Chapter IX: Part 9

Third Week. Sunday.
——
Calf’s Head Soup.
Imitation Turtle. Chopped Macaroni.
Bermuda Potatoes. String-Beans and Fried Brains.
——
Alice’s Pudding.
Coffee and Whipped Cream.
——

CALF’S HEAD SOUP.

The liquor in which a calf’s head has been boiled.
1 lb. of lean beef cut into dice and fried brown.
3 sliced and fried onions.
1 grated carrot.
Bunch of sweet herbs.
2 tablespoonfuls of butter rubbed warm into the same quantity of
browned flour.
1 tablespoonful of Worcestershire sauce.
1 glass brown sherry.
Dice of meat from the head.
Pepper and salt.

Boil a calf’s head on Saturday until the flesh slips from the bones. Salt and pepper the meat and set away, with the brains—also salted and cooked—in a cool place. Return the bones to the liquor with the vegetables and herbs cut small, the fried beef and onions, and boil one hour. Season highly and put by in a cool cellar until Sunday. Take off the fat, and melt the soup-jelly under it by heating all together in a soup-kettle. When hot, strain, and set aside half the stock for Monday. Boil up that meant for to-day, stir in the butter and flour, and a cupful of dice made from one cheek of the cold head. Simmer ten minutes, add sauce and wine, and pour out.

IMITATION TURTLE.

The cold calf’s head, with the tongue.
1 cup of good gravy. If you have nothing else, borrow a cupful from
your soup-jelly.
A dozen force-meat balls, made of the ears chopped fine, mixed with
bread-crumbs, bound with beaten egg and rolled in flour.
1 teaspoonful minced parsley and thyme.
A little minced onion.
Browned flour.
4 hard-boiled eggs.
Pepper and salt.

Slice the meat from the head neatly. Heat the gravy with seasoning, herbs, and onion, and boil ten minutes. Strain; put the meat into the saucepan; pour the gravy over it, and set all in boiling water fifteen minutes. Put over the fire with the sliced eggs and force-meat balls. Let them begin to boil, and take off. Lay the meat evenly upon a dish, and the eggs upon it, the force-meat balls around all, and pour half the gravy over it, sending up the rest in a boat.

CHOPPED MACARONI.

Boil half a pound of macaroni tender in hot salted water, and let it cool. Then chop small. Have ready in a saucepan a cupful of hot milk in which an onion has been boiled and strained out. Stir into this a great spoonful of butter, pepper, salt, and two tablespoonfuls of grated cheese. When these are well mixed, put in the macaroni, and shake—not stir—until very hot. Turn into a deep dish, and grate more cheese on the top. Pass a red-hot shovel over this until the cheese browns—or if dry, takes fire. Blow it out, and serve.

STRING-BEANS AND FRIED BRAINS.

Cut the beans into short lengths and cook in boiling water salted. Drain, stir in butter, pepper, and salt, and dish. Garnish with the brains, rubbed smooth, seasoned, beaten up with a raw egg and a little flour, and fried by the spoonful in hot fat.

BERMUDA POTATOES.

Put on in boiling water; cook until a fork will go in easily; dry off, and serve in their skins.

ALICE’S PUDDING.

1 quart of milk.
4 eggs.
1 cup dry crumbs.
½ cup of strawberry or other sweet jam.
½ cup of sugar.

Sprinkle the bottom of a buttered bake-dish with crumbs. Pour in the jam, and cover this with the rest of the crumbs, wet with a little milk. Scald the remainder of the milk, and pour, gradually, upon the beaten eggs and sugar. Heat and stir three minutes; put it, spoonful by spoonful, upon the crumbs, so as not to displace them, and when all is in, bake until well set and slightly colored by the heat. Eat cold—with cream, if you can get it.

COFFEE AND WHIPPED CREAM.

Whip a little cream in a syllabub churn, and lay a spoonful upon the surface of each cup of made coffee.

Third Week. Monday.
——
A Good White Soup.
Ham and Eggs. Succotash.
Oyster Salad. Stewed Potatoes.
——
Plain Macaroni Pudding.
——

A GOOD WHITE SOUP.

Skim the stock set aside yesterday; heat and season, then strain through thin muslin, and return to the fire. Skim again; add a great spoonful of butter, cut up in flour, and boil up. Have ready in your tureen a cupful of hot milk, in which has been soaked half a cupful of bread-crumbs; beat into these the whites of two eggs; pour in the soup, by degrees, stirring in well, and serve.

HAM AND EGGS.

Cut slices of ham of equal size; cover with boiling water, and cook ten minutes, then let them get cold. Cut off the rind and fry in their own fat, until browned. Lay upon a hot dish; strain the fat, returning it to the pan with a little butter, and when hot break in the eggs. Fry upon one side; trim off the ragged edges, and lay upon the ham. Dust with pepper, and serve.

SUCCOTASH.

Open a can of succotash; drain off the liquor, cut the beans into short lengths, and put on in boiling water, salted. Cook twenty-five minutes; drain off the water, and add as much cold milk. When this is hot, stir in a great spoonful of butter, cut up in flour; pepper and salt, cook three minutes more and serve.

OYSTER SALAD.

Cut the oysters into thirds; pull the hearts out of nice lettuce heads and shred up one-third as much as you have oysters. Make a dressing in the proportion of two tablespoonfuls of best oil to four of vinegar; one teaspoonful of salt and the same of sugar; half as much pepper, and made mustard. Rub all up well, and pour over oysters and lettuce just before serving.

STEWED POTATOES.

Cut into small squares and put on in boiling water, slightly salted. When tender, but not broken, throw off half the water, and proceed as with the succotash, only adding a teaspoonful of finely minced parsley.

PLAIN MACARONI PUDDING.

½ lb. macaroni, broken in pieces an inch long, boiled tender (or
about twenty minutes) in hot, salted water.
1 tablespoonful of butter.
1 large cup of milk.
2 tablespoonfuls powdered sugar.
2 eggs.
Grated peel of half a lemon.
A little cinnamon and salt.

When the macaroni is tender, drain off the water and add the salt and butter. Heat the milk and pour over the beaten eggs, sugar and flavoring. Mix with the macaroni, and bake in a buttered pudding-dish, covered, for half an hour; then brown. Eat with butter and sugar.

