thee,
Thou giant rose, wrapped in a green surtout.
Doubtless in Eden thou didst blush as bright
As these thy puny brethren, and thy breath
Sweetened the fragrance of her spicy air;
And now thou seemst like a bankrupt beau
Stripped of his gaudy hues and essences,
And growing portly in his sober garments."

The cabbage is without honour in America; and yet if boiled in water which is thrown away, having absorbed all its grosser essences, and then boiled again and chopped and dressed with butter and cream, it is an excellent vegetable. Its disagreeable odour has led to its expulsion from many a house, but corn-beef and cabbage are not to be despised.

Cauliflower, which Thackeray calls the "apotheosis of cabbage," is the most delicate of vegetables; and a _purée_ of cauliflower shall close our chapter on soups.

Boil in salted water, using a small piece of butter, two heads
of cauliflower, drain and pass them through a colander, dilute
with two quarts of sauce and a quart of chicken broth, season
with salt, white pepper, and grated nutmeg. Add a teaspoonful
of fine white sugar, then pass the whole forcibly with a
wooden presser through a fine sieve,--the finer the sieve the
better the _purée_. Put the residue in a stewpan, set it on
the fire, stir all the while till it boils, let it boil for
ten minutes, strain well, add a mixture made with the yolks of
six eggs and half a pint of cream, finish with four ounces of
table butter, and serve with small, fried, square _croûtons_.

A _purée_ of celery is equally excellent; but all these soups require an intelligent cook. It is better to have one's cook taught to make soups by an expert, for it is the most difficult of all the dishes, if thoroughly good. The plain soup, free from grease and well flavoured, is easy enough after a little training, "but the chief ingredient of soup is brains," according to a London _chef_. It is, however, a good practice for an amateur cook to experiment and to try these various recipes, all of which are practicable.

FISH.

What is thy diet? Canst thou gulf a shoal
Of herrings? Or hast thou gorge and room
To bolt fat porpoises and dolphins whole
By dozens, e'en as oysters we consume?
PUNCH.

The world's mine oyster, which I with sword will open.
HOTSPUR.

The Egyptians, strange to say, did not deify fish, that important article of their food. We read of the enormous yield of Lake Moeris, which was dammed up by the great Rameses, and whose draught of fishes brought him so enormous a revenue.

One of the most fascinating of all the Egyptian Queens, Sonivaphra, received the revenues of one of these fisheries to keep her in shoe-strings,--probably another name for pin money.

And yet the Egyptians, while mummying the cats and dogs and beetles, and such small deer, made no gods of the good carp or other fish which must have stocked the river Nile. They emblazoned the crocodile on their monuments, but never a fish. It is a singular foreshadowing of that great vice of the human race, ingratitude.

The Romans were fond of fish, and the records of their gastronomy abound in fish stories. We read of Licinius Crassus, the orator, that he lived in a house of great elegance and beauty. This house was called the "Venus of the Palatine," and was remarkable for its size, the taste of the furniture, and the beauty of the grounds. It was adorned with pillars of Hymettian marbles, with expensive vases and _triclinia_ inlaid with brass; his gardens were provided with fish-ponds, and noble lotus-trees shaded his walks. Abenobarbus, his colleague in the censorship, found fault with such luxury, such "corruption of manners," and complained of his crying for the loss of a lamprey as if it had been a favourite daughter!

This, however, was a tame lamprey, which used to come to the call of Crassus and feed out of his hand. Crassus retorted by a public speech against his colleague, and by his great power of ridicule turned him into derision, jested upon his name, and to the accusation of weeping for a lamprey, replied that it was more than Abenobarbus had done for the loss of any of his three wives!

In the sixteenth century, that golden age of the Vatican, the splendid court of Leo X. was the centre of artistic and literary life, and the witty and pleasure-loving Pope made its gardens the scene of his banquets and concerts, where he listened to the recitations of the poets who sprung up under his protection. There beneath the shadow of the ilex and the lauristines, in a circle so refined that ladies were admitted, Leo himself leaned on the shoulder of the handsome Raphael, who was allowed to caress and admire the Medicean white hand of his noble patron. We read that this famous Pope was so fastidious as to the fish dinners of Lent, that he invented twenty different recipes for the chowder of that day! Walking in disguise with Raphael through the fish-market, he espied a boy who, on his knees, was presenting a fish to a pretty _contadina_. The scene took form and immortality in the famous _Vierge au Poisson_, in which, conducted by the Angel Gabriel, the youthful Saint John presents the fish to the Virgin and child,--a beautiful picture for the church whose patron saint was a fisherman.

