Common Sense in the Household

COMMON SENSE
IN THE HOUSEHOLD
A MANUAL OF
PRACTICAL HOUSEWIFERY

BY
MARION HARLAND.

“We go upon the practical mode of teaching, Nickleby. When a boy knows this out of book, he goes and does it. This is our system. What do you think of it?”—Nicholas Nickleby.

NEW YORK:
CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS
1883.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1871, by
CHARLES SCRIBNER & CO.,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.
——————
Copyright, 1880, by
CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS.

GRANT, FAIRES & RODGERS,
Electrotypers and Printers,
Philadelphia.

TO MY
FELLOW-HOUSEKEEPERS,
NORTH, EAST, SOUTH AND WEST, THIS VOLUME,
THE GLEANINGS OF MANY YEARS,
IS CORDIALLY
DEDICATED.

INTRODUCTORY OF REVISED EDITION.

It is not yet quite ten years since the publication of “Common Sense in the Household. General Receipts.” In offering the work to the publishers, under whose able management it has prospered so wonderfully, I said: “I have written this because I felt that such a Manual of Practical Housewifery is needed.” That I judged aright, taking my own experience as a housekeeper as the criterion of the wants and perplexities of others, is abundantly proved by the circumstance which calls for this new and revised edition of the book. Through much and constant use—nearly 100,000 copies having been printed from them—the stereotype plates have become so worn that the impressions are faint and sometimes illegible. I gladly avail myself of the opportunity thus offered to re-read and so far to alter the original volume as may, in the light of later improvements in the culinary art and in my understanding of it, make the collection of family receipts more intelligible and available. Nor have I been able to resist the temptation to interpolate a few excellent receipts that have come into my hands at a later period than that of the publication of the last, and in my estimation, perhaps the most valuable of the “Common Sense Series,” viz.: “The Dinner Year-Book.”

I am grateful, also, to the courtesy of my publishers for the privilege of thanking those to whom this book was, and is dedicated, “My fellow-housekeepers—North, East, South and West”—for their substantial endorsement of the work I have done in their behalf. A collection of the private letters I have received from those who have used the “General Receipts” would make a volume very nearly as large as this. If I have, as the writers of these testimonials assure me—“done them good,”—they have done me more in letting me know that I have not spent my strength for naught. I acknowledge with pleasure sundry pertinent suggestions and inquiries which have led me, in this revision, to examine warily the phraseology of some receipts and to modify these, I believe, for the better. But, by far, the best “good” done me through this work has been the conscious sisterhood into which I have come with the great body of American housewives. This is a benefit not to be rated by dollars and cents, or measured by time. I hope my fellow-workers will find their old kitchen-companion, in fresh dress, yet more serviceable than before, and that their daughters may, at the close of a second decade, demand new stereotype plates for still another, and, like this, a progressive edition.

Marion Harland.

October 1, 1880.

INDEX OF GENERAL SUBJECTS.

FAMILIAR TALK
WITH MY
FELLOW-HOUSEKEEPER AND READER.

A talk as woman to woman, in which each shall say, “I” and “you,” and “my dear,” and “you know,” as freely as she pleases. It would not be a womanly chat if we omitted these forms of expression. An informal preface to what I mean shall be an informal book—bristling with “I’s” all the way through. If said bristles offend the critic’s touch, let him remember that this work is not prepared for the library, but for readers who trouble themselves little about editorial “we’s” and the circumlocutions of literary modesty.

