Miss Parloa's New Cook Book Part 19

All pieces, unless very salt, should be plunged into boiling water, and boiled rapidly for fifteen minutes, to harden the alb.u.men that is on the outside, and thus keep in the juices. The kettle should then be put back where it will just simmer, for meat that is boiled rapidly becomes hard and stringy, while that which is kept just at the boiling point (where the water hardly bubbles) will cut tender and juicy, provided there is any juiciness in it at the beginning. White meats, like mutton and poultry, are improved in appearance by having rice boiled with them; or, a still better way is to thickly flour a piece of coa.r.s.e cotton cloth, pin the meat in it, and place in the boiling water. Meat cooked in this way will be extremely juicy.

Leg of Mutton.

Cook, as directed, in boiling water to cover. A leg that weighs eight or nine pounds will cook in one hour and a quarter if it is wanted done rare. Allow five minutes for every additional pound. Save the water for soups.

Lamb.

Cook the same as mutton. Serve with drawn b.u.t.ter.

Boiled Ham.

Wash the ham very clean, and put on with cold water to cover. Simmer gently five hours, and set the kettle aside for one or two hours. When nearly cold, take out the ham and draw off the skin. Cover with cracker crumbs and about three table-spoonfuls of sugar. Place in the oven, in a baking-pan, for thirty or forty minutes. Many people stick cloves into the fat part of the ham, and use only a few crumbs. The time given is for a ham weighing about twelve pounds; every pound over that will require fifteen minutes more. The fish kettle comes next to a regular ham kettle, and answers quite as well as both. If you have neither kettle, and no pot large enough to hold all the meat, cut off the knuckle, which will cook in about two hours. But this rather hurts the flavor and appearance of the dish.

Salt Tongue.

Soak over night, and cook from five to six hours. Throw into cold water and peel off the skin.

Fresh Tongue.

Put into boiling water to cover, with two table-spoonfuls of salt.

Cook from five to six hours. Skin the same as salt tongue.

Corned Beef.

Wash, and put into cold water, if very salt; but such a piece as one finds in town and city shops, and which the butchers corn themselves, put into boiling water. Cook very slowly for six hours. This time is for a piece weighing eight or ten pounds. When it is to be served cold let it stand for one or two hours in the water in which it was boiled.

If the beef is to be pressed, get either a piece of the brisket, flank or rattle-ran. Take out the bones, place in a flat dish or platter, put a tin sheet on top, and lay on it two or three bricks. If you have a corned beef press, use that, of course.

ROASTING.

There are two modes of roasting: one is to use a tin Kitchen before an open fire, and the other and more common way is to use a very hot oven. The former gives the more delicious favor, but the second is not by any means a poor way, if the meat is put on a rack, and basted constantly when in the oven. A large piece is best for roasting, this being especially true of beef. When meat is cooked in a tin kitchen it requires more time, because the heat is not equally distributed, as it is in the oven.

To prepare for roasting: Wipe the meat with a wet towel. Dredge on all sides with salt, pepper and flour; and if the kitchen is used, dredge the flour into that. Run the spit through the centre of the meat, and place very near the fire at first, turning as it browns. When the flour in the kitchen is browned, add a pint of hot water, and baste frequently with it, dredging with salt and flour after each basting.

Roast a piece of beef weighing eight pounds fifty minutes, if to be rare, but if to be medium, roast one hour and a quarter, and ten minutes for each additional pound.

Roasting in the Oven.

Prepare the meat as before. Have a rack that will fit loosely into the baking-pan. Cover the bottom of the pan rather lightly with flour, put in rack, and then meat Place in a very hot oven for a few minutes, to brown the flour in the pan, and then add hot water enough to cover the bottom of the pan. Close the oven; and in about ten minutes, open, and baste the meat with the gravy. Dredge with salt, pepper and flour. Do this every fifteen minutes; and as soon as one side of the meat is brown, turn, and brown the other. Make gravy as before. Allow a quarter of an hour less in the oven than in the tin kitchen. The heat for roasting must be very great at first, to harden the alb.u.men, and thus keep in the juices. After the meat is crusted over it is not necessary to keep up so great a heat, but for rare meats the heat must, of course, be greater than for those that are to be well done.

The kitchen can be drawn back a little distance from the fire and the drafts closed. Putting salt on fresh meat draws out the juices, but by using flour a paste is formed, which, keeps in all the juices and also enriches and browns the piece. Never roast meat without having a rack in the pan. If meat is put into the water in the pan it becomes soggy and looses its flavor. A meat rack costs not more than thirty or forty cents, and the improvement in the looks and flavor of a piece of meat is enough to pay for it in one roasting. The time given for roasting a piece of beef is for rib roasts and sirloin. The same weight in the face or the back of the rump will require twenty minutes longer, as the meat on these cuts is in a very compact form. If a saddle or loin of mutton is to be roasted, cook the same time as beef if the weight is the same; but if a leg is to be roasted, one hour and a quarter is the time. Lamb should be cooked an hour and a half; veal, two hours and three-quarters; pork, three hours and a quarter. Ten minutes before dis.h.i.+ng the dinner turn the gravy into a sauce-pan, skim off all the fat, and set on the stove. Let it come to a boil; then stir in one table-spoonful of flour, mixed with half a cupful of cold water.

Season with salt and pepper, and cook two minutes. Serve the meat on a hot dish and the gravy in a hot tureen.

Boiled Rib Roast.