Indeed, that picture of the sea of Galilee, and the sacred meaning attached to the etymology of the word "fish," has given the finny wanderer of the seas a peculiar and valuable personality. All this, with the selection by our Lord of so many of his disciples from amongst the fishermen, the many poetical associations which form around this, the cheapest and most delicate form of food with which the Creator has stocked this world of ours, would, if followed out, afford a volume of suggestion, quotation, poetry, and romance with which to embellish the art of entertaining.

Fish is now believed to produce aliment for the brain, and as such is recommended to all authors and editors, statesmen, poets and lawyers, clergymen and mathematicians,--all who draw on that finer fibre of the brain which is used for the production of poetry or prose.

England is famed for its good fish, as why should it not be, with the ocean around it? The turbot is, _par excellence_, the fish for a Lord Mayor's dinner, and it is admirable _à la crème_ for anybody's dinner. Excellent is the whitebait of Richmond, that mysterious little dwarf. Eaten with slices of brown bread and butter it is a very delicious morsel, and the whiting, which always comes to the table with his tail in his mouth, beautifully browned outside, white as snow within, what so excellent as a whiting, except a _sole au gratin_ with sauce Tartare?

Fresh herrings in Scotland are delicious, almost equal to the red mullets which Cæsar once ate at Marseilles. The fresh sardines at Nice, and all along the Mediterranean, are very delicate, as are the thousand shell-fish. The langoose, or large lobster of France and the Mediterranean, is a surprise to the American traveller. Not so delicate as our American lobster, it still is admirable for a salad. It is so large that the flesh--if a fish has flesh--can be sliced up and served like cold roast turkey.

The salmon, king of fish, inspires in his capture, in Scotland rivers, in Labrador, in Canada, some of the best writing of the day. William Black, in Scotland, and Dr. Wier Mitchell, of Philadelphia, can tell stories of salmon-fishing which are as brilliant as Victor Hugo's description of Waterloo, or of that mysterious jelly-fish in his novel, "The Toilers of the Sea."

The New York market boasts the red snapper, the sheepshead, the salmon, the salmon-trout, the Spanish mackerel, most toothsome of viands, the sea bass, cod, halibut, the shad, the greatest profusion of excellent oysters and clams, the cheap pan-fish, and endless eels. The French make many fine dishes of eels, as the Romans did.

To be good, fish must be fresh. It is absolutely indispensable, to retain certain flavours, that the fish should go from one element to another, out of the water into the fire, and onto the gridiron or into the frying pan as soon as possible. Therefore, if the housewife has a fish seasonable and fresh, and a gridiron, she can make a good dish for a hungry man.

We shall begin with the cheapest of the products of the water, and although they may squirm out of our hands, try to bring to the table the despised eels.

An old proverb said that matrimony was a bag in which there were ninety-nine snakes and one eel, and the young lady who put her hand into this agreeable company had small chance at the eel. It would seem at first blush as if no one would care particularly for the eel. In old England, eels were exceedingly popular, and the monks dearly loved to feed upon them. The cellarist of Barking Abbey, Essex, in the ancient times of monastic foundations, was, amongst other eatables, to provide stewed eels in Lent and to bake eels on Shrove Tuesday. There were artificial receptacles made for eels. The cruel custom of salting eels alive is mentioned by some old writers.

"When the old serpent appeared in the guise of a stewed eel it was impossible to resist him."

Eels _en matelote_ should be cut in three-inch pieces, and
salted; fry an onion brown in a little dripping, add half a
pint of broth to the brown onion, part of a bay leaf, six
broken pepper-corns, four whole cloves, and a gill of claret.
Add the eels to this and simmer until thoroughly cooked.
Remove the eels, put them on a hot dish, add a teaspoonful of
brown flour to the sauce, strain and pour over the eels.
Spatch-cooked eels are good.