I wish it were in my power to bring you, the prospective owner of this volume, in person, as I do in spirit, to my side on this winter evening, when the bairnies are “folded like the flocks;” the orders for breakfast committed to the keeping of Bridget, or Gretchen, or Chloe, or the plans for the morrow definitely laid in the brain of that ever-busy, but most independent of women, the housekeeper who “does her own work.” I should perhaps summon to our cozy conference a very weary companion—weary of foot, of hand—and I should not deserve to be your confidant, did I not know how often heart-weary with discouragement; with much producing of ways and means; with a certain despondent looking forward to the monotonous grinding of the household machine; to the certainty, proved by past experience, that toilsome as has been this day, the morrow will prove yet more abundant in labors, in trials of strength and nerves and temper. You would tell me what a dreary problem this of “woman’s work that is never done” is to your fainting soul. How, try as you may and as you do to be systematic and diligent, something is always “turning up” in the treadmill to keep you on the strain. How you often say to yourself, in bitterness of spirit, that it is a mistake of Christian civilization to educate girls into a love of science and literature, and then condemn them to the routine of a domestic drudge. You do not see, you say, that years of scholastic training will make you a better cook, a better wife or mother. You have seen the time—nay, many times since assuming your present position—when you would have exchanged your knowledge of ancient and modern languages, belles-lettres, music, and natural science, for the skill of a competent kitchen-maid. The “learning how” is such hard work! Labor, too, uncheered by encouraging words from mature housewives, unsoftened by sympathy even from your husband, or your father or brother, or whoever may be the “one” to whom you “make home lovely.” It may be that, in utter discouragement, you have made up your mind that you have “no talent for these things.”

I have before me now the picture of a wife, the mother of four children, who, many years ago, sickened me for all time with that phrase. In a slatternly morning-gown at four in the afternoon, leaning back in the laziest and most ragged of rocking-chairs, dust on the carpet, on the open piano, the mantel, the mirrors, even on her own hair, she rubbed the soft palm of one hand with the grimy fingers of the other, and with a sickly-sweet smile whined out—

“Now, I am one of the kind who have no talent for such things! The kitchen and housework and sewing are absolutely hateful to me—utterly uncongenial to my turn of mind. The height of my earthly ambition is to have nothing to do but to paint on velvet all day!”

I felt then, in the height of my indignant disgust, that there was propriety as well as wit in the “Spectator’s” suggestion that every young woman should, before fixing the wedding-day, be compelled by law to exhibit to inspectors a prescribed number of useful articles as her outfit—napery, bed-linen, clothing, etc., made by her own hands, and that it would be wise legislation which should add to these proofs of her fitness for her new sphere a practical knowledge of housework and cookery.

If you have not what our Yankee grandmothers termed a “faculty” for housewifery—yet are obliged, as is the case with an immense majority of American women, to conduct the affairs of a household, bills of fare included—there is the more reason for earnest application to your profession. If the natural taste be dull, lay to it more strength of will—resolution born of a just sense of the importance of the knowledge and dexterity you would acquire. Do not scoff at the word “profession.” Call not that common and unclean which Providence has designated as your life-work. I speak not now of the labors of the culinary department alone; but, without naming the other duties which you and you only can perform, I do insist that upon method, skill, economy in the kitchen, depends so much of the well-being of the rest of the household, that it may safely be styled the root—the foundation of housewifery. I own it would be pleasanter in most cases, especially to those who have cultivated a taste for intellectual pursuits, to live above the heat and odor of this department. It must be very fine to have an efficient aide-de-camp in the person of a French cook, or a competent sub-manager, or an accomplished head-waiter who receives your orders for the day in your boudoir or library, and executes the same with zeal and discretion that leave you no room for anxiety or regret. Such mistresses do not need cookery-books. The few—and it must be borne in mind that in this country these are very few—born in an estate like this would not comprehend what I am now writing; would not enter into the depths of that compassionate yearning which moves me as I think of what I have known for myself in the earlier years of my wedded life, what I have heard and seen in other households of honest intentions brought to contempt; of ill-directed toil; of mortification, and the heavy, wearing sense of inferiority that puts the novice at such a woful disadvantage in a community of notable managers.

There is no use in enlarging upon this point. You and I might compare experiences by the hour without exhausting our store.

“And then”—you sigh, with a sense of resentment upon you, however amiable your disposition, for the provocation is dire—“cookery-books and young housekeepers’ assistants, and all that sort of thing, are such humbugs!—Dark lanterns at best—too often Will-o’-the-wisps.”

My dear, would you mind handing me the book which lies nearest you on the table there? “Dickens?” Of course. You will usually find something of his in every room in this house—almost as surely as you will a Bible. It rests and refreshes one to pick him up at odd times, and dip in anywhere. Hear the bride, Mrs. John Rokesmith, upon our common grievance.

