The American Frugal Housewife Part 7

Six or seven pounds of veal will roast in an hour and a half.

Fried veal is better for being dipped in white of egg, and rolled in nicely pounded crumbs of bread, before it is cooked. One egg is enough for a common dinner.

CALF'S HEAD.

Calf's head should be cleansed with very great care; particularly the lights. The head, the heart, and the lights should boil full two hours; the liver should be boiled only one hour. It is better to leave the wind-pipe on, for if it hangs out of the pot while the head is cooking, all the froth will escape through it. The brains, after being thoroughly washed, should be put in a little bag; with one pounded cracker, or as much crumbled bread, seasoned with sifted sage, and tied up and boiled one hour. After the brains are boiled, they should be well broken up with a knife, and peppered, salted, and b.u.t.tered.

They should be put upon the table in a bowl by themselves. Boiling water, thickened with flour and water, with b.u.t.ter melted in it, is the proper sauce; some people love vinegar and pepper mixed with the melted b.u.t.ter; but all are not fond of it; and it is easy for each one to add it for themselves.

BEEF.

Beef soup should be stewed four hours over a slow fire. Just water enough to keep the meat covered. If you have any bones left of roast meat, &c. it is a good plan to boil them with the meat, and take them out half an hour before the soup is done. A pint of flour and water, with salt, pepper, twelve or sixteen onions, should be put in twenty minutes before the soup is done. Be careful and not throw in salt and pepper too plentifully; it is easy to add to it, and not easy to diminish. A lemon, cut up and put in half an hour before it is done, adds to the flavor. If you have tomato catsup in the house, a cupful will make soup rich. Some people put in crackers; some thin slices of crust, made nearly as short as common shortcake; and some stir up two or three eggs with milk and flour, and drop it in with a spoon.

A quarter of an hour to each pound of beef is considered a good rule for roasting; but this is too much when the bone is large, and the meal thin. Six pounds of the rump should roast six quarters of an hour; but bony pieces less. It should be done before a quick fire.

The quicker beef-steak can be broiled the better. Seasoned after it is taken from the gridiron.

ALAMODE BEEF.

Tie up a round of beef so as to keep it in shape; make a stuffing of grated bread, suet, sweet herbs, quarter of an ounce of nutmeg, a few cloves pounded, yolk of an egg. Cut holes in the beef, and put in the stuffing, leaving about half the stuffing to be made into b.a.l.l.s. Tie the beef up in a cloth, just cover it with water, let it boil an hour and a half; then turn it, and let it boil an hour and a half more; then turn out the liquor, and put some skewers across the bottom of the pot, and lay the beef upon it, to brown; turn it that it may brown on both sides. Put a pint of claret, and some allspice and cloves, into the liquor, and boil some b.a.l.l.s made of the stuffing in it.

MUTTON AND LAMB.

Six or seven pounds of mutton will roast in an hour and a half. Lamb one hour. Mutton is apt to taste strong; this may be helped by soaking the meat in a little salt and water, for an hour before cooking.

However, unless meat is very sweet, it is best to corn it, and boil it.

Fresh meat should never be put in to cook till the water boils; and it should be boiled in as little water as possible; otherwise the flavor is injured. Mutton enough for a family of five or six should boil an hour and a half. A leg of lamb should boil an hour, or little more than an hour, perhaps. Put a little thickening into boiling water; strain it nicely; and put sweet b.u.t.ter in it for sauce. If your family like broth, throw in some clear rice when you put in the meat. The rice should be in proportion to the quant.i.ty of broth you mean to make. A large table spoonful is enough for three pints of water.

Seasoned with a very little pepper and salt. Summer-savory, or sage, rubbed through a sieve, thrown in.

PORK.

Fresh pork should be cooked more than any other meat. A thick shoulder piece should be roasted full two hours and a half; and other pieces less in proportion. The slight sickness occasioned by eating roasted pork may be prevented by soaking it in salt and water the night before you cook it. If called to prepare it on short notice, it will answer to baste it with weak brine while roasting; and then turn the brine off, and throw it away.

ROAST PIG.

Strew fine salt over it an hour before it is put down. It should not be cut entirely open; fill it up plump with thick slices of b.u.t.tered bread, salt, sweet-marjoram and sage. Spit it with the head next the point of the spit; take off the joints of the leg, and boil them with the liver, with a little whole pepper, allspice, and salt, for gravy sauce. The upper part of the legs must be braced down with skewers.

Shake on flour. Put a little water in the dripping-pan, and stir it often. When the eyes drop out, the pig is half done. When it is nearly done, baste it with b.u.t.ter. Cut off the head, split it open between the eyes. Take out the brains, and chop them fine with the liver and some sweet-marjoram and sage; put this into melted b.u.t.ter, and when it has boiled a few minutes, add it to the gravy in the dripping-pan.

When your pig is cut open, lay it with the back to the edge of the dish; half a head to be placed at each end. A good sized pig needs to be roasted three hours.