_Fricasseed eels_: Cut three pounds of eels into pieces of
three inches in length, put them into a stewpan, and cover
them with Rhine wine, or two thirds water and one third
vinegar; add fifteen oysters, two pieces of lemon, a bouquet
of herbs, one onion quartered, six cloves, three stalks of
celery, a pinch of cayenne pepper, and salt to taste. Stew the
eels one hour, remove them from the dish, strain the liquor.
Put it back into the saucepan with a gill of cream and an
ounce of butter rolled in flour, simmer gently a few minutes,
pour over the fish, and you have a dish for a king.

Stewed eels are great favourites with _gourmets_, cooked as follows:--

Cut into three-inch pieces two pounds of medium-sized cleaned
eels. Rub the inside of each piece with salt. Let them stand
half an hour, then parboil them. Boil an onion in a quart of
milk and remove the onion. Drain the eels from the water and
add them to the milk. Season with half a teaspoonful of
chopped parsley, salt and pepper, and the smallest bit of
mace. Simmer until the flesh falls from the bones.

Fried eels should be slightly salted before cooking. Do not cover them with batter, but dredge them with just flour enough to absorb all moisture, then cover them with boiling lard.

As for the thousand and one recipes for cooking an oyster, no one need tell an American hostess much on that subject. Raw, roasted, boiled, stewed, scalloped and baked in patties, what so savoury as the oyster? They should be bought alive, and opened with care by an expert, for the bits of shell are dangerous. If eaten raw, pieces of lemon should be served with them. Plates of majolica to hold five or seven oysters are now to be bought at all the best crockery stores.

To stew oysters well, cream and butter should be added, and the whole mixture done in a silver dish over an alcohol lamp. Broiled oysters should be dipped first in melted butter, then in bread crumbs, then put in a very fine wire gridiron, and broiled over a bright bed of coals. Scalloped oysters should be carefully dried with a clean napkin, then laid in a deep dish on a bed of crumbs and fresh butter, all softened by the liquor of the oyster; a layer of oysters and a layer of crumbs should follow each other, with little walnuts of butter put between. The mixture should be put in a very hot oven and baked a delicate brown, but not dried.

The plain fried oyster is very popular, but it should not be cooked in small houses just before an entertainment, as the odour is not appetizing. To dip them in egg batter, then in bread-crumbs, and fry them in drippings is a common and good fashion. A more elaborate fashion is to beat up the yolks of four eggs with three tablespoonfuls of sweet oil, and season them with a teaspoonful of salt, and a saltspoonful of cayenne pepper. Beat up thoroughly, dip each oyster in this mixture and then in bread crumbs, and fry in hot oil. The best and most elegant way of cooking an oyster is, however, "_à la poulette_."

Scald the oysters in their own liquor, drain them, and add to
the liquor, salt, half an ounce of butter, the juice of half a
lemon, a gill of cream, and a teaspoonful of dissolved flour.
Beat the yolk of one egg, and add to the sauce, stir until the
sauce thickens; place the oysters on a hot dish, pour the
sauce over them, add a little chopped parsley and serve.

A simpler and more primitive but excellent way of cooking oysters is to clean the shells thoroughly, and place them in the coals in an open fireplace, or to roast them in hot ashes until the shells snap open.

When the oyster departs then the clam takes his place, and is delicious as an _avant goût_ or an appetizer at a dinner. If clams are broiled they must be done quickly, else they become hard and indigestible.

The soft-shell clam, scalloped, makes a good dish. Clean the shells well, then put two clams to each shell, with half a teaspoonful of minced celery. Cut a slice of fat bacon small, add a little to each shell, put bread crumbs on top and a little pat of butter, bake in the oven until brown. A clam broth is a delicious and healthful beverage for sick or well; add cream and a spoonful of sherry to it, and it becomes a fabulously fine thing. In this mixture the clams must be strained out before the cream and wine are added.

But if the clam is good what shall we say of crabs. Hard-shell crabs must be boiled about twelve minutes, drained, and set away to cool. Eaten with sandwiches and a dressing they are considered a delicacy for supper. They can be more cooked with chopped eggs, or treated like a chicken pasty, and cooked in a paste shell they are very good.