“She was under the constant necessity of referring for advice and support to a sage volume, entitled ‘The Complete British Family Housewife,’ which she would sit consulting, with her elbows upon the table, and her temples in her hands, like some perplexed enchantress poring over the Black Art. This, principally because the Complete British Housewife, however sound a Briton at heart, was by no means an expert Briton at expressing herself with clearness in the British tongue, and sometimes might have issued her directions to equal purpose in the Kamtchatkan language.”

Don’t interrupt me, my long-suffering sister! There is more of the same sort to come.

“There was likewise a coolness on the part of ‘The Complete British Housewife’ which Mrs. John Rokesmith found highly exasperating. She would say, ‘Take a salamander,’ as if a general should command a private to catch a Tartar. Or, she would casually issue the order, ‘Throw in a handful’ of something entirely unattainable. In these, the housewife’s most glaring moments of unreason, Bella would shut her up and knock her on the table, apostrophizing her with the compliment—‘O you ARE a stupid old donkey! Where am I to get it, do you think?’”

When I took possession of my first real home, the prettily furnished cottage to which I came as a bride, more full of hope and courage than if I had been wiser, five good friends presented me with as many cookery-books, each complete, and all by different compilers. One day’s investigation of my ménage convinced me that my lately-hired servants knew no more about cookery than I did, or affected stupidity to develop my capabilities or ignorance. Too proud to let them suspect the truth, or to have it bruited abroad as a topic for pitying or contemptuous gossip, I shut myself up with my “Complete Housewives,” and inclined seriously to the study of the same, comparing one with the other, and seeking to shape a theory which should grow into practice in accordance with the best authority. I don’t like to remember that time! The question of disagreeing doctors, and the predicament of falling between two stools, are trivial perplexities when compared with my strife and failure.

Said the would-be studious countryman to whom a mischievous acquaintance lent “Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary” as an entertaining volume,—“I wrastled, and I wrastled, and I wrastled with it, but I couldn’t get up much of an int’rest.”

My wrestling begat naught save pitiable confusion, hopeless distress, and a three-days’ sick headache, during which season I am not sure that I did not darkly contemplate suicide as the only sure escape from the meshes that girt me. At the height—or depth—of my despondency a friend, one with a great heart and steady brain, came to my rescue. Her cheerful laugh over my dilemma rings down to me now, through all these years, refreshingly as it then saluted my ears.

“Bless your innocent little heart!” she cried, in her fresh, gay voice, “Ninety-nine out of a hundred cookbooks are written by people who never kept house, and the hundredth by a good cook who yet doesn’t know how to express herself to the enlightenment of others. Compile a receipt book for yourself. Make haste slowly. Learn one thing at a time, and when you have mastered it, ‘make a note on it,’ as Captain Cuttle says—never losing sight of the principle that you must do it in order to learn how.”

Then she opened to me her own neatly-written “Manual”—the work of years, recommending, as I seized it that I should commence my novitiate with simple dishes.

This was the beginning of the hoard of practical receipts I now offer for your inspection. For twenty years, I have steadily pursued this work, gleaning here and sifting there, and levying such remorseless contributions upon my friends, that I fear the sight of my paper and pencil has long since become a bugbear. For the kindness and courtesy which have been my invariable portion in this quest, I hereby return hearty thanks. For the encouraging words and good wishes that have ever answered the hint of my intention to collect what had proved so valuable to me into a printed volume, I declare myself to be yet more a debtor. I do not claim for my compend the proud pre-eminence of the “Complete American Housewife.” It is no boastful system of “Cookery Taught in Twelve Lessons.” And I should write myself down a knave or a fool, were I to assert that a raw cook or ignorant mistress can, by half-a-day’s study of my collection, equal Soyer or Blot, or even approximate the art of a half-taught scullion.