SAUSAGES.

Three tea-spoons of powdered sage, one and a half of salt, and one of pepper, to a pound of meat, is good seasoning for sausages.

MINCE MEAT.

There is a great difference in preparing mince meat. Some make it a coa.r.s.e, unsavory dish; and others make it nice and palatable. No economical house-keeper will despise it; for broken bits of meat and vegetables cannot so well be disposed of in any other way. If you wish to have it nice, mash your vegetables fine, and chop your meat very fine. Warm it with what remains of sweet gravy, or roast-meat drippings, you may happen to have. Two or three apples, pared, cored, sliced, and fried, to mix with it, is an improvement. Some like a little sifted sage sprinkled in.

It is generally considered nicer to chop your meat fine, warm it in gravy, season it, and lay it upon a large slice of toasted bread to be brought upon the table without being mixed with potatoes; but if you have cold vegetables, use them.

BEANS AND PEAS.

Baked beans are a very simple dish, yet few cook them well. They should be put in cold water, and hung over the fire, the night before they are baked. In the morning, they should be put in a colander, and rinsed two or three times; then again placed in a kettle, with the pork you intend to bake, covered with water, and kept scalding hot, an hour or more. A pound of pork is quite enough for a quart of beans, and that is a large dinner for a common family. The rind of the pork should be slashed. Pieces of pork alternately fat and lean, are the most suitable; the cheeks are the best. A little pepper sprinkled among the beans, when they are placed in the bean-pot, will render them less unhealthy. They should be just covered with water, when put into the oven; and the pork should be sunk a little below the surface of the beans. Bake three or four hours.

Stewed beans are prepared in the same way. The only difference is, they are not taken out of the scalding water, but are allowed to stew in more water, with a piece of pork and a little pepper, three hours or more.

Dried peas need not be soaked over night. They should be stewed slowly four or five hours in considerable water, with a piece of pork. The older beans and peas are, the longer they should cook. Indeed, this is the case with all vegetables.

SOUSE.

Pigs' feet, ears, &c., should be cleaned after being soaked in water not very hot; the hoofs will then come off easily with a sharp knife; the hard, rough places should be cut off; they should be thoroughly singed, and then boiled as much as four or five hours, until they are too tender to be taken out with a fork. When taken from the boiling water, it should be put into cold water. After it is packed down tight, boil the jelly-like liquor in which it was cooked with an equal quant.i.ty of vinegar; salt as you think fit, and cloves, allspice, and cinnamon, at the rate of a quarter of a pound to one hundred weight: to be poured on scalding hot.

TRIPE.

Tripe should be kept in cold water, or it will become too dry for cooking. The water in which it is kept should be changed more or less frequently, according to the warmth of the weather. Broiled like a steak, b.u.t.tered, peppered, &c. Some people like it prepared like souse.

GRAVY.

Most people put a half a pint of flour and water into their tin-kitchen, when they set meat down to roast. This does very well; but gravy is better flavored, and looks darker, to shake flour and salt upon the meat; let it brown thoroughly, put flour and salt on again, and then baste the meat with about half a pint of hot water (or more, according to the gravy you want.) When the meat is about done, pour these drippings into a skillet, and let it boil. If it is not thick enough, shake in a little flour; but be sure to let it boil, and be well stirred, after the flour is in. If you fear it will be too greasy, take off a cupful of the fat before you boil. The fat of beef, pork, turkeys and geese is as good for shortening as lard. Salt gravy to your taste. If you are very particular about dark gravies, keep your dredging-box full of scorched flour for that purpose.

POULTRY.

There are various ways of deciding about the age of poultry.

If the bottom of the breast bone, which extends down between the legs, is soft, and gives easily, it is a sign of youth; if stiff, the poultry is old.

If young, the legs are lighter, and the feet do not look so hard, stiff, and worn.

There is more deception in geese than in any other kind of poultry.

The above remarks are applied to them; but there are other signs more infallible. In a young goose, the cavity under the wings is very tender; it is a bad sign if you cannot, with very little trouble, push your finger directly into the flesh. There is another means by which you may decide whether a goose be tender, if it be frozen or not.

Pa.s.s the head of a pin along the breast, or sides, and if the goose be young, the skin will rip, like fine paper under a knife.

Something may be judged concerning the age of a goose by the thickness of the web between the toes. When young, this is tender and transparent; it grows coa.r.s.er and harder with time.

In broiling chickens, it is difficult to do the inside of the thickest pieces without scorching the outside. It is a good plan to parboil them about ten minutes in a spider or skillet, covered close to keep the steam in; then put them upon the gridiron, broil and b.u.t.ter. It is a good plan to cover them with a plate, while on the gridiron.

They may be basted with a very little of the water in which they were broiled; and if you have company who like melted b.u.t.ter to pour upon the chicken, the remainder of the liquor will be good use for that purpose.