Either have the butcher remove the bones, or do it your-self by slipping a sharp knife between the flesh and bones--a simple matter with almost any kind of meat. Roll up the piece and tie with strong twine. Treat the same as plain roast beef, giving the same time as if it were a piece of rump (one hour and a half for eight pounds), as the form it is now in does not readily admit the heat to all parts. This piece of beef can be larded before roasting, or it can be larded and braised. Serve with tomato or horse-radish sauce.

Roast Beef, with Yorks.h.i.+re Pudding.

A rib or sirloin roast should be prepared as directed for roasting.

When within three-quarters of an hour of being done, have the pudding made. b.u.t.ter a pan like that in which the meat is being cooked, and pour in the batter. Put the rack across the pan, not in it. Place the meat on the rack, return to the oven, and cook forty-five minutes. If you have only one pan, take up the meat, pour off the gravy and put in the pudding. Cut in squares, and garnish the beef with these. Another method is to have a pan that has squares stamped in it. This gives even squares and crust on all the edges, which baking in the flat pan does not. When the meat is roasted in the tin-kitchen, let the pudding bake in the oven for half an hour, and then place it under the meat to catch the drippings.

For the Yorks.h.i.+re pudding, one pint of milk, two-thirds of a cupful of flour, three eggs and one scant teaspoonful of salt will be needed.

Beat the eggs very light. Add salt and milk, and then pour about half a cupful of the mixture upon the flour; and when perfectly smooth, add the remainder. This makes a small pudding--about enough for six persons. Serve it hot.

Fillet of Veal, Roasted.

About eight or ten pounds of the fillet, ham force-meat (see rule for force-meat), half a cupful of b.u.t.ter, half a teaspoonful of pepper, two table-spoonfuls of salt, two lemons, half a pound of salt pork.

Rub the salt and pepper into the veal; then fill the cavity, from which the bone was taken, with the force-meat. Skewer and tie the fillet into a round shape. Cut the pork in thin slices, and put half of these on a tin sheet that will fit into the dripping pan; place this in the pan, and the fillet on it. Cover the veal with the remainder of the pork. Put hot water enough in the pan to just cover the bottom, and place in the oven. Bake slowly for four hours, basting frequently with the gravy in the pan, and with salt, pepper and flour.

As the water in the pan cooks away, it must be renewed, remembering to have only enough to keep the meat and pan from burning. After it has been cooking three hours, take the pork from the top of the fillet, spread the top thickly with b.u.t.ter and dredge with flour. Repeat this after thirty minutes, and then brown handsomely. Put the remainder of the b.u.t.ter, which should be about three table-spoonfuls, in a sauce- pan, and when hot, add two heaping table-spoonfuls of flour, and stir until dark brown. Add to it half a pint of stock or water; stir a minute, and set back where it will keep warm, but not cook. Now take up the fillet, and skim all the fat off of the gravy; add water enough to make half a pint of gravy, also the sauce just made. Let this boil up, and add the juice of half a lemon, and more salt and pepper, if needed. Strain, and pour around the fillet. Garnish the dish with potato puffs and slices of lemon.

Roast Ham.

Prepare the ham as for boiling, and if it is of good size (say ten pounds), boil three hours. Remove the skin, and put the ham in a baking pan. Let it cook two hours in a moderate oven. Serve with champagne sauce.

BROILING.

The fire for broiling must be clear, and for meats it must be hotter and brighter than for fish. Coals from hard wood or charcoal are best, but in all large towns and cities hard coal is nearly always used, except in hotels and restaurants, where there is usually a special place for broiling with charcoal. The double broiler is the very best thing in the market for broiling meats and fish. When the meat is placed in it, and the slide is slipped over the handles, all there is to do is to hold the broiler over the fire, or, if you have an open range, before the fire. A fork or knife need not go near the meat until it is on the dish. A great amount of the juice is saved. With the old-fas.h.i.+oned gridirons it is absolutely necessary to stick a fork into the meat to turn it, and although there are little grooves for the gravy to run into, what is saved in this way does not compare with what is actually kept within the meat where the double broiler is used. Professional cooks can turn a steak without running a fork into the meat, but not one in a hundred common cooks can do it.

Mutton Chops.

Sprinkle the chops with salt, pepper and flour. Put them in the double broiler. Broil over or before the fire for eight minutes. Serve on a _hot_ dish with b.u.t.ter, salt and pepper for tomato sauce. The fire for chops should not be as hot as for steak. Chops can be seasoned with salt and pepper, wrapped in b.u.t.tered paper and broiled ten minutes over a hot fire.

Beef Steak.

Have it cut thick. It will never be good, rich and juicy if only from one-fourth to one-half an inch thick. It ought to be at least three- quarters of an inch thick. Trim off any suet that may be left on it, and dredge with salt, pepper and flour. Cook in the double broiler, over or before clear coals, for ten minutes, if to be rare, twelve, if to be rather well done. Turn the meat constantly. Serve on a hot dish with b.u.t.ter and salt, or with mushroom sauce, _maitre d' Hotel_ b.u.t.ter or tomato sauce. Do not stick a knife or fork into the meat to try it. This is the way many people spoil it. Pounding is another bad habit: much of the juice of the meat is lost. When, as it sometimes happens, there is no convenience for broiling, heat the frying pan very hot, then sprinkle with salt, and lay in the steak. Turn frequently.

MISCELLANEOUS MODES.

Braised Beef.