Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches Part 19

Dish it all together, either with the rice covering the fowl, or laid round it in little heaps.

You may make a pilau of beef or mutton with a larger quant.i.ty of rice; which must not be put in at first, or it will be done too much, the meat requiring a longer time to stew.

CHICKEN SALAD.

The fowls for this purpose should be young and fine. You may either boil or roast them. They must be quite cold. Having removed all the skin and fat, and disjointed the fowls cut the meat from the bones into very small pieces, not exceeding an inch. Wash and split two large fine heads of celery, and cut the white part into pieces also about an inch long; and having mixed the chicken and celery together, put them into a deep china dish, cover it and set it away.

It is best not to prepare the dressing till just before the salad is to be eaten, that it may be as fresh as possible. Have ready the yolks of eight hard-boiled eggs. Put them into a flat dish, and mash them to a paste with the back of a wooden spoon. Add to the egg a small tea-spoonful of fine salt, the same quant.i.ty of cayenne pepper, half a jill of made mustard, a jill or a wine-gla.s.s and a half of vinegar, and rather more than two wine-gla.s.ses of sweet oil. Mix all these ingredients thoroughly; stirring them a long time till they are quite smooth.

The dressing should not be put on till a few minutes before the salad is sent in; as by lying in it the chicken and celery will become tough and hard. After you pour it on, mix the whole well together with a silver fork.

Chicken salad should be accompanied with plates of bread and b.u.t.ter, and a plate of crackers. It is a supper dish, and is brought in with terrapin, oysters, &c.

Cold turkey is excellent prepared as above.

An inferior salad may be made with cold fillet of veal, instead of chickens.

Cold boiled lobster is very fine cut up and drest in this manner, only subst.i.tuting for celery, lettuce cut up and mixed with the lobster.

TO ROAST A PAIR OF DUCKS.

After the ducks are drawn, wipe out the inside with a clean cloth, and prepare your stuffing. Mince very fine some green sage leaves, and twice their quant.i.ty of onion, (which should first be parboiled,) and add a little b.u.t.ter, and a seasoning of pepper and salt. Mix the whole very well, and fill the crops and bodies of the ducks with it, leaving a little s.p.a.ce for the stuffing to swell. Reserve the livers, gizzards, and hearts to put in the gravy. Tie the bodies of the ducks firmly round with strings, (which should be wetted or b.u.t.tered to keep them from burning,) and put them on the spit before a clear brisk fire. Baste them first with a little salt and water, and then with their own gravy, dredging them lightly with flour at the last. They will be done in about an hour. After boiling the livers, gizzards and hearts, chop them, and put them into the gravy; having first skimmed it, and thickened it with a little browned flour.

Send to table with the ducks a small tureen of onion-sauce with chopped sage leaves in it. Accompany them also with stewed cranberries and green peas.

Canvas-back ducks are roasted in the same manner, omitting the stuffing. They will generally be done enough in three quarters of an hour. Send currant jelly to table with them, and have heaters to place under the plates. Add to the gravy a little cayenne, and a large wine-gla.s.s of claret or port.

Other wild ducks and teal may be roasted in about half an hour.

Before cooking soak them all night in salt and water, to draw out whatever fishy or sedgy taste they may happen to have, and which may otherwise render them uneatable. Then early in the morning put them in fresh water (without salt,) changing it several times before you spit them.

You may serve up with wild ducks, &c. orange-sauce, which is made by boiling in a little water two large sweet oranges cut into slices, having first removed the rind. When the pulp is all dissolved, strain and press it through a sieve, and add to it the juice of two more oranges, and a little sugar. Send it to table either warm or cold.

STEWED DUCK.

Half roast a large duck. Cut it up, and put it into a stew-pan with a pint of beef-gravy, or dripping of roast-beef. Have ready two boiled onions, half a handful of sage leaves, and two leaves of mint, all chopped very fine and seasoned with pepper and salt.

Lay these ingredients over the duck. Stew it slowly for a quarter of an hour. Then put in a quart of young green peas. Cover it closely, and simmer it half an hour longer, till the peas are quite soft. Then add a piece of b.u.t.ter rolled in flour; quicken the fire, and give it one boil. Serve up all together.

A cold duck that has been under-done may be stewed in this manner.

TO HASH A DUCK.

Cut up the duck and season it with pepper and mixed spices. Have ready some thin slices of cold ham or bacon. Place a layer of them in a stew-pan; then put in the duck and cover it with ham. Add just water enough to moisten it, and pour over all a large gla.s.s of red wine. Cover the pan closely and let it stew for an hour.

Have ready a quart or more of green peas, boiled tender drained, and mixed with b.u.t.ter and pepper. Lay them round the hashed duck.

If you hash a cold duck in this manner, a quarter of an hour will be sufficient for stewing it; it having been cooked already.

TO ROAST A GOOSE.

Having drawn and singed the goose, wipe out the inside with a cloth, and sprinkle in some pepper and salt. Make a stuffing of four good sized onions minced fine, and half their quant.i.ty of green sage leaves minced also, a large tea-cupful of grated bread-crumbs, a piece of b.u.t.ter the size of a walnut, and the beaten yolks of two eggs, with a little pepper and salt. Mix the whole together, and incorporate them well. Put the stuffing into the goose, and press it in hard; but do not entirely fill up the cavity, as the mixture will swell in cooking. Tie the goose securely round with a greased or wetted string; and paper the breast to prevent it from scorching. Fasten the goose on the spit at both ends. The fire must be brisk and well kept up. It will require from two hours to two and a half to roast. Baste it at first with a little salt and water, and then with its own gravy.