Third Week. Tuesday.
——
Pot-au-feu.
Boiled Leg of Mutton. Potatoes à la Lyonnaise.
Stewed Pie-Plant. Caper Sauce.
——
Peach Lèche Crèma.
——

POT-AU-FEU.

3 lbs. of lean beef, cut into dice.
1 sliced and fried onion.
2 carrots, cut into small squares.
2 turnips, ditto.
1 bunch of sweet herbs, minced.
2 potatoes, parboiled and sliced.
Pepper and salt.
3 quarts of water.

Put on the beef in two quarts of water and cook slowly until it is tender, and the water reduced to one quart. Put the vegetables—except the potatoes—on in boiling water. Cook ten minutes; throw away the water and cover with a quart of cold. Add the potatoes; pepper and salt and cook gently half an hour. Put in the meat and the quart of gravy and simmer ten minutes more, with the minced herbs. Then pour out. This is only a family soup, but is a good one when properly cooked.

BOILED LEG OF MUTTON.

Do not have the shank too long, nor cut it so short as to make the leg “chunky.” The meat will look cleaner and less sodden if you boil it in a piece of mosquito net or tarlatan, sewed about it somewhat tightly. Put on in boiling salted water, plenty of it, and cook fifteen minutes to the pound. Unwrap and lay upon a hot dish. Butter all over, and sprinkle lightly with salt. Twist frilled paper about the end of the shank.

CAPER SAUCE.

Take out a cupful of the liquor in which the mutton was boiled (putting away the rest for soup), strain, heat, and skim; stir in two tablespoonfuls of butter rubbed in a teaspoonful of flour; pepper, boil up, pour upon a beaten egg; return to the fire and stir for a minute; add two dozen capers or nasturtium-seed, and pour into a sauce-boat. Pass, of course, with the mutton.

POTATOES À LA LYONNAISE.

Parboil the potatoes, and cut into dice. Chop a small onion and mince a tablespoonful of parsley. Put two tablespoonfuls of butter or excellent dripping into a frying-pan, and when hot, stir in potatoes, onion, and parsley. Shake and toss until all are hissing hot, but do not let them brown. Shake off the fat in a hot colander, and serve in a deep dish.

STEWED PIE-PLANT.

Skin and wash the stalks, and cut into half inch lengths. Stew tender in a little water, with a handful of seedless raisins. Sweeten to taste. Eat cold with meat.

PEACH LÈCHE CRÈMA.

1 can of peaches.
Yolks of 3 eggs and whites of four.
3 cups of milk.
½ cup of powdered sugar.
2 tablespoonfuls of corn-starch.
1 tablespoonful of melted butter.

Scald the milk; stir in the corn-starch wet with cold milk, and cook, still stirring, until it begins to thicken. Take from the fire, and beat in the butter, then the whipped yolks, two whites and sugar. Whisk to a light cream. Drain the syrup from the peaches; lay them in the bottom of a bake-dish, and pour the mixture gently over them. Bake in a quick oven ten minutes, then spread with a _méringue_ of four whites whisked stiff with a little sugar. Shut up in the oven until this is slightly tinged. Eat warm with sauce, or cold with cream.

Third Week. Wednesday.
——
Scotch Broth.
Mutton Pie. Stewed Tomatoes.
Cabbage Salad. Mashed Potatoes.
——
Lemon Puffs.
——

SCOTCH BROTH.

Take the fat from the top of the broth in which the mutton was boiled yesterday. Chop up an onion, a good sized one, and put in it. Boil half an hour and strain. Add a cup of barley, previously soaked two hours in cold water, and cook for two hours more. Chop up some parsley fine and add. When the barley is very soft, and the broth has boiled down one-half, pour out and serve, having peppered to taste.

MUTTON PIE.

Cut the meat from yesterday’s mutton, into strips two inches long by half an inch wide. Chop a pickled cucumber to pieces, also two boiled eggs. Put a layer of meat in a bake-dish, strew with pickle and egg; salt and pepper and drop, pretty thickly, over it, bits of butter rolled in flour. Go on in this order, until your meat is used up, when pour in a cup of oyster-liquor or cold water. Cover with a good crust, ornamented around the edges; make a slit in the middle, and bake one hour.

N. B.—The bare bones will “help out” to-morrow’s soup.

STEWED TOMATOES.

Receipts for these, as also for plain mashed potatoes, have been given so lately that repetition here is needless.

CABBAGE SALAD.

1 small, firm white cabbage, shred fine.
1 cup of boiling milk.
1 smaller cup of vinegar, also hot.
1 tablespoonful of butter, and the same of sugar.
2 eggs, well beaten.
1 teaspoonful essence of celery.
Pepper and salt to taste.

When the vinegar boils, put in butter, sugar, and seasoning. Boil, and add the shred cabbage. When this is scalding hot, take from the fire. Pour the hot milk upon the eggs, and cook one minute, stirring constantly. Turn the cabbage into a bowl, pour over it the smoking custard, toss up and mix well, and set it, covered, in ice-cold water. Eat perfectly cold.

LEMON PUFFS.

1 cup of prepared flour.
½ cup of powdered sugar.
1 tablespoonful of butter.
3 eggs—whites and yolks beaten separately.
Grated peel of 1 lemon.
3 tablespoonfuls of milk.
A little salt.

Cream butter and sugar, whip in the yolks, milk, and lemon-peel; then, the whisked whites and flour, alternately. Bake in small, buttered tins, or in “gem” pans. Turn out while hot, and eat with sweet sauce.

Third Week. Thursday.
——
Soup à la Bonne Femme.
Corned Beef. Mashed Turnips.
Scalloped Cauliflower. Fried Potatoes.
——
Orange Cream Pie.
——

SOUP À LA BONNE FEMME.

Bones of cold mutton, cracked.
2 lbs. of lean veal from the knuckle, bones broken, and meat cut up.
2 tablespoonfuls of butter, rubbed in flour.
½ cup of raw rice.
½ cup of milk.
1 onion, chopped.
3 eggs.
Minced parsley.
Salt and pepper.
3 quarts of water.

Put bones, meat, onion, and rice on in the cold water, and cook slowly three hours. Strain, rubbing the rice and onion to a pulp, through a coarse sieve. Season, boil up, skim, and stir in parsley and butter. Heat the milk, pour upon the beaten eggs, and add to the soup, stirring in well. Let it _almost_ boil, and take from the fire. Pour out, and serve at once.

CORNED BEEF.

Wash the beef well, put on in plenty of boiling water, and cook at least eighteen minutes to the pound, if the piece be tolerably thick. Put away the liquor for to-morrow. Dish the meat. Make a sauce as directed on Tuesday, for mutton, but substituting pickled cucumber, chopped, and a very little pickled onion, for the capers. Serve in a boat.

MASHED TURNIPS.

At this season the yellow turnips are best. Put on, when you have pared and quartered them, in cold water, salted, and cook tender. Mash, and press out the water; stir in a good piece of butter; pepper and salt to taste, and dish very hot.

SCALLOPED CAULIFLOWER.

The cauliflowers in market now are less nice than those to be had earlier, or later in the year. Still, you can get them, now and then. Boil, tied in a net, in hot water. Clip into neat clusters, and set, stems downward, in a buttered bake-dish. Beat up a cupful of bread-crumbs to a soft paste with two tablespoonfuls of melted butter, and four of milk. Season with pepper and salt, and whip in a raw egg. Butter, salt, and pepper the cauliflower, and pour the mixture over it. Cover closely, and bake ten minutes, or until very hot, in a brisk oven; then brown lightly and rapidly.

FRIED POTATOES.

Wash, pare, and slice round, very thin. Leave in cold water one hour; wipe, by spreading upon one towel, and pressing another upon it, and fry, not too many at a time, in boiling lard, salted. Cook quickly, take out with a wire spoon, and shake in a hot colander. Serve in a deep dish lined with a hot napkin.

ORANGE CREAM PIE.

1 teacup of powdered sugar.
1 tablespoonful of butter.
1 egg.
1 orange—juice and half the grated peel soaked together, for half
an hour, then squeezed in a muslin bag.
1 teacupful boiling water.
1 tablespoonful of corn-starch, dissolved in cold water.
Pulp of half an orange.

Stir the corn-starch into the water; cream the butter and sugar, and pour over them the hot mixture. Cool, and add the orange and beaten egg. Take the inner rind from the half-orange, remove the seeds, and chop _very_ fine. Bake in open shells.

Third Week. Friday.
——
“Peas Porridge Hot.”
Baked Shad. Miroton of Beef.
Spinach with Eggs. Cresses.
——
Ambushed Trifle.
——

“PEAS PORRIDGE HOT.”

Soak a quart of split peas all night. In the morning put on in the liquor from your corned beef, with a sliced onion and a little celery-seed, tied in thin muslin. The liquor should be skimmed and poured cold upon the peas. Cook slowly, until these are soft enough to pulp through a colander. Rub them; if the soup be very salt, add hot water; pepper to taste; boil up, and stir in a cup of hot milk, in which have been dissolved two tablespoonfuls of corn-starch, wet up in water, and a tablespoonful of butter. Add minced parsley; simmer two minutes; have a double handful of fried bread dice in the tureen, and pour on the soup.

BAKED SHAD.

Clean, wash, and wipe a large shad. Stuff with a dressing of bread-crumbs, butter, salt, and pepper, wet with milk, and sew up carefully with fine cotton. Lay in the dripping-pan; pour over it a cupful of hot water, and bake one hour, covered, except when you are basting it with butter and water. Put into a hot dish, and keep warm, while you add to the gravy a teaspoonful of anchovy sauce, the juice of a lemon, a tablespoonful of browned flour, wet up with cold water, and pepper. Boil up well, and serve in a boat. Garnish the fish with sliced lemon, and pass the cress-salad with it.

MIROTON OF BEEF.

Chop your cold corned beef fine. Have ready in a saucepan a cup of drawn butter, into which stir a teaspoonful of minced onion, the yolk of a boiled egg, pounded, and a beaten raw egg. Boil gently three minutes, and add the mince of beef. Stir until hot, but not boiling; pour into a bake-dish; spread with a cover of mashed potatoes, into which have been worked half a cup of milk and a great spoonful of butter. Brown in a good oven, and glaze with butter, when it begins to color well. Serve in the dish. It is very good.

CRESSES.

Pick over, wash, and cut into small pieces. Pile in a salad-bowl, and season with vinegar, salt, pepper, and a little sugar, mixing in well.

SPINACH WITH EGGS.

Cut the leaves from the stems, and cook twenty minutes in boiling, salted water. Drain and chop _very_ fine upon a board or chopping-tray. Return to the fire with a good spoonful of butter, a teaspoonful of sugar; salt and pepper to taste. Heat, stirring constantly and beat in the yolks of two hard-boiled eggs, rubbed to a fine powder. When well mixed, turn the spinach into a deep dish and garnish with a chain of sliced whites laid on top.

AN AMBUSHED TRIFLE.

A round, stale sponge-cake.
1 pint of milk.
1 teaspoonful of corn-starch.
1 cup of sweet jelly or jam.
3 eggs.
Vanilla flavoring.
2 tablespoonfuls of powdered sugar.
A little salt.

Cut the top carefully from the cake in one piece. Scoop out the inside of the loaf, leaving side-walls and bottom an inch thick. Coat these with the jelly. Heat the milk; beat eggs and sugar, with the cake-crumbs, and pour on the hot milk. Stir over the fire until thick, and add the corn-starch wet up with cold milk. Cook one minute and turn out. When cold, flavor and fill the cake with it. Coat the inside of the lid with jelly, and fit into its place; brush the whole cake with white of egg, sift powdered sugar over it, and set in a cool, dry place until wanted.

Third Week. Saturday.
——
Clam Soup.
Beefsteak. Scalloped Tomatoes and Corn.
Whole Bermuda Potatoes. Made Mustard.
——
Boiled Custards.
——

CLAM SOUP.

Strain the liquor from the clams, add one-third as much water, bring to a slow boil, skim and strain. Then put in the clams, chopped, with pepper and salt. Stew half an hour, and stir in two great spoonfuls of butter rolled in cracker-dust, one teaspoonful essence of celery (Colgate’s), and the juice of a lemon. Simmer ten minutes, have ready in your tureen a cup of scalding milk, slightly salted. Pour upon this the soup, stirring up well.

BEEFSTEAK.

Cook according to receipt given on Thursday of Second Week in this month. If you use the “Vertical Broiler,” manufactured by the Dover Stamping Company, 88 North Street, Boston, you will save every drop of gravy, and be spared the trouble of watching and turning the steak.—See FAMILIAR TALK, “Touching Saucepans.”

SCALLOPED TOMATOES AND CORN.

Open a can of corn; drain, and cook twenty minutes in boiling water, salted. Throw off the water; cover the bottom of a bake-dish with fine crumbs; put in a layer of corn, butter, pepper, and salt; upon this a layer of canned tomatoes; butter and pepper, and sprinkle with a little sugar. Go on in this order until the dish is full. Cover with bread-crumbs; stick bits of butter over them, and bake, covered, half an hour. Brown and serve in the dish.

WHOLE BERMUDA POTATOES.

Pick out those of uniform size; put on in boiling water, salted slightly, and cook until a fork will pierce the largest. Turn off the water; set back on the range to “dry off;” lay a napkin, heated and neatly folded, upon a dish. Pare the potatoes quickly by pulling off their skins, and heap upon the napkin.

BOILED CUSTARDS.

1 quart of milk.
Yolks of 5 eggs and the whites of two—reserving three for the
_méringue_.
6 tablespoonfuls of sugar.
2 teaspoonfuls bitter almond or vanilla flavoring.

Heat the milk; beat yolks and two whites light, and pour the milk upon them. Return to the fire and cook, stirring all the while, until the custard begins to thicken. Let it cool. Season and put into glass cups. Whip the whites to a _méringue_ with a little powdered sugar, and heap upon the top of each.

Fourth Week. Sunday.
——
Ox Head Soup.
Roast Breast of Mutton. Hominy Fritters.
Currant Jelly. Lettuce Salad.
Browned Potatoes.
——
Pine Apple Ambrosia.
——

OX HEAD SOUP.

1 ox head, well cleaned.
2 grated carrots.
2 turnips.
2 onions.
1 dozen whole allspice, and the same of whole peppers.
1 bunch sweet herbs, chopped.
Browned flour.
Pepper and salt.
1 tablespoonful Worcestershire Sauce.
1 glass of sherry.
5 quarts of water.
Small bag of celery seed.

Soak the head two hours in cold, salted water. Wash well, and put on in cold water, with the vegetables and herbs. Cover, bring slowly to a boil, and cook four hours. Then, take out the meat of the head; salt well, and set away in a cool place. Salt and pepper the soup, and set by in an earthenware crock, leaving in the bones and vegetables. Do this on Saturday.

On Sunday, take off the fat and heat the soup. Strain, first through a colander, rubbing the vegetables to a pulp, then through a sieve, back into the kettle. Cut the meat into dice and drop in; season with sauce and wine, and having let it barely boil, pour out.

There should be enough for two days. In setting aside Monday’s portion, make an equal distribution of meat and broth.

ROAST BREAST OF MUTTON.

Sew up in a thin cloth and boil ten minutes to the pound. (Take care of the broth for gravy.) When unwrapped, lay in a dripping-pan, wash well with butter, dredge with flour, and set in the oven half an hour, basting freely with its own broth, and lastly with butter. A few minutes before taking it up, strew thickly with crumbs—fine and dry—pepper these, and drop dots of butter over it. Brown, and dish. Garnish with sliced beet-root and cresses.

HOMINY FRITTERS.

2 cups cold boiled hominy—small-grained.
1 tablespoonful of sugar.
2 tablespoonfuls of cream.
2 beaten eggs.
½ teaspoonful soda dissolved in vinegar.
A little salt.

Rub the sugar and salt into the hominy; wet with the milk, and when smooth beat in the whipped eggs. Drop by the spoonful into boiling fat, and fry quickly. Drain in a hot colander. Everything depends upon beating and cooking. The soda should go in last of all the ingredients, and be whipped in hard.

BROWNED POTATOES.

Mash soft, with butter and milk; mound smoothly upon a greased plate and brown in a quick oven, glazing with butter. Slip to a hot flat dish.

LETTUCE SALAD.

Pull out the hearts and pick them apart. Heap loosely in a salad-bowl, and season, first sprinkling lightly with powdered sugar—with oil, vinegar, salt and pepper. Toss up with a silver fork; lay cold-boiled eggs, cut into sixths, lengthwise, upon the top.

PINE-APPLE AMBROSIA.

1 pine-apple, pared and cut into small squares.
1 cocoanut, pared and grated.
1 cup powdered sugar.
1 large glass good sherry or Marsala.

Put a layer of pine-apple in a glass bowl; strew with sugar, and wet with wine. Next, put a stratum of cocoanut, and sprinkle more sparsely with sugar. More pine-apple, sugar, and wine, and continue to add layers in the order given. The top coating must be of cocoanut. Eat soon, or the pine-apple will wither in the wine and become tough. Pass light cake with it.

Fourth Week. Monday.
——
Next Day Soup.
Pilau of Mutton. Green Peas.
Cheese Fondu. Sweet Pickles.
——
Farina Hasty Pudding with Sauce.
——

NEXT DAY SOUP.

Take the fat from the top of the cold soup set by on Sunday; heat it almost to the boil, and pour out. It is better for the second and third warming up. Save every drop that is left over.

PILAU OF MUTTON.

Cut your cold roast into neat strips an inch long. Make a gravy of the cracked bones and skin, hard bits, etc., and a pint of water. While it is stewing down one-half, skim the liquor in which the meat was parboiled; put it over the fire with a cup of washed rice, and cook the latter tender. When there is but one cup of gravy left upon the bones, etc., strain, season highly with pepper, salt, and nearly a teaspoonful of curry powder. Chop, also, a quarter of a pickled onion, and mix in. Roll a tablespoonful of butter in a heaping spoonful of browned flour, and when the gravy is hot stir it in; lastly, put in the mutton, and when nearly on the boil, draw aside. Drain the rice, and season well. Pile the meat upon a hot dish, and make a fence of rice about it.

GREEN PEAS.

Open a can of green peas, drain, and cook twenty minutes in boiling water, a little salt. Strain off the water; dish the peas, stir in butter, pepper, and if needed, salt.

CHEESE FONDU.

1 cup of bread-crumbs, very dry.
2 cups of fresh milk.
½ lb. of dry cheese, grated.
3 eggs.
1 tablespoonful of butter.
Pepper and salt.
A pinch of soda dissolved in boiling water, and stirred into the milk.

Soak the crumbs in the milk; beat in the eggs, butter, seasoning, and at last, the cheese. Butter a bake-dish; pour in the _fondu_; cover with crumbs, and bake in a brisk oven. Serve at once, as it soon falls.

FARINA HASTY PUDDING WITH SAUCE.

1 quart of milk.
4 tablespoonfuls of farina.
1 tablespoonful of butter.
1 teaspoonful of salt.

Heat the milk, when the farina has soaked two hours in just enough water to cover it, and has absorbed it all. Salt the milk and stir in the farina. Boil half an hour, steadily stirring now and then, from the bottom. Add the butter; and let the pudding stand in hot water three minutes after you cease to stir, before turning out into an open, deep dish. Make a good sauce of butter, sugar, and nutmeg, and eat with it.

Fourth Week. Tuesday.
——
Crust Soup.
Mock Pigeons with Mushroom Sauce. Baked Potatoes.
Cabbage Sprouts and Eggs. Mixed Pickles.
——
Bread and Raisin Pudding.
——

CRUST SOUP.

1 quart of dry crusts, the more stale the better, if sweet.
2 cups of yesterday’s soup.
2 cups of boiling water.
1 onion.
3 great spoonfuls of butter.
2 eggs.
Salt and pepper.
A little chopped parsley.

Pour the boiling water upon the crusts, which should be broken small. Set in a pot of boiling water for one hour, with a small onion minced fine, and the seasoning. Meanwhile skim the cold soup (or any good gravy) and heat to a boil. At the end of the hour, add the butter to the bread, and cover ten minutes longer. Then turn into the soup; beat up the bread and stir in the parsley. Simmer fifteen minutes, beat the eggs light, pour a little of the soup upon them to heat them before stirring them well into the contents of the kettle. Take from the fire at once, lest the eggs should curdle.

MOCK PIGEONS WITH MUSHROOM SAUCE.

2 fillets of veal.
Force-meat of crumbs and chopped salt pork, well seasoned.
½ cup of mushrooms and a little minced onion.
1 sweetbread.
12 oysters.
Pepper and salt.

The fillets must be boneless. Sprinkle with pepper and spread with force-meat. Roll up closely and wind with packthread. Put into a dripping-pan with enough water to half cover them. Invert a pan over them, and bake from forty-five minutes to one hour in proportion to their size. Boil, then blanch the sweetbread, by dropping it into cold water. Cut into dice, put into a cup of oyster liquor with a spoonful of butter, and simmer fifteen minutes. Baste the “pigeons” four times—twice with butter, and when tender, lay on a hot dish, clip and carefully withdraw the threads, and cover to keep warm. Add the gravy from the dripping-pan to the sweetbread; thicken with browned flour; boil once; put in the oysters and mushrooms, chopped, and stew five minutes quite fast. Pour a few large spoonfuls, taking up the thickest part, over the “pigeons;” send the rest up in a sauce-boat. You will find this a very nice dish.

BAKED POTATOES.

Parboil and skin while hot. Lay in a pan and anoint with beef-dripping or butter, from time to time, as they brown. Drain off the grease and serve hot, after peppering and salting.

CABBAGE SPROUTS AND EGGS.

Boil the sprouts tender, drain well, pepper and salt. Lay some slices of crustless toast in a deep dish, and soak in boiling water; drain them and cover with a soft omelette made of three or four eggs, “stirred” up in a pan in which has been heated a spoonful of butter. Lay the sprouts upon this, butter well and eat hot.

BREAD AND RAISIN PUDDING.

1 quart of milk.
1 loaf of stale _light_ bread, pared and sliced.
Butter to spread the bread.
4 eggs.
½ cup of sugar.
¾ lb. of raisins, seeded and cut into thirds.

Butter the bread. Make a raw custard of eggs, sugar and milk. Line the bottom of a buttered dish with the bread. Wet with custard; strew with raisins, and lay in more bread. Go on in this order until the dish is full. The uppermost layer should be of bread, well buttered and soaked. Cover the dish; set in boiling water, and bake one hour, keeping the water at a fast boil. Turn out carefully, and pour hot, sweet sauce over it. The liquor from brandied peaches, made hot, with a little butter, makes a delicious sauce for it.

Fourth Week. Wednesday.
——
Bouillon of Beef.
Tomato Omelette with Cheese. Savory Rice Pudding.
——
Corn-Starch Custard Pie.
——

BOUILLON OF BEEF.

6 lbs. of brisket or round of beef, all in one piece.
4 turnips.
3 carrots.
2 Bermuda onions.
A good handful of cabbage sprouts.
2 tablespoonfuls of butter, cut up in flour.
Bunch of sweet herbs.
1 teaspoonful of made mustard.
4 quarts of water.

Cover the beef with the water and cook slowly one hour. Meanwhile, cut the vegetables into long strips—not too thin—leaving the sprouts whole. Cook them all in boiling, salted water twenty minutes. Throw this water away, and at the end of the hour, skim the soup well, and put in the vegetables. Stew all very slowly two hours longer. There must never be a fast boil. Take out the beef; put into a dripping-pan; pour a cup of the soup (strained), seasoned well with pepper, salt, and mustard, over it; dredge thickly with flour and brown in a good oven, basting every few minutes. Take half the vegetables from the pot and keep hot. Rub the rest through a colander; season the soup and pulp, add the herbs and return to the saucepan; boil sharply five minutes; stir in butter and flour; simmer five minutes, and the soup is ready for the tureen. Season the reserved vegetables, and having dished your beef, lay them, very hot, around it. Serve with each slice.

TOMATO OMELETTE WITH CHEESE.

Break six eggs into a bowl and give about a dozen whirls of the beater, just enough to mingle whites and yolks well. Have ready in a frying-pan a great spoonful of butter. When it begins to hiss, run it quickly over the bottom of the pan, and pour in your eggs. Take the handle of the pan in one hand, a cake-turner in the other, and with the latter, loosen all around the edges of the omelette, while with the other hand you shake the pan to keep the eggs free from the bottom. In about three minutes, the eggs should be “set,” but still soft. Let an assistant lay upon one-half of the omelette five or six slices of canned tomatoes. Fold the other half over this by a dexterous motion of the turner; invert a hot dish upon the pan; upset the latter, and dish the omelette. Have at hand a handful of _dry_ cheese, grated and seasoned with pepper and salt. Strew the omelette thickly, singe with a red-hot shovel held very close to the cheese, and serve hot.

N. B.—Teach your cook the art of omelette-making at breakfasts, and she will soon be capable of managing this very delightful _entrée_.

SAVORY RICE PUDDING.

1 teacupful of raw rice.
1 small onion.
1 cup of weak broth. Steal from your soup before the vegetables
go in, if you have no other.
1 cup of milk.
1 egg.
Nearly a cupful of chopped cold meat—left from yesterday.
Pepper and salt.

Boil the rice with the whole onion in the broth, adding more, or hot water, as it swells. When the rice is soft and has soaked up the broth, remove the onion and add a raw custard made of the milk, egg, pepper, and salt. Mix well with the meat, put into a greased mould, set in a pan of boiling water, and bake, covered, until firm. Keep the water boiling hard. About forty-five minutes should be ample time. Turn out and eat with meat.

CORN-STARCH CUSTARD PIE.

6 eggs.
3 pints of milk.
6 tablespoonfuls of white sugar.
2 tablespoonfuls of corn-starch.
2 teaspoonfuls essence bitter almonds.

Boil the milk, stir in the corn-starch wet with milk. Boil one minute and cool. When cold, beat in the sugar, the yolks and _two_ whites. Flavor, and bake in open shells of paste. When the custard is “set,” draw to the door of the oven, and cover with a _méringue_ made of the reserved whites whipped stiff with two tablespoonfuls of white sugar and a teaspoonful of vanilla. Do this quickly and close the oven until the whites begin to color. Eat cold.

Fourth Week. Thursday.
——
Frugal Soup.
Calf’s Liver à l’Anglaise. Potato Croquettes.
Spinach and Eggs. Cucumber Pickles.
——
Cocoanut Pudding.
——

FRUGAL SOUP.

3 lbs. of bones.
½ lb. of liver.
1 slice of corned ham.
2 turnips.
2 carrots.
Nearly a can of tomatoes.
½ cup of sago.
Pepper and salt.
Sweet herbs.
3 quarts cold water.

Break the bones, chop the meat, vegetables, and herbs, and cook slowly three hours in the water. Soak the sago, all this time, in a little cold water. Strain the soup, rubbing the vegetables and liver through the colander; season, boil, and skim; put in the sago and cook half an hour more.

CALF’S LIVER À L’ANGLAISE.

2 lbs. liver—sliced.
½ lb. fat salt pork.
2 tablespoonfuls of butter.
1 small onion, minced fine.
1 teaspoonful chopped parsley.
Pepper and browned flour.

Melt, but not heat the butter in a saucepan; lay in the liver, then the pork, next the minced parsley and onion, with a little salt and pepper. Cover closely, and set where it will heat very slowly _without boiling_, for one hour and a half. Then increase the heat gradually until the gravy begins to bubble. Remove from the fire; cover the liver in a hot water dish, thicken the gravy in the saucepan and pour over it when it has boiled one minute. Please obey these directions implicitly.

POTATO CROQUETTES.

2 cups cold mashed potato, free from lumps.
2 beaten eggs.
1 tablespoonful melted butter.
Salt and pepper to taste.
1 raw egg, beaten alone.
Cracker-crumbs.

Mix soft, as for hominy croquettes, roll in egg and cracker, and fry in hot lard or dripping. You can make into long rolls, or round balls. Drain, and serve hot.

SPINACH AND EGGS.

Pick the leaves from the stems; cook twenty minutes in plenty of boiling, salted water; drain, chop fine, return to the fire with butter, a little sugar, pepper, and salt. Beat until nearly dry, and very smooth; mould in a hot, oblong pan; turn out and garnish with sliced egg.

COCOANUT PUDDING.

1 large cup bread-crumbs.
1 cocoanut, pared and grated.
1 tablespoonful corn-starch, wet with cold water.
½ cup of butter.
1 cup of sugar.
2 cups of milk.
5 eggs.
Nutmeg and rose-water to taste.

Soak the crumbs in the milk; cream butter and sugar, and beat in the yolks, then add to the soaked crumbs. Stir in corn-starch, beaten whites and flavoring—at last, cocoanut. Beat hard and bake forty-five minutes in a buttered pudding-dish. Eat cold.

Fourth Week. Friday.
——
Onion Soup.
Salmon Croquettes. Mutton Chops, Broiled.
Parsnip Fritters. Squeezed Potatoes.
Almond Blanc-Mange.
——
White Cake.
——

ONION SOUP.

3 sliced onions.
2 tablespoonfuls of butter, and twice as much flour.
1 quart of milk.
2 cups of boiling water.
1 cup of mashed potato.
Pepper, salt, and fried bread.
1 teaspoonful essence of celery.
Soda.

Fry the onions in the butter; strain the latter; return to the frying-pan and stir in the flour gradually, cooking until it is a light bistre color. Thin with boiling water, added slowly. Meanwhile, heat the milk, and work by degrees, into the potato. Then strain through a colander into a saucepan; add a piece of soda the size of a pea, and set within a pot of boiling water. Cook ten minutes, season well, put in the flour and butter. Then mince the onions _very_ fine, and stir in. Let all stand in the hot water ten minutes; add celery. Flavor and pour upon the fried bread, cut into dice and put into the tureen.

SALMON CROQUETTES.

1 can preserved salmon.
2 raw eggs.
1 tablespoonful of butter.
Yolks of 2 hard boiled eggs.
1 teaspoonful anchovy sauce.
Juice of ½ lemon.
Season with salt, pepper, a little mace and nutmeg.
½ cup crumbs.

Mince the fish; work in the butter, slightly warmed; the _powdered_ yolks, the seasoning, raw eggs—finally, the crumbs. Make into rolls; shape well by rolling in a dish covered thickly with flour. Fry quickly in sweet lard. Roll each, when done, for one instant, upon a clean cloth to take off the grease. Lay a square of treble tissue-paper, red, green, and white, upon a dish (fringing the ends), and serve.

MUTTON CHOPS—BROILED.

If you have not a “vertical broiler,” lay upon a hot gridiron—greased—and turn often over a clear fire, until nicely browned. Butter, salt, and pepper each one as it is taken from the fire.

SQUEEZED POTATOES.

Put old potatoes on in cold water, and cook soft. Skin rapidly, set over the fire for one minute; then, twist a soft, dry cloth around each one until you feel it crush but not quite break open. Lay each, as you squeeze it, within a hot dish, lined with a napkin. When all are in, turn the four corners of the napkin over the top to keep in the heat.

PARSNIP FRITTERS.

Boil, scrape, and mash; take out fibres and hard bits. Work into four large parsnips one beaten egg, a teaspoonful of flour, with pepper and salt. Make into small, round cakes, roll in flour and fry in good dripping. Drain well, and serve hot.

ALMOND BLANC-MANGE.

1 quart of milk.
1 oz. Cooper’s gelatine.
¼ lb. of almonds, blanched and pounded, with 1 tablespoonful of
rose-water to prevent oiling.
¾ cup of sugar.

Soak the gelatine one hour in a cup of the milk. Heat the rest; add the almond-paste, and stir over the fire three minutes, then put in the sugar and gelatine, and stir five minutes more. Strain through thin muslin, pressing hard. When cool, pour into a wet mould, and set upon ice, or in cold water to form. Eat with cream and sugar. It is a good plan to blanch the almonds the day before they are to be pounded.

WHITE CAKE.

Please see “COMMON SENSE IN THE HOUSEHOLD” Series No. 1., “General Receipts,” page 334.

Fourth Week. Saturday.
——
Okra and Tomato Soup.
Beef’s Heart. Ramakins.
Potatoes à la Crème. Lima Beans.
——
Newark Pudding.
——

OKRA AND TOMATO SOUP.

6 lbs. of coarse beef.
2 lbs. of mutton bones.
Two slices of corned ham, or a ham bone, or bones of salt pork.
1 can okra and tomatoes.
6 quarts of cold water.
Large bunch of sweet herbs.
Pepper and salt.
1 lump of white sugar.

Crack the bones into splinters. Cut the meat into strips and mince the herbs. Put on in the water, and cook _slowly_, four hours. Strain off the liquor, and divide into two portions. Season the meat, bones, etc., highly, put them back into that portion designed for Sunday, and set aside in a cold place. Pour the stock for to-day’s soup back into the pot; season with salt and pepper; boil up, and skim, and add the okra, tomatoes, and sugar. Simmer half an hour, boil briskly one minute. Skim and serve.

BEEF’S HEART.

Choose a fine, fresh one. Wash well, lay in salt and water an hour, then wipe dry. Stuff with a force-meat of crumbs, minced salt pork, pepper, salt, and chopped parsley with a little onion. Pack this in tightly, sew the heart up in coarse net, fitted well to it, and stew one hour and a half in weak broth. (A cupful can be taken from your soup stock.) At the end of this time, take it out, undo the cloth, and return the heart to the saucepan with enough gravy to half cover it. Add to this a tablespoonful of butter cut up in as much flour; pepper and salt to taste. Cover closely, and simmer half an hour, turning the heart as it browns. Dish it; add the juice of half a lemon to the gravy, boil once, and pour over the heart.

RAMAKINS.

Rounds of lightly toasted bread.
3 tablespoonfuls grated cheese.
2 eggs, beaten light.
1 tablespoonful melted butter.
1 teaspoonful anchovy sauce.
1 teaspoonful of flour, wet with cream.
A little salt and cayenne.

Beat eggs, butter, and seasoning together; then the cheese, lastly, the flour. Work all to a cream; spread thickly upon the bread, and brown lightly.

POTATOES À LA CRÈME.

Heat a cupful of milk; stir in a heaping tablespoonful of butter cut up in as much flour. Stir until smooth and thick; pepper and salt, and add two cupfuls of cold boiled potatoes, sliced, and a little very finely chopped parsley. Shake over the fire until the potatoes are hot all through, and pour into a deep dish.

LIMA BEANS.

Open the can an hour before it is needed, and empty into a bowl. When ready for the beans drain off the liquor and cook in boiling water twenty-five minutes. Drain, butter, pepper and salt, and serve.

NEWARK PUDDING.

1 quart of milk.
5 eggs.
1 large cup fine crumbs.
2 tablespoonfuls of rice-flour.
½ lb. of raisins cut in two, seeded and dredged with flour.
2 teaspoonfuls vanilla, or other extract. (If possible get your
flavoring extracts from COLGATE & CO., 53 AND 55 JOHN
STREET, NEW YORK. They are good from first _to last_,
which is more than I can say for many others.)
2 tablespoonfuls of melted butter.
½ teaspoonful of soda.

Beat the yolks. Add the crumbs soaked in a pint of the milk. Stir in the rice-flour, wet in cold milk; the reserved pint of milk; the butter, flavoring, the fruit, and lastly, the whisked whites. Bake one hour in a well-greased mould; turn out and eat with hard sauce.

MAY.

First Week. Sunday.
——
Clear Soup.
Roast Lamb. Green Peas.
Mint Sauce. Asparagus on Toast.
Potato Eggs.
——
Rice and Tapioca Pudding.
——

CLEAR SOUP.

Take _all_ the fat from the stock reserved for to-day, and pour the liquid carefully off from the meat and bones, not disturbing the sediment in the bottom. (_Mem._ Take out a little of the meat, beef, and ham, for a purpose of which we shall speak presently—add boiling water—about a quart—to the rest of the residuum with more seasoning, and the remains of your okra and tomato soup. Stew gently half an hour, and set aside in a cool place for to-morrow. The growing heat of the weather makes this a necessary precaution.) Put then the clear stock upon the fire with a whole onion, and simmer thirty minutes. Skim well, take out the onion, and stir in two tablespoonfuls of gelatine previously soaked one hour in cold water, with a tablespoonful (scant) of Harvey’s sauce. Cook five minutes and pour out.

ROAST LAMB.

Lay in the dripping-pan; dash a cupful of boiling water over it and roast in a good oven, allowing about ten minutes—not more—to the pound. Baste often and freely, and after half an hour, cover with a sheet of thick paper. Five minutes before taking it up, remove this, dredge with flour, and as this browns, bring to a froth with butter. Do not send the gravy to table if you use mint sauce.

MINT SAUCE.

2 tablespoonfuls green mint, chopped very fine.
1 tablespoonful white sugar.
About half a cupful best cider vinegar.

Put sugar and vinegar into a sauce-boat and stir in the mint. Let it stand fifteen minutes before serving.

GREEN PEAS.

I have purposely avoided too early an introduction of green vegetables and other spring dainties, through fear that the high prices demanded for them might make this part of my work useless for housekeepers of moderate means. By the first of May, however, even our Northern markets should be well supplied at reasonable rates with many delightful esculents which are, as yet, brought only from the South.

Shell the peas and wash well in cold water. Cook in boiling water—salted—for twenty-five minutes. A lump of sugar will be an addition, and a pleasant one, to market peas. Drain well, stir in a great lump of butter, and pepper and salt. Serve hot.

ASPARAGUS UPON TOAST.

Cut the stalks of equal length, rejecting the woody portions and scraping the whiter parts retained. Tie in a bunch with soft tape, and cook _about_ thirty minutes, if of fair size. Have ready six or eight slices of crustless bread, nicely toasted. Dip in the asparagus-liquor, butter well and lay upon a very hot dish. Drain the asparagus, untie, and arrange upon the toast, peppering and buttering to taste.

POTATO EGGS.

2 cups mashed potato.
½ cup minced meat.
2 beaten eggs.
2 tablespoonfuls hot milk.
1 tablespoonful melted butter.
3 tablespoonfuls gravy.
Pepper, salt, and dripping.

Work the potato _smooth_ with butter, milk, gravy, and beaten eggs. Put into a saucepan, and stir over the fire until smoking hot. Stir in the meat; let it get cool enough to handle. Flour your hands and make the mixture into egg-shaped balls. Roll in flour and fry in hot dripping. Pile upon a hot dish.

RICE AND TAPIOCA PUDDING.

½ cup rice.
½ cup tapioca.
¾ cup sugar.
3 pints of milk.
Cinnamon to taste.

Soak the tapioca three hours in half of the milk. Wash the rice in three waters and soak in the rest of the milk the same length of time. Put them together, stir in the sugar by degrees, until all is melted; season with cinnamon and a pinch of salt; mix up well, and bake in a slow oven two hours. Make it on Saturday, and eat cold on Sunday with sugar and cream.

First Week. Monday.
——
Yesterday’s Soup.
Cold Lamb. Savory Macaroni.
Sea Kale. Potato Salad.
——
Coffee and Sister Mag’s Cake.
——

YESTERDAY’S SOUP.

Strain the stock heated up on Sunday with the remains of Saturday’s soup. Boil four tablespoonfuls of rice in a little water until soft. Add, with the water, to the soup, with additional seasoning, if necessary, and heat almost to a boil. If it has been kept in a cool place you will find it very good. Never throw away a spoonful of any soup. It will come into use if you can keep it from spoiling.

COLD LAMB.

Trim neatly, garnish with curled parsley, and pass mixed pickles with it. Few methods of preparing lamb for the table by warming over can compare with the easier way of setting it on cold, if it has been nicely roasted at first.

SAVORY MACARONI.

To a cup of yesterday’s soup add another of boiling water. Let them boil once; skim and put in half a pound of macaroni broken into inch lengths. While it is cooking tender, boil one sweetbread fifteen minutes; throw into cold water and let it cool, then cut into small dice. When the macaroni is tender, but not broken, mix with it a custard made of two eggs, one large cup of milk, and a little salt. Stir into the macaroni a very little minced onion, pepper to taste; add the chopped sweetbread; put into a greased mould, with a cover; put this into a dripping-pan full of boiling water and cook in a good oven a little over one hour. Turn out upon a hot dish, and send around grated cheese with it.

SEA-KALE.

Pick over carefully, tie up in bunches, and lay for half an hour in cold water. Put into salted boiling water and cook twenty-five minutes. Put buttered toast in the bottom of a deep dish; clip the threads binding the kale, and lay it upon the toast. Pepper, and pour a cupful of drawn butter over it.

POTATO SALAD.

Slice cold boiled potatoes, and put a layer in a salad dish. Cover with thin slices of hard boiled egg, and strew with bits of pickled onion. When the dish is full pour over them a dressing made in the proportion of one tablespoonful of vinegar to three of salad oil; one spoonful of salt to half as much pepper, and the same quantity of made mustard. Beat up well before pouring over the salad. Let all stand ten minutes—or more—before serving.

COFFEE AND SISTER MAG’S CAKE.

Let your coffee be strong and hot, with plenty of boiling milk.

For receipt for the delightful cake mentioned please see “COMMON SENSE IN THE HOUSEHOLD” Series No. 1, “General Receipts,” page 321. Friday is a good cake-baking day.

First Week. Tuesday.
——
Veal and Tapioca Broth.
Baked Beefsteak. Young Onions Stewed.
Potatoes Baked with Steak. Lettuce Salad.
——
Oatmeal Pudding with Cream.
——

VEAL AND TAPIOCA BROTH.

3 lbs. scrag of veal, well broken, and the meat cut small.
1 onion.
1 turnip.
½ cup of pearl tapioca.
2 blades of mace.
2 teaspoonfuls essence of celery.
Pepper and salt.
3 quarts of cold water.

Put meat, bones, and sliced vegetables on in the water, and cook slowly three hours. Soak the tapioca during this time in a very little milk. Strain the soup, rubbing the vegetables through the colander; cool to throw up the fat. Skim and season. When hot again put in the tapioca and stir until it melts. Simmer half an hour, add the celery essence and serve.

BAKED BEEFSTEAK.

Take the bone from a large sirloin steak; flatten it with the side of a hatchet, wash over the upper side with a beaten egg and spread thickly with a force-meat of crumbs, minced ham, and any other cold meat you may have, a teaspoonful of minced onion, a pinch of grated lemon peel, with pepper and salt, a beaten egg and three tablespoonfuls of cream or milk. Work these into a paste before spreading. Roll the steak upon them, binding closely with soft pack-thread. Have ready some dripping in a frying-pan, and cook the steak five minutes in this, turning as it browns. Now lay it in a dripping-pan with a cupful of boiling water; cover and bake forty minutes, basting and turning often. When done, remove the strings; lay the beef upon a hot dish; thicken the gravy with browned flour, boil up and pour half over it—the rest into a boat.

YOUNG ONIONS STEWED.

Skin, wash well, and cook in boiling water, salted, until half-done—say fifteen minutes. Then, throw off nearly all the water and replenish with scalding milk. Cook tender in this, stir in pepper, salt, a great spoonful of butter cut up in a teaspoonful of flour. Simmer three minutes, and pour out.

POTATOES BAKED WITH STEAK.

Parboil, skin, and quarter some large potatoes. About ten minutes before you take up your steak, lay the potatoes around it in the pan, and brown in the hot gravy. Serve in the dish with the meat, laid on the outer edge.

LETTUCE SALAD.