We may as well start from the right point, if we hope to continue friends. You must learn the rudiments of the art for yourself. Practice, and practice alone, will teach you certain essentials. The management of the ovens, the requisite thickness of boiling custards, the right shade of brown upon bread and roasted meats—these and dozens of other details are hints which cannot be imparted by written or oral instructions. But, once learned, they are never forgotten, and henceforward your fate is in your own hands. You are mistress of yourself, though servants leave. Have faith in your own abilities. You will be a better cook for the mental training you have received at school and from books. Brains tell everywhere, to say nothing of intelligent observation, just judgment, a faithful memory, and orderly habits. Consider that you have a profession, as I said just now, and resolve to understand it in all its branches. My book is designed to help you. I believe it will, if for no other reason, because it has been a faithful guide to myself—a reference beyond value in seasons of doubt and need. I have brought every receipt to the test of common sense and experience. Those which I have not tried myself were obtained from trustworthy housewives—the best I know. I have enjoyed the task heartily, and from first to last the persuasion has never left me that I was engaged in a good cause. Throughout I have had you, my dear sister, present before me, with the little plait between your brows, the wistful look about eye and mouth that reveal to me, as words could not, your desire to “do your best.”

“In a humble home, and in a humble way,” I hear you add, perhaps. You “are not ambitious;” you “only want to help John, and to make him and the children comfortable and happy.”

Heaven reward your honest, loyal endeavors! Would you mind if I were to whisper a word in your ear I don’t care to have progressive people hear?—although progress is a grand thing when it takes the right direction. My dear, John and the children, and the humble home, make your sphere for the present, you say. Be sure you fill it—full! before you seek one wider and higher. There is no better receipt between these covers than that. Leave the rest to God. Everybody knows those four lines of George Herbert’s, which ought to be framed and hung up in the work-room of every house:—

“A servant, with this clause,

Makes drudgery divine;

Who sweeps a room as for Thy laws

Makes that and th’ action fine.”

I wonder if the sainted poet knows—in that land where drudgery is one of the rough places forever overpast, and work is unmingled blessing—to how many sad and striving hearts those words have brought peace?

And by way of helping John, not only by saving money and preparing palatable and wholesome dishes for his table, but by sparing the wife he loves many needless steps and much hurtful care, will you heed a homely hint or two relative to the practice of your art? Study method, and economy of time and strength, no less than of materials. I take it for granted that you are too intelligent to share in the vulgar prejudice against labor-saving machines. A raisin-seeder costs a trifle in comparison with the time and patience required to stone the fruit in the old way. A good egg-beater—the Dover, for instance—is a treasure. So with farina-kettles, syllabub churns, apple-corers, potato-peelers and slicers, clothes wringers and sprinklers, and the like. Most of these are made of tin—are therefore cheap and easily kept clean. Let each article have its own place in the closet and kitchen, to which restore it so soon as you have done using it. Before undertaking the preparation of any dish, read over the receipt carefully, unless you are thoroughly familiar with the manufacture of it. Many excellent housewives have a fashion of saying loftily, when asked how such things are made—“I carry all my receipts in my head. I never wrote out one in my life.”

And you, if timid and self-distrustful, are smitten with shame, keep your receipt-book out of sight, and cram your memory with ingredients and measures, times and weights, for fear Mrs. Notable should suspect you of rawness and inefficiency. Whereas the truth is, that if you have a mind worthy of the name, its powers are too valuable to be laden with such details. Master the general principles, as I said just now, and for particulars look to your marching-orders. Having refreshed your memory by this reference, pick out from your household stores, and set in convenient order, within reach of your hand, everything you will need in making ready the particular compound under consideration. Then, take your stand in the midst—or sit, if you can. It is common sense—oftentimes a pious duty, to take judicious care of your physical health. I lay it down as a safe and imperative rule for kitchen use—Never stand when you can do your work as well while sitting. If I could have John’s ear for a minute, I would tell him that which would lead him to watch you and exercise wholesome authority in this regard.

Next, prepare each ingredient for mixing, that the bread, cake, pudding, soup, or ragoût may not be delayed when half finished because the flour is not sifted, or the “shortening” warmed, the sugar and butter are not creamed, the meat not cut up, or the herbs not minced. Don’t begin until you are ready; then go steadily forward, “without haste, without rest,” and think of what you are doing.

“Dickens again?”

Why not, since there is no more genial and pertinent philosopher of common life and every-day subjects? To quote, then—

“It was a maxim of Captain Swosser’s,” said Mrs. Badger, “speaking in his figurative, naval manner, that when you make pitch hot, you cannot make it too hot, and that if you have only to swab a plank, you should swab it as if Davy Jones were after you. It appears to me that this maxim is applicable to the medical as well as the nautical profession.”