Take off the paper when the goose is about half done, and dredge it with a little flour towards the last. Having parboiled the liver and heart, chop them and put them into the gravy, which must be skimmed well and thickened with a little browned flour.

Send apple-sauce to table with the goose; also mashed potatoes.

A goose may be stuffed entirely with potatoes, boiled and mashed with milk, b.u.t.ter, pepper and salt.

You may make a gravy of the giblets, that is the neck, pinions, liver, heart and gizzard, stewed in a little water, thickened with b.u.t.ter rolled in flour, and seasoned with pepper and salt. Add a gla.s.s of red wine. Before you send it to table, take out all but the liver and heart; mince them and leave them in the gravy. This gravy is by many preferred to that which comes from the goose in roasting. It is well to have both.

If a goose is old it is useless to cook it, as when hard and tough it cannot be eaten.

A GOOSE PIE.

Cut a fine large young goose into eight pieces, and season it with pepper. Reserve the giblets for gravy. Take a smoked tongue that has been all night in soak, parboil it, peel it, and cut it into thick slices, omitting the root, which you must divide into small pieces, and put into a sauce-pan with the giblets and sufficient water to stew them slowly.

Make a nice paste, allowing a pound and a half of b.u.t.ter to three pounds of flour. Roll it out thick, and line with it the bottom and sides of a deep dish. Fill it with the pieces of goose, and the slices of tongue. Skim the gravy you have drawn from the giblets, thicken it with a little browned flour, and pour it into the pie dish. Then put on the lid or upper crust. Notch and ornament it handsomely with leaves and flowers of paste. Bake the pie about three hours in a brisk oven.

In making a large goose pie you may add a fowl, or a pair of pigeons, or partridges,--all cut up.

A duck pie may be made in the same manner.

Small pies are sometimes made of goose giblets only.

A CHRISTMAS GOOSE PIE.

These pies are always made with a standing crust. Put into a sauce-pan one pound of b.u.t.ter cut up, and a pint and a half of water; stir it while it is melting, and let it come to a boil.

Then skim off whatever milk or impurity may rise to the top. Have ready four pounds of flour sifted into a pan. Make a hole in the middle of it, and pour in the melted b.u.t.ter while hot. Mix it with a spoon to a stiff paste, (adding the beaten yolks of three or four eggs,) and then knead it very well with your hands, on the paste-board, keeping it dredged with flour till it ceases to be sticky. Then set it away to cool.

Split a large goose, and a fowl down the back, loosen the flesh all over with a sharp knife, and take out all the bones. Parboil a smoked tongue; peel it and cut off the root. Mix together a powdered nutmeg, a quarter of an ounce of powdered mace, a tea-spoonful of pepper, and a tea-spoonful of salt, and season with them the fowl and the goose.

Roll out the paste near an inch thick, and divide it into three pieces. Cut out two of them of an oval form for the top and bottom; and the other into a long straight piece for the sides or walls of the pie. Brush the paste all over with beaten white of egg, and set on the bottom the piece that is to form the wall, pinching the edges together, and cementing them with white of egg.

The bottom piece must be large enough to turn up a little round the lower edge of the wall piece, to which it must be firmly joined all round. When you have the crust properly fixed, so as to be baked standing alone without a dish, put in first the goose, then the fowl, and then the tongue. Fill up what s.p.a.ce is left with pieces of the flesh of pigeons, or of partridges, quails, or any game that is convenient. There must be no bones in the pie.

You may add also some bits of ham, or some force-meat b.a.l.l.s.

Lastly, cover the other ingredients with half a pound of b.u.t.ter, and pat on the top crust, which, of course, must be also of an oval form to correspond with the bottom. The lid must be placed not quite on the top edge of the wall, but an inch and a half below it. Close it very well, and ornament the sides and top with festoons and leaves cut out of paste. Notch the edges handsomely, and put a paste flower in the centre. Glaze the whole with beaten yolk of egg, and bind the pie all round with a double fold of white paper. Set it in a regular oven, and bake it four hours.

This is one way of making the celebrated goose pies that it is customary in England to send as presents at Christmas. They are eaten at luncheon, and if the weather is cold, and they are kept carefully covered up from the air, they will be good for two or three weeks; the standing crust a.s.sisting to preserve them.

TO ROAST A TURKEY.

Make a force-meat of grated bread-crumbs, minced suet, sweet marjoram, grated lemon-peel, nutmeg, pepper, salt, and beaten yolk of egg. You may add some grated cold ham. Light some writing paper, and singe the hairs from the skin of the turkey. Reserve the neck, liver, and gizzard for the gravy. Stuff the craw of the turkey with the force-meat, of which there should be enough made to form into b.a.l.l.s for frying, laying them round the turkey when it is dished. Dredge it with flour, and roast it before a clear brisk fire, basting it with cold lard. Towards the last, set the turkey nearer to the fire, dredge it again very lightly with flour, and baste it with b.u.t.ter. It will require, according to its size, from two to three hours roasting.

Make the gravy of the giblets cut in pieces, seasoned, and stewed for two hours in a very little water; thicken it with a spoonful of browned flour, and stir into it the gravy from the dripping-pan, having first skimmed off the fat.