Chapter VIII: Letter V (2)

_For an excellent Yorkshire pudding,_ take six eggs, six heaped table-spoonfuls of flour, and one tea-spoonful of salt. Beat the eggs well, strain them, and mix them with the flour, and then add gradually about a pint of milk, so as to make the whole into a rather thin batter. Warm the pan, and rub it with dripping or butter before the batter is poured into it, and let the batter be about an inch thick. When the pudding is browned on one side cut it into quarters, or eight pieces, and turn them to brown the other. In some places the pudding is made very thin, and not turned; and sometimes currants are added. A plainer pudding may be made with half a pound of flour, a tea-spoonful of salt, three eggs, and a pint of milk.

_For a Plum pudding,_ take suet, flour, currants, and stoned raisins, one pound each, the grated rind of a lemon, four eggs, a wine-glassful of brandy, and as much milk as is required to make it of a proper consistence. It should be boiled eight or nine hours in either a cloth or a mould, and served with wine sauce.

_Sir Joseph Brookes's Plum pudding._ "Take the crumb of a twopenny loaf, six ounces of suet, two apples grated, three ounces of sugar, the rind of a lemon grated, a little candied orange, half a pound of currants, two table-spoonfuls of flour, the yolks of four eggs, half a nutmeg, a little ginger, and three table-spoonfuls of brandy. Mix all well together, and boil two hours. Eight ounces of apple or gooseberry pulp, with five ounces of sugar, may be substituted for the suet."

_Mr. Sopwith's Victoria pudding._ "Take half a pound of flour, half a pound of currants, a quarter of a pound of suet shred very fine, a quarter of a pound of moist sugar, half a pound of mashed potatoes, a quarter of a pound of carrots boiled and beaten smooth, and one ounce of lemon-peel. Mix all well together the night before the pudding is wanted, and boil it four hours." Another similar pudding is made as follows:--"Take of flour, suet chopped fine, currants, raisins, and grated carrot, half a pound of each; mix the ingredients well together, without any liquid, and boil five hours. A little grated lemon-peel may be added, and the pudding should be served with sweet sauce poured over it."

I shall now give you a few miscellaneous receipts of various kinds, which I know to be good.

_A Charlotte de pommes_ is a French apple pudding, made by lining a mould or dish with thin slices of stale bread that have been dipped in clarified butter. The middle is then filled with apples, stewed as if for sauce; and a piece of bread being laid on the top, the charlotte is baked with fire above and below.

_A French Apple pudding_ is made by baking or stewing some apples with sugar till they become a sort of marmalade. A custard is then made of half a pound of sweet almonds, blanched and pounded smooth, with an ounce of bitter ones, half a pint of cream, the yolks of two eggs, and the white of one, and poured over the apples, which should then be baked in a slow oven. As this is what is called a French apple pudding in England, it may amuse you to give you now what is called an English apple pudding in France; it is as follows:--Take twelve moderate-sized apples, pare and core them, and then put them into a saucepan with four or five table-spoonfuls of water. Stew them till they are soft, and then mix them with half a pound of powdered lump sugar, the juice of three lemons, and the grated rind of two, and the yolks of eight eggs well beaten. Mix all well together; cover a dish with a light puff paste, and pour the mixture into it. Put it into the oven, and bake it half an hour.

_A Parsnep pudding_ is made by boiling two parsneps, draining the water from them, mashing them, and adding grated bread, the yolks of two eggs, sugar and spice to the taste, and a little cream; the whole, when mixed, is poured into a light puff paste, and baked.

_Mr. Sopwith's Almond pudding._ Take five or six bitter almonds, blanched, and pound them in a mortar, with seven or eight pieces of lump sugar. Then beat up the yolks of two, and the whites of three eggs, and add them to the almonds and sugar, with two spoonfuls of cream made lukewarm. Pour the whole into a mould or basin well buttered, and steam it for twenty minutes.

To make a _Cabinet pudding_. Butter a pudding basin, and line the inside with a layer of raisins that have been previously stoned. Then cut some thin bread and butter, taking off the crust, and fill the basin with it. In another basin beat up three eggs, and add to them a pint of milk, with sugar and spice; mix all well together, and pour the whole into the first basin upon the bread and butter. Let it stand half an hour, and then tie a floured cloth over it in the usual manner, taking care that the basin is quite full. This is a most delicious pudding; and when turned out of the basin it has a singular appearance, the outside being quite covered with raisins.

For _Lemon cream_. Take a quart of lemonade made very sweet, strain it, and put it in a saucepan on the fire. Add the yolks of eight eggs beaten, and stir it always one way till it is of a proper thickness. Serve it in custard-glasses, or in a cream-dish. To make the lemonade, dissolve five ounces of sugar in two pints of boiling water, having previously, with part of the sugar, rubbed the yellow rind off a lemon; then add the juice of three lemons. Some persons put the lemon and sugar into a jug, and pour the boiling water upon them.

_Rice flummery_, which is a very nice side dish, is made by mixing a quarter of a pound of ground rice with a little cold milk, and then adding a pint of hot milk which has been boiled with a stick of cinnamon and a bit of lemon-peel; add sugar to the taste, and, if required, a few drops of essence of almonds. Boil it up, stirring it carefully, and then pour it into a mould.

_Dutch flummery_ is made by boiling two ounces of isinglass in three half-pints of water very gently for half an hour. Strain the liquor, and add a few lumps of sugar which have been rubbed on the rind of two lemons, and the juice of three lemons strained; then beat the yolks of seven eggs, and add them gradually. Put the whole over the fire, and stir it carefully, all one way, till it boils, and then pour it into a mould, or put it first into a basin to settle before putting it into the mould. The whites of the eggs beaten up to a froth will look very pretty over preserves; or they may be coloured with some kind of preserve, to form a dish.

The following is a receipt to make _Rice cream_, which was sent to me by a friend, and is said to be most excellent. Take a quarter of a pound of ground rice, one quart of cream, the peel of a lemon, and a small piece of butter. Put all into a stewpan, and place it over the fire, stirring it carefully till it boils, when it should be of about the same thickness as bread sauce. After boiling two minutes, add a spoonful of prepared isinglass, and turn it out, as you would any other cream. Send it to table with a little raspberry or currant syrup.

_Blancmange_ may be made quickly by boiling, or rather simmering, two ounces of isinglass in three pints of milk till it is dissolved, which will be in about half an hour. Then strain it into a pint and a half of cream; sweeten it, and add a little peach-water, to give the flavour of almonds. Let it boil up once, and then stand a few minutes to settle before it is put into the moulds. Use tin moulds, and set them in cold pump-water changing the water when it becomes warm, and the blancmange will very soon be quite firm.

I will now give you a few miscellaneous receipts, and then I think you will have had enough; for I know, as far as my own experience goes, I have always felt perplexed, when I have taken up a cookery book, by the great number of receipts which I found in it, and all of which appeared to me so excellent that I knew not which to choose. I have, naturally enough, supposed you to have the same feeling; and thus, in what I have written, I have endeavoured as much as possible to save you the trouble of selection, by giving you only such dishes as I either know to be good myself, or which have been given to me by friends I can fully rely upon. But I am forgetting your receipts; they are as follow:--

To make _Potato flour_ or _starch_, to serve also instead of arrow-root. Peel and wash the potatoes, cutting out all the specks; then grate or rasp them into a pan of water; stir it up well, and let it remain for about ten hours, or till all the flour is settled down. Then pour off the water with the fibrous parts of the potatoes, and put some fresh water to the flour, which, as it settles very hard, must be well stirred and strained into another pan, where let it remain till it is again settled down, and so do till the water is quite clear, which will be in four or five times mixing in fresh water; once straining is sufficient. When clear enough, break the flour up into a dish, and dry it gently before the fire; it takes a good while, as it must be thoroughly dried and broken into a fine powder. It may then be put away for use, and keeps a long time. Very small potatoes answer the purpose as well as large; and, when persons grow them, it uses up those that are too small for boiling. Ten ounces and a half of starch have been produced from very small potatoes, which weighed only seven pounds and a half before peeling them. When this flour is made on a large scale, the potatoes may be washed, and then ground in a cider-mill without paring.

_To pickle Lemons._ Grate off the rind, then lay them in salt for six days; boil vinegar with a little turmeric, and pour over them boiling; let them stand till next day; then boil in best vinegar, mace, shallots, anchovy, Cayenne pods, and cloves; boil the lemons and liquor together two minutes, and cover them close up. In a few days they will be fit for use, and are much admired with fish, cutlets, or cold meat.

_Mixture for India Pickle._ One gallon of vinegar, a quarter of a pound of garlic, half a pound of salt, a quarter of a pound of ginger, two ounces of white mustard seed, and two teaspoonfuls of Cayenne pepper; mix all well together. Any vegetables, such as small onions, cauliflowers, French beans, radish pods, and gherkins, may be laid in salt three days, dried, and put into the above mixture, and it is an excellent pickle for general use.

_Cucumber Vinegar._ Pare and slice fifteen large cucumbers, and three or four onions, a few shallots, and a clove or two of garlic. Then put a layer of slices of cucumber in a deep jar, and strew over it some pepper and salt, and a little Cayenne pepper; then a layer of onions and shallots, with pepper and salt as before; repeating alternate layers of cucumbers and onions till the jar is about half full, when three pints of vinegar is to be poured on the whole. After standing four days the vinegar is strained off, and is ready for use. It is a great improvement to cold meat.

_Excellent Walnut catsup._ Take walnuts of the size fit for pickling; cut and pound them in a marble mortar to obtain the juice. To a pint of this juice put a pound of anchovies. Boil till the anchovies are dissolved, and then strain through a piece of muslin. Then boil again, and add a quarter of an ounce of mace, half a quarter of an ounce of cloves, some whole white pepper, and seven or eight shallots, a few cloves of garlic, and a pint of white wine vinegar. Boil all together till the shallots become tender; then strain, and, when cold, bottle for use.

_Tomato sauce_ may be made by putting ripe tomatoes into an earthen jar, and setting it in an oven from which the bread has been just drawn. When the tomatoes have become soft, the skins should be taken out, and the pulp should be mixed with vinegar, a few cloves of garlic pounded, Cayenne pepper, powdered ginger, and salt, to the taste. Another way is to stew a gallon of ripe tomatoes with a pound of salt till they are reduced to a pulp; then rub them through a sieve, and add half a drachm of cochineal, and Cayenne pepper, mace, allspice, and ginger to the taste. Let the whole boil gently for twenty minutes, and when cold put into wide-mouthed bottles for use. By adding a little brandy to each bottle, this sauce will keep several years. Tomatoes are also very good, boiled gently in salt and water.

_For Tomato sauce_ (_the Spanish way_). Cut six tomatoes in half, and, having pressed out their juice, put to them a sufficient quantity of gravy, a quarter of a head of garlic, a little parsley, and a few drops of vinegar. All this must be boiled together for a short time and passed through a sieve. This sauce is a great improvement to mutton chops, ham, boiled beef, or beef steaks.

_The Spanish mode of keeping Tomatoes._ Boil some sugar, in the proportion of an ounce to each tomato, until it becomes candied. Add a tenth part of onions; and when they begin to colour put in the tomatoes, with salt, pepper, cloves, and nutmeg in suitable quantities. Boil the whole on a very quick fire, and, when of sufficient thickness, strain it through a hair-sieve. Place it on the fire again immediately, and, when it becomes solid, put it into jelly-pots. These must be covered with two plies of paper, and kept apart from the light. The onions may be omitted from the above; in which case it can be used as a sauce for a variety of dishes.

_Sirop de Cerises._ Prepare some ripe cherries by pulling out their stalks, crush them, and leave them to ferment for twenty-four hours. Press the cherries, and strain their juice through a sieve. The liquid should be quite clear, and to every seventeen ounces of juice add two pounds of lump sugar. Put the liquid into a stewpan on the fire, and let it boil once, then take off the scum, and when the liquor is nearly cold bottle it. All other syrups of fruit are made in the same manner.

I think you will now be as much tired of reading receipts for cookery as I am of writing them, and therefore I will only add two receipts for making _Pork pies_, the first of which is the mode practised in my native county, Warwickshire.

Half a pound of lard is put into a saucepan containing a quart of water. The saucepan is set on the fire, and stirred till the water boils. The boiling lard and water is then poured slowly into as much flour as will suffice to make it into a smooth and very stiff paste, and mixed with a wooden spoon, after which it must be beaten with a rolling-pin. When the ingredients are thoroughly incorporated, the paste is put into an earthen pan, covered with a linen cloth, and placed near the fire, where it is left for about half an hour. The meat is now prepared by being separated from every particle of bone, skin, and gristle, and cut into pieces about the size of dice. Care is taken to keep the fat and lean separate; but both are well seasoned with pepper and salt. A piece of the paste large enough to form one pie is then broken off the mass, and the rest is again covered up, as it cannot be worked if it is too cold, though it will not stand if it is too warm. If it breaks and crumbles, instead of being plastic, it is too cold; and if it is too soft, and falls when raised, it is either too warm or too rich. When it is of just the right heat to bear being moulded, and yet to retain whatever shape may be given to it, the piece of paste is worked with the hands on a pasteboard, into the form of a high-peaked hat, with a broad brim; and then the peak of the hat being turned downwards on the board, one of the hands is put inside the hat, and the other used to raise and smooth the sides, till the pie is gradually worked into a proper shape. The meat is then put into the crust in layers, two of lean to one of fat, and pressed as closely as possible, in order that the pie may cut firm when cold. When the pie is quite full, the lid is put on, and wet round the edge to make it adhere to the top of the walls, on which it is laid, the two being pinched together, in order to unite them more thoroughly.

In Leicestershire, and some parts of Staffordshire, a layer of raisins is often put below the meat, and, in Northamptonshire, pork pies or pasties are made with the same kind of crust as I have described, but, instead of being raised, it is rolled out, and then cut into pieces of a proper size for the top and bottom, with a long piece of the necessary width for the sides. The bottom is cemented to the walls with egg, the two parts which are to adhere being pinched together; and the crust is filled with well-seasoned meat, put in layers of fat and lean as before; the lid is then put on, and, after it has been made to adhere to the walls, it is washed over with a feather dipped in white of egg.

These pies are frequently baked in a tin, which is made so as only to support the walls, and is fastened on one side with a kind of skewer, which may be drawn out, so as to allow the tin to be removed without breaking the crust. As, however, the sides sometimes look too pale, when the pie is baked in a tin, the pie may be put into the oven again for a few minutes after the tin is removed, in order that the walls may be properly browned.

All pork pies should be baked slowly, on account of the solid nature of the meat; and a hole is generally made in the middle of the lid to let out the steam. No water should be put into the pie when it is made; but, when it is baked, a little gravy made from the bones of the pork may be poured in through the hole in the lid. Pork pies are never cut till they are cold. Those persons who dislike lard may use butter instead of it for the crust; but it is not quite so good.