“To all professions!” observed Mr. Badger. “It was admirably said by Captain Swosser; beautifully said!”

But it will sometimes happen that when you have heated your pitch, or swabbed your deck, or made your pudding according to the lights set before you, the result is a failure. This is especially apt to occur in a maiden effort. You have wasted materials and time, and suffered, moreover, acute demoralization—are enwrapped in a wet blanket of discouragement, instead of the seemly robe of complacency. Yet no part of the culinary education is more useful, if turned to proper account, than this very discipline of failure. It is a stepping-stone to excellence—sharp, it is true, but often sure. You have learned how not to do it right, which is the next thing to success. It is pretty certain that you will avoid, in your second essay, the rock upon which you have split this time. And, after all, there are few failures which are utter and irremediable. Scorched soups and custards, sour bread, biscuit yellow with soda, and cake heavy as lead, come under the head of “hopeless.” They are absolutely unfit to be set before civilized beings and educated stomachs. Should such mishaps occur, lock the memory of the attempt in your own bosom, and do not vex or amuse John and your guests with the narration, still less with visible proof of the calamity. Many a partial failure would pass unobserved but for the clouded brow and earnest apologies of the hostess. Do not apologize except at the last gasp! If there is but one chance in ten that a single person present may not discover the deficiency which has changed all food on the table to dust and gravel-stones to you, trust to the one chance, and carry off the matter bravely. You will be astonished to find, if you keep your wits about you how often even your husband will remain in blissful ignorance that aught has gone wrong, if you do not tell him. You know so well what should have been the product of your labor that you exaggerate the justice of others’ perceptions. Console yourself, furthermore, with the reflection that yours is not the first failure upon record, nor the million-and-first, and that there will be as many to-morrows as there have been yesterdays.

Don’t add to a trifling contretemps the real discomfort of a discontented or fretful wife. Say blithely, if John note your misfortune—“I hope to do better another time,” and do not be satisfied until you have redeemed your pledge. Experience and your quick wit will soon teach you how to avert impending evils of this nature, how to snatch your preparations from imminent destruction, and, by ingenious correctives or concealments, to make them presentable. These you will soon learn for yourself if you keep before you the truism I have already written, to wit, that few failures are beyond repair.

Never try experiments for the benefit of invited guests nor, when John is at home, risk the success of your meal upon a new dish. Have something which you know he can eat, and introduce experiments as by-play. But do not be too shy of innovations in the shape of untried dishes. Variety is not only pleasant, but healthful. The least pampered palate will weary of stereotyped bills of fare. It is an idea which should have been exploded long ago, that plain roast, boiled, and fried, on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, cod-fish on Friday, with pork-and-beans every Saturday, are means of grace, because economical. And with this should have vanished the prejudice against warmed-over meals—or réchauffés, as our French friends term them. I have tried, in the following pages, to set forth the attractions of these, and their claims to your attention as being savory, economical, nourishing, and often elegant. In preparing these acceptably, everything depends upon your own taste and skill. Season with judgment, cook just enough and not a minute too long, and dish nicely. The recommendation of the eye to the palate is a point no cook can afford to disregard. If you can offer an unexpected visitor nothing better than bread-and-butter and cold ham, he will enjoy the luncheon twice as much if the bread be sliced thinly and evenly, spread smoothly, each slice folded in the middle upon the buttered surface, and piled symmetrically; if the ham be also cut thin, scarcely thicker than a wafer, and garnished with parsley, cresses, or curled lettuce. Set on mustard and pickles; let the table-cloth and napkin be white and glossy; the glass clear, and plate shining clean; and add to these accessories to comfort a bright welcome, and, my word for it, you need fear no dissatisfaction on his part, however epicurean may be his tastes. Should your cupboard be bare of aught more substantial than crackers and cheese, do not yield to dismay; split the crackers (if splittable), toast the inside lightly, and butter while hot. Grate your cheese into a powdery mound, garnishing the edges of the plate. If you have no beverage except water to set before him, let this be cool, and pour it out for him yourself, into an irreproachable glass. A dirty table-cloth, a smeared goblet, or a sticky plate, will spoil the most luxurious feast. A table well set is half-spread.