Take half an ounce of butter, half an onion minced, half a pound of minced raw veal, and a small carrot shredded, a chopped crab, a pint of boiling cream; simmer an hour, then strain into a saucepan, and what a sauce you have!

The soft-shell crab is an invalid. He is caught when he is helpless, feverish, and not at all, one would say, healthy. He is killed by the jarring of the train, by thunder, by some passing noisy cart, and some say by a fall in stocks, or a sudden change in political circles.

Such sensitive creatures must be cooked as soon as possible. It is only necessary to remove the feathery substance under the pointed sides of the shells, rinse them in cold water, drain, season with salt and pepper, dredge them in flour and fry in hot fat. Crab patties and crabs cooked in any other way than this fail to please the epicure. Nothing with so pronounced an individuality as a soft-shelled crab should be disguised.

A devilled crab is considered good, but it should be cooked by a negro expert from Maryland.

Scallops are essentially good in stews, or fried, and when, cut in small pieces, with a pint of milk, a little butter, and a little salt, they again return to their beautiful shells and are baked as a scallop, they are delicious. Put in pork fat, and fried, they are also very fine.

The lobster is now considered very healthful, and as conveying more phosphorus into the human system than any other fish. Broiled, devilled, stewed, cooked in a fashion called _Bourdelaise_, it is the most delicious of dishes, and as a salad what can equal it?

A baked whitefish with Bordeaux sauce is very fine.

Clean and stuff the fish with bread-crumbs, onions, butter,
and sweet marjoram. Put it in a baking pan, add a liberal
quantity of butter previously rolled in flour, put in the pan
a pint of claret, and bake for an hour. Remove the fish and
strain the gravy, put in a teaspoonful of brown flour and a
pinch of cayenne pepper.

Halibut with an egg sauce and a border of parsley is a dish for a banquet, only the cook must know how to make egg sauce. Supposing we tell her?

Put two ounces of butter in a stew-pan; when it melts, add one
ounce of flour. Stir for one minute or more, but do not brown.
Then add by degrees two gills of boiling water, stirring until
smooth, and boiling about two minutes. If not perfectly
smooth, pass it through a sieve; then add another ounce of
butter cut in pieces. When the butter is melted, add three
hard-boiled eggs, chopped not too fine, season with pepper and
salt, and serve immediately.

This sauce is admirable for cod, and for all boiled fish.

But the "perfectest thing on earth" is a broiled fish, a shad for instance; and one of the best preventives against burning is to rub olive oil on the fish before putting it on the gridiron. Charcoal affords the best fire, and it must be free from all smoke and flame.

A little sweet butter, half a teaspoonful of chopped parsley and the juice of a lemon should be melted together, and stand ready to be poured over the broiled fish.

Mr. Lowell, in one of his delightful, witty papers in the Atlantic Monthly years ago, regretted that he could not find a gridiron near the St. Lawrence, although its patron saint suffered martyrdom on that excellent kitchen utensil. It is a lamentable fact that wood fires and gridirons are giving out. They contain within themselves the merits of all the kitchen ranges, all the lost juices of that early American cookery, which one who has tasted it can never forget. Where are the broils of our childhood?

Codfish is a family stand-by, but a tasteless fish unless covered with oysters or something very good; but salt-codfish balls are a great luxury.

Brook trout, boiled, baked, and broiled, are all inferior to the fry. The frying-pan has to answer for a multitude of sins, but nothing so base can be found as to deprive it of its great glory in sending us a fried brook-trout. "Clean and rinse a quarter-of-a-pound trout in cold water," says one recipe.

Why not a pound-and-a-quarter trout? The recipe begins later on: after some pork has been fried in the pan, throw in your carefully cleaned fish, no matter what their weight may be, turn them three times most carefully. Send to table without adding or detracting from their flavour.

This is for the sportsman who cooks his trout himself by a wood fire in the woods; and no other man ever arrives at just that perfect way of cooking a trout. When the trout has come down from cooling springs to the hot city, it requires a seasoning of salt, pepper, and lemon-juice.

Frogs--frogs as cooked in France, _grenouilles à la poulette_--are a most luxurious delicacy. They are very expensive and are to be bought at the _marché St. Honoré_. As only the hind legs are eaten, and the price is fifteen francs a dozen, they are not often seen. We might have them in this country for the catching. Of their tenderness, succulence, and delicacy of flavour there can be no question. They are clean feeders, and undoubtedly wholesome.

Sala, writing in "Breakfasts in Bed" does not praise _bouillabaisse_. He declares that the cooks plunge a rolling-pin in tallow and then with it stir that _pot pourri_ of red mullet, tomatoes, red pepper, red Burgundy, oil, and garlic to which Thackeray has written so delightful a lyric. "Against fish soups, turtle, terrapin, oyster, and bisque," he says, "I can offer no objection." The Italians again have their good _zuppa marinara_, which is not all like the _bouillabaisse_, and the Russians make a very appetizing fish pottage which is called _batwina_, the stock of which is composed of _kraus_, or half-brewed barley beer, and oil. Into this is put the fish known as the sterlet of the Volga, or the sassina of the Gulf of Finland, together with bay leaves, pepper, and lumps of ice. _Batwina_ is better than _bouillabaisse_.

THE SALAD.

"Epicurean cooks shall sharpen with cloyless sauce the
appetite."

Of all the vegetables of which a salad can be made, lettuce is the greatest favourite. That lettuce which is _panachée_, says the _Almanach des Gourmands_, that is, when it has streaked or variegated leaves, is truly _une salade de distinction_. We prefer in this country the fine, crisp, solid little heads, of which the leaves are bright green. The milky juices of the lettuce are soporific, like opium seeds, and predispose the eater to sleep, or to repose of temper and to philosophic thought.

After, or before, lettuce comes the fragrant celery, always an appetizer. Then the tomato, a noble fruit as sweet in smell as Araby the blest, which makes an illustrious salad. Its medicinal virtue is as great as its gastronomical goodness. It is the friend of the well, for it keeps them well, and the friend of the sick, for it brings them back to the lost sheep-folds of hygeia.

There are water-cress and dandelion, common mustard, boiled asparagus, and beet root, potato salad, beloved of the Germans, the cucumber, most fragrant and delicate of salads, a salad of eggs, of lobsters, of chickens, sausages, herrings, and sardines. Anything that is edible can be made into a salad, and a vegetable mixture of cold French beans, boiled peas, carrots and potato, onion, green peppers, and cucumber, covered with fresh mayonnaise dressing, is served ice cold in France, to admiration.

To learn to make a salad is the most important of qualifications for one who would master the art of entertaining.

Here is a good recipe for the dressing:--

Two yolks of eggs, a teaspoonful of salt, and three of
mustard,--it should have been mixed with hot water before
using,--a little cayenne pepper, a spoonful of vinegar; pound
the eggs and mix well. Common vinegar is preferred by many,
but some like tarragon vinegar better. Stir this gently for a
minute, then add two full spoonfuls of best oil of Lucca.

"A sage for the mustard, a miser for the vinegar, a
spendthrift for the oil, and a madman to stir" is the old saw.
Add a teaspoonful of brown sugar, half a dozen little spring
onions cut fine, three or four slices of beet root, the white
of the egg, not cut too small, and then the lettuce itself,
which should be torn from the head stock by the fingers.

Some French salad dressers say _fatiguez la salade_, which means, shake it, mix it, and bruise it; but the modern arrangement is to delicately cover the leaves with the dressing, and not to bruise them. This is an old-fashioned salad.

An excellent salad of cold boiled potatoes cut into slices about an inch thick, may be made with thin slices of fresh beet root, and onions cut very thin, and very little of them, with the same dressing, minus the sugar.

Francatelli speaks of a Russian salad with lobster, a German salad with herrings, and an Italian salad with potatoes; but these come more under the head of the mayonnaises than of the simpler salads.

The cucumber comes next to lettuce, as a purely vegetable salad, and is most desirable with fish. Dr. Johnson declared that the best thing you could do with a cucumber, after you had prepared it with much care and thought, was to throw it out of the window; but Dr. Johnson, although he could write Rasselas and a dictionary, knew nothing about the art of entertaining. He was an eater, a glutton, a _gourmand_, not a _gourmet_. How should he dare to speak against a cucumber salad?

Endive and chiccory should be added to the list of vegetable salads. Neither of them is good, however.

An old-fashioned French salad is made thus: "Chop three anchovies, an onion, and some parsley small; put them in a bowl with two tablespoonfuls of vinegar, one of oil, a little mustard and salt. When well mixed, add some slices of cold roast beef not exceeding two or three inches long. Make three hours before eating. Garnish with parsley." This is by no means a bad way of serving up yesterday's roast beef.

The etymology of salad is said to be "sal," or something salted. Shakspeare mentions the salad five or six times. In Henry VI., Jack Cade, in his extremity of peril when hiding from his pursuers in Ida's garden, says he has climbed over the wall to see if he could eat grass, or pick a salad, which he says "will not come amiss to cool a man's stomach in the hot weather." In Antony and Cleopatra, the passionate queen speaks of her "salad days" when she was "green in judgment, cool in blood." This means, however, something raw or unripe. Hamlet uses the word with the more ancient orthography of "sallet," and says in his speech to the players, "I remember when there were no sallets in these times to make them savoury." By this he meant there was nothing piquant in them, no Attic salt. One author, not so illustrious, claims that the noblest prerogative of man is that he is a cooking animal, and a salad eater.

"The lion is generous as a hero, the rat artful as a lawyer, the dove gentle as a lover, the beaver is a good engineer, the monkey is a clever actor, but none of them can make a salad. The wisest sheep never thought of culling and testing his grasses, seasoning them with thyme or tarragon, softening them with oil, exasperating them with mustard, sharpening them with vinegar, spiritualizing them with a suspicion of onions, in that no sheep has made a salad. Their only sauce is hunger.

"Salads," says this pleasant writer, "were invented by Adam and Eve,--probably made of pomegranates as to-day in Spain."

Of all salads, lobster is the most picturesque and beautiful. Its very scarlet is a trumpet tone to appetite. It lies embedded in green leaves like a magnificent tropical cactus. A good dressing for lobster is essence of anchovy, mushroom ketchup, hard-boiled eggs, and a little cream.

Mashed potatoes, rubbed down with cream, or simply mixed with vinegar, are no bad substitute for eggs, and impart to the salad a new and not unpleasing flavour. French beans, the most delicate of vegetables, give the salad eater a new sensation. A dressing can be mixed in the following proportions: "Four mustard ladles of mustard, four salt ladles of salt. Three spoonfuls of best Italian oil, twelve of vinegar, three unboiled eggs. All are to be carefully rubbed together." This is for those who like sours and not sweets. An old French _émigré_, who had to make his living in England during the time of the Regency, a man of taste and refinement, an epicurean Marquis, carried to noblemen's houses his mahogany box full of essences, spices, and condiments, and made his salad in this way: he chopped up three anchovies with a little shallot and some parsley; these he threw into a bowl with a little mustard and salt, two tablespoonfuls of oil, and one brimming over with vinegar. When thoroughly merged he added his lettuce, or celery, or potato, extremely thin, short slices of best Westphalia ham, or the finest roast beef, which he had steeped in the vinegar. He garnished with parsley and a few layers of bacon. This man was called _Le Roi de la salade_.

A cod mayonnaise is a good dish:--

Boil a large cod in the morning. Let it cool; then remove the
skin and bones. For sauce put some thick cream in a porcelain
sauce-pan and thicken it with corn-flour which has been mixed
with cold water. When it begins to boil stir in the beaten
yolks of two eggs. As it cools beat it well to prevent it from
being lumpy, and when nearly cold stir in the juice of two
lemons, a little tarragon vinegar, a pinch of salt, and a
_soupçon_ of cayenne pepper. Peel and slice some very ripe
tomatoes or cold potatoes, steep them in vinegar with cayenne,
pounded ginger, and plenty of salt. Lay these around the fish
and cover with cream sauce. The tomatoes and potatoes should
be carefully drained before they are placed around the fish.

A salmon covered with a green sauce is a famous dish for a ball supper; indeed, there are thirty or forty salads with a cold fish foundation.

This art of dressing cold vegetables with pepper, salt, oil, and vinegar, should be studied. In France they give you these salads to perfection at the _déjeuner à la fourchette_. Fillippini, of Delmonico's, in his admirable work, "The Table," adds Swedish salad, String Bean Salad, Russian Salad, Salad Macédoine, _Escarolle_, _Doucette_, _Dandelion à la coutoise_, _Baib de Capucine_, Cauliflower salad, and _Salad a l'Italian_. I advise any young housekeeper to buy this book of his, as suggestive. It is too elaborate and learned, however, for practical application to any household except one in which a French cook is kept.

A mayonnaise dressing is a triumph of art when well made:--

A tablespoonful of mustard, one teaspoonful of salt, the yolk
of three uncooked eggs, the juice of half a lemon, a quarter
of a cupful of butter, a pint of oil, and a cupful of whipped
cream. Beat the yolks and dry ingredients until they are very
light, with a wooden spoon or with a wire beater. The bowl in
which the dressing is being made should be set in a pan of ice
water. Add oil, a few drops at a time, until the dressing
becomes thick and rather hard. After it has reached this stage
the oil can be added more rapidly. When it gets so thick as to
be difficult to beat add a little vinegar, then add the juice
of the lemon and the whipped cream, and place on ice until
desired to be used.

Another dressing can be made more quickly:--

The yolk of a raw egg, a tablespoonful of mixed mustard, one
fourth of a teaspoonful of salt, six tablespoonfuls of oil.
Stir the yolk, mustard, and salt together with a fork until
they begin to thicken; add the oil gradually, stirring all the
time.

An excellent salad dressing is also made by using the yolk of hard-boiled eggs, some cold mashed potatoes well pressed together with a fork, oil, vinegar, mustard, and salt rubbed in, in the proportions of two of oil to one of vinegar.

A salad must be fresh and freshly made, to be good. Never serve a salad the second day; and it is not well to cover a delicate salad with too much mayonnaise. The very heart of the celery or the delicate inner leaves of the lettuce are the best for dinners. The heavy chicken and lobster, cabbage and potato salads, are dishes for lunches and suppers.

The chief employment of a kitchen maid, in France, where a man cook is kept, is to wash the vegetables; and you see her swinging the salad in a wire safe after washing it delicately in fresh water. The care bestowed on these minor morals of cookery, so often wholly neglected, adds the finishing touch to the excellence of a French dinner.

For a green mayonnaise dressing, so much admired on salmon, use a little chopped spinach and finely chopped parsley. The juice from boiled beets can be used to make a fine red dressing. Two of these dishes will make a plain, country lunch-table very nice, and will have an appetizing effect, as has anything that betokens care, forethought, neatness, and taste.

Some people cannot eat oil. Often the best oil cannot be bought in a retired and rural neighbourhood. But an excellent substitute is fresh butter or clarified chicken-fat, very carefully prepared, and icy cold. The yolks of four raw eggs, one tablespoonful of salt, one of mustard, the juice of a lemon, and a speck of cayenne pepper should be used.

Two drops of onion juice, or a bit of onion sliced, will add great piquancy to salad dressing, if every one likes onion.

I have never tried the following recipe,--I have tried all the others,--but I have heard that it was very good:

Four tablespoonfuls of butter, one of flour, one tablespoonful
of salt, one of sugar, one heaping teaspoonful of mustard, a
speck of cayenne, one cupful of milk, half a cupful of
vinegar, three eggs. Let the butter get hot in a saucepan. Add
the flour and stir until smooth, being careful not to brown.
Add the milk and boil up. Place the saucepan in another of hot
water. Beat the eggs, salt, pepper, sugar, and mustard
together, and add the vinegar. Stir this into the boiling
mixture and stir until it thickens like soft custard, which
will be about five minutes. Set away to cool, and when cold,
bottle and place in the ice-chest. This will keep two weeks.

If one wishes to use prepared mayonnaise it is better to buy that which is sold at the grocers. It has not the charm of a fresh dressing, however, but is rather like those elaborated impromptus which some studied talkers get off.

A very pretty salad can be made of nasturtium-blossoms, buttercups, a head of lettuce, and a pint of water-cresses. It is to be covered with the French dressing and eaten immediately.

Asparagus is so good in itself that it seems a shame to dress it as a salad; yet it is very good eaten with oil, vinegar, and salt. Cauliflower, cold, is delicious as a salad, and can be made very ornamental with a garniture of beet root, which is a good ingredient for a salad of salt codfish, boiled.

Sardine salads are very appetizing for lunch. Arrange a cold salmon or codfish on a bed of lettuce. Split six sardines, remove the bones, and mix them into the dressing. Garnish the whole dish with sardines, and cover with the dressing.

All kinds of cooked fish can be served with salads. Lettuce is the best green salad to serve with them; but all cooked and cold vegetables go well with fish. Add capers to the mayonnaise.

A housekeeper who has conquered the salad question can always add to the plainest dinner a desirable dish. She can feed the hungry, and she can stimulate the most jaded fancy of the over-fastidious _gourmet_ by these delicate and consummate luxuries.

Here is Sydney Smith's recipe for a salad:--

"To make this condiment your poet begs
The pounded yellow of two hard-boiled eggs;
Two boiled potatoes, passed through kitchen sieve,
Smoothness and softness to the salad give.
Let onion atoms wink within the bowl,
And half suspected, animate the whole;
Of mordant mustard, add a single spoon,
(Distrust the condiment that bites too soon),
But deem it not, thou man of herbs, a fault,
To add a double quantity of salt.
Four times the spoon with oil of Lucca crown,
And twice with vinegar, procured from town;
And lastly, o'er the favoured compound toss
A magic _soupçon_ of anchovy sauce.
Oh, green and glorious! Oh, herbaceous treat!
'T would tempt the dying anchorite to eat!
Back to the world would turn his fleeting soul,
To plunge his fingers in a salad bowl!
Serenely full, the epicure would say,
'Fate cannot harm me,--I have dined to-day.'"

LOBSTER SALAD.

"Take, take lobsters and lettuces,
Mind that they send you the fish that you order;
Take, take a decent sized salad bowl,
One that's sufficiently deep in the border;
Cut into many a slice,
All of the fish that's nice;
Place in the bowl with due neatness and order;
Then hard-boiled eggs you may
Add in a neat array,
All toward the bowl, just by way of a border.

"Take from the cellar of salt a proportion,
Take from the castors both pepper and oil,
With vinegar too, but a moderate portion,--
Too much of acid your salad will spoil;
Mix them together,
You need not mind whether
You blend them exactly in apple-pie order,
But when you've stirred away,
Mix up the whole you may,
All but the eggs which are used as a border.

"Take, take plenty of seasoning;
A teaspoonful of parsley that's chopped in small pieces
Though, though, the point will bear reasoning,
A small taste of onion the flavour increases
As the sauce curdle may,
Should it, the process stay.
Patiently do it again in good order;
For if you chance to spoil
Vinegar, eggs, and oil,
Still to proceed would on lunacy border."

A Spanish salad, _gaspacho_, is a favourite food of the Andalusian peasant. It is but bread soaked in oil and water, with a large Spanish onion peeled, and a fresh cucumber.

Slice three tomatoes, take out the grain and cut up the fruit.
Arrange carefully all these materials in a shallow earthen
pan, tier upon tier, salting and peppering each to taste,
pouring in oil plentifully, and vinegar. Last of all, let the
salad lie in some cool spot for an hour or two, then sprinkle
over it two handfuls of bread-crumbs.

In Spanish peasant houses, the big wooden bowl hanging below the eaves to keep it cool is always ready for attack. The oil in Spain is not to our taste; but the salad made as above, with good oil, is delicious. It should have a sprinkling of red pepper.

DESSERTS.

There is not in the wide world so tempting a sweet
As that trifle where custard and macaroons meet.
Oh! the latest sweet tooth from my head must depart
Ere the taste of that trifle shall not win my heart.

Yet it is not the sugar that's thrown in between,
Nor the peel of the lemon so candied and green,
'T is not the rich cream that's whipped up by a mill,
Oh, no; it is something more exquisite still!

The great meaning of dessert is to offer "something more exquisite still." And it is the province of the housekeeper, be she young or old, to study how this can be done.