I have not said one-tenth of that which is pressing upon my heart and mind, yet I fear you may think me trite and tedious. One suggestion more, and we will proceed to the details of business.

I believe that, so far as care can avail in securing such a result, my receipts are accurate. But in the matter of seasoning and other minor details, consult your judgment and John’s taste. Take this liberty with whatever receipt you think you can improve. If I chance to find in your work-basket, or upon the kitchen dresser, a well-thumbed copy of my beloved “Common Sense,” with copious annotations in the margin, I shall, so far from feeling wounded, be flattered in having so diligent a student, and, with your permission, shall engraft the most happy suggestions upon the next edition.

For the speedy issue of which, the petitioner doth humbly pray.

Marion Harland.

NOTE.

In looking over this book the reader will notice certain receipts marked thus—✠. I do not claim for these greater merit than should of right be accorded to many others. I merely wish to call the attention of the novice to them as certainly safe, and for the most part simple. Every one thus marked has been tried by myself; most of them are in frequent, some in daily use, in my own family.

My reason for thus singling out comparatively a small number of receipts from the rest, is the recollection of my own perplexities—the loss of time and patience to which I have been subjected in the examination of a new cookery-book, with an eye to immediate use of the directions laid down for various dishes. I have often and vainly wished for a finger-board to guide me in my search for those which were easy and sure, and which would result satisfactorily. This sort of directory I have endeavored to supply, taking care, however, to inform the reader in advance that, so far as I know, there is not an unsafe receipt in the whole work.

Of course it was not necessary or expedient to append the above sign to plain “roast and boiled,” which are in common use everywhere.

SOUPS.

The base of your soup should always be uncooked meat. To this may be added, if you like, cracked bones of cooked game, or of underdone beef or mutton; but for flavor and nourishment, depend upon the juices of the meat which was put in raw. Cut this into small pieces, and beat the bone until it is fractured at every inch of its length. Put them on in cold water, without salt, and heat very slowly. Do not boil fast at any stage of the operation. Keep the pot covered, and do not add the salt until the meat is thoroughly done, as it has a tendency to harden the fibres, and restrain the flow of the juices. Strain—always through a cullender, after which clear soups should be filtered through a hair-sieve or coarse bobbinet lace. The bag should not be squeezed.

It is slovenly to leave rags of meat, husks of vegetables and bits of bone in the tureen. Do not uncover until you are ready to ladle out the soup. Do this neatly and quickly, having your soup-plates heated beforehand.

Most soups are better the second day than the first, unless they are warmed over too quickly or left too long upon the fire after they are hot. In the one case they are apt to scorch; in the other they become insipid.

VEGETABLE SOUPS.

Green Pea. (No. 1.) ✠

• 4 lbs. beef—cut into small pieces.
• ½ peck of green peas.
• 1 gallon water.
• ½ cup of rice-flour, salt, pepper and chopped parsley.

Boil the empty pods of the peas in the water one hour before putting in the beef. Strain them out, add the beef, and boil slowly for an hour and a half longer. Half an hour before serving, add the shelled peas; and twenty minutes later, the rice-flour, with salt, pepper and parsley. After adding the rice-flour, stir frequently, to prevent scorching. Strain into a hot tureen.

Green Pea (No. 2.)

• 2 qts. of strong veal or beef broth.
• ½ teaspoonful sugar.
• 1 tablespoonful butter.
• 1 qt. shelled peas.

Bring the broth to a boil; put in the peas, and boil for twenty minutes. Add the sugar, and a sprig of green mint. Boil a quarter of an hour more, and stir in the butter, with pepper and salt, if the broth be not sufficiently salted already. Strain before serving, and send to table with small squares of toasted bread floating upon the top.

Split Pea (dried). ✠

• 1 gallon water.
• 1 qt. split peas, which have been soaked over night.
• 1 lb. salt pork, cut into bits an inch square.
• 1 lb. beef, cut into bits an inch square.
• Celery and sweet herbs.
• Fried bread.

Put over the fire, and boil slowly for two hours, or until the quantity of liquor does not exceed two quarts. Pour into a cullender, and press the peas through it with a wooden or silver spoon. Return the soup to the pot, adding a small head of celery, chopped up, a little parsley, or, if preferred, summer savory or sweet marjoram. Have ready three or four slices of bread (stale) which have been fried in butter until they are brown; cut into slices and scatter them upon the surface of the soup after it is poured into the tureen.

Pea and Tomato. ✠

This is made according to either of the foregoing receipts, in summer with green—in winter with dried and split peas. Just before straining the soup, add a quart of tomatoes, which have already been stewed soft; let the whole come to a good boil, and strain as above directed. If the stewed tomato be watery, strain off the superfluous liquid before pouring into the pea soup, or it will be too thin.

Bean (dried.) ✠

The beans used for this purpose may be the ordinary kidney, the rice or field bean, or, best of all, the French mock-turtle soup bean. Soak a quart of these over night in soft lukewarm water; put them over the fire next morning, with one gallon of cold water and about two pounds of salt pork. Boil slowly for three hours, keeping the pot well covered; shred into it a head of celery, add pepper—cayenne, if preferred—simmer half an hour longer, strain through a cullender, and serve, with slices of lemon passed to each guest.

Mock-turtle beans, treated in this way, yield a very fair substitute for the fine calf’s-head soup known by the same name.

Bean and Corn. ✠

This is a winter soup, and is made of white beans prepared according to the foregoing receipt, but with the addition of a quart of dried or canned corn. If the former is used—and the Shaker sweet corn is nearly, salted corn quite as good for the purpose as the more expensive canned green corn—soak it overnight in warm water—changing this early in the morning, and pouring on more warm water, barely enough to cover the corn, and keeping it in a close vessel until ready to put on the beans. Let all boil together, with pork as in the bean soup proper. Strain out as usual, rubbing hard through the cullender. Some persons have a habit of neglecting the use of the cullender in making bean soup, and serving it like stewed beans which have been imperfectly drained. The practice is both slovenly and unwholesome, since the husks of the cereal are thus imposed upon the digestive organs of the eater, with no additional nutriment. To the beans and corn may be added a pint of stewed tomato, if desired.

Asparagus (White soup.)

• 3 lbs. veal. The knuckle is best.
• 3 bunches asparagus, as well bleached as you can procure.
• 1 gallon water.
• 1 cup milk.
• 1 tablespoonful rice flour.
• Pepper and salt.

Cut off the hard green stem, and put half of the tender heads of the asparagus into the water with the meat. Boil in closely covered pot for three hours, until the meat is in rags and the asparagus dissolved. Strain the liquor and return to the pot, with the remaining half of the asparagus heads. Let this boil for twenty minutes more, and add, before taking up, a cup of sweet milk (cream is better) in which has been stirred a tablespoonful of rice-flour, arrow-root, or corn-starch. When it has fairly boiled up, serve without further straining, with small squares of toast in the tureen. Season with salt and pepper.

Asparagus (Green soup.)

• 3 lbs. veal—cut into small pieces.
• ½ lb. salt pork.
• 3 bunches asparagus.
• 1 gallon water.

Cut the entire stalk of the asparagus into pieces an inch long, and when the meat has boiled one hour, add half of the vegetable to the liquor in the pot. Boil two hours longer and strain, pressing the asparagus pulp very hard to extract all the green coloring. Add the other half of the asparagus—(the heads only, which should be kept in cold water until you are ready for them), and boil twenty minutes more. Then proceed as with the asparagus white soup, omitting the milk, thickening, and salt. The pork will supply the latter seasoning.

Tomato (Winter soup.) ✠

• 3 lbs. beef.
• 1 qt. canned tomatoes.
• 1 gallon water.
• A little onion.
• Pepper and salt.

Let the meat and water boil for two hours, until the liquid is reduced to little more than two quarts. Then stir in the tomatoes, and stew all slowly for three-quarters of an hour longer. Season to taste, strain, and serve.

Tomato (Summer soup). ✠

• 2½ lbs. veal, or lamb.
• 1 gallon water.
• 2 qts. fresh tomatoes, peeled and cut up fine.
• 1 tablespoonful butter.
• 1 teaspoonful white sugar.
• Pepper and salt. Chopped parsley.

Boil the meat to shreds and the water down to two quarts. Strain the liquor, put in the tomatoes, stirring them very hard that they may dissolve thoroughly; boil half an hour. Season with parsley or any other green herb you may prefer, pepper, and salt. Strain again, and stir in a tablespoonful of butter, with a teaspoonful of white sugar, before pouring into the tureen.

This soup is more palatable still if made with the broth in which chickens were boiled for yesterday’s dinner.

Turnip.

• Knuckle of veal, well cracked.
• 5 qts. water.

Cover closely and stew gently for four hours, the day before the soup is wanted. On the morrow, skim off the fat and warm the stock gradually to a boil. Have ready an onion and six large winter or a dozen small summer turnips, sweet marjoram or thyme minced very finely. Put these into the soup and let them simmer together for an hour. Strain: return to the fire and add a cup of milk—in which has been stirred a tablespoonful of rice-flour or other thickening—and a tablespoonful of butter. Season with salt and pepper, let it boil up once, stirring all the time, as is necessary in all soups where milk is added at last, and remove instantly, or it will scorch.

Potato.

• A dozen large mealy potatoes.
• 2 onions.
• 1 lb. salt pork.
• 3 qts. water.
• 1 tablespoonful butter.
• 1 cup milk or cream.
• 1 well-beaten egg.
• Chopped onion.

Boil the pork in the clear water for an hour and a half, then take it out. Have ready the potatoes, which, after being peeled and sliced, should lie in cold water for half an hour. Throw them into the pot, with the chopped onion. Cover and boil three-quarters of an hour, stirring often. Beat in butter, milk and egg. Add the latter ingredients carefully, a little at a time; stir while it heats to a final boil, and then serve.

This is a cheap wholesome dish, and more palatable than one would suppose from reading the receipt.

Graham Soup. ✠

• 3 onions.
• 3 carrots.
• 4 turnips.
• 1 small cabbage.
• 1 bunch celery.
• 1 pt. stewed tomatoes.

Chop all the vegetables, except the tomatoes and cabbage, very finely, and set them over the fire with rather over three quarts of water. They should simmer gently for half an hour, at the end of which time the cabbage must be added, having previously been parboiled and chopped up. In fifteen minutes more put in the tomatoes and a bunch of sweet herbs, and give all a lively boil of twenty minutes. Rub through a cullender, return the soup to the fire, stir in a good tablespoonful of butter, pepper, and salt, half a cup of cream if you have it, thickened with corn-starch; let it boil up, and it is ready for the table.

Ochra, or Gumbo.

Ochra, or okra, is a vegetable little known except in the far South, where it is cultivated in large quantities and is very popular. A favorite soup is prepared from it in the following manner:—

• 2 qts. of ochras, sliced thin.
• 1 qt. of tomatoes, also sliced.
• 4 tablespoonfuls of butter.
• 2 lbs. of beef, cut into small pieces.
• ½ lb. corned ham or pork, also cut up.

Put the meat and ochras together in a pot with a quart of cold water—just enough to cover them—and let them stew for an hour. Then add the tomatoes and two quarts of boiling water—more, if the liquid in the pot has boiled away so as to expose the meat and vegetables. Boil three-quarters of an hour longer, skimming often with a silver spoon. When the contents of the vessel are boiled to pieces, put in the butter, with cayenne pepper and salt, if the ham has not seasoned it sufficiently. Strain and send up with squares of light, crisp toast floating upon it.

Corn. ✠

• 1 large fowl, cut into eight pieces.
• 1 doz. ears green corn—cut from the cobs.

Boil the chicken with the cobs in a gallon of water until the fowl is tender—if tough, the boiling must be slow and long. Then, put the corn into the pot, and stew an hour longer—still gently. Remove the chicken with a cupful of the liquid, if you wish to make other use of the meat. Set this aside, take out the cobs, season the corn-soup with pepper, salt, and parsley; thicken with rice or wheat flour, boil up once, and serve without straining, if the corn be young and tender.

A tolerable fricassee may be made of the chicken, unless it has boiled to rags, by beating up an egg and a tablespoonful of butter, adding this to the cupful of reserved liquor from which the corn must be strained. Boil this for a moment, thicken with flour, throw in a little chopped parsley, pepper, and salt; pour, while scalding, over the chicken, which you have arranged in a dish; garnish with circular slices of hard-boiled eggs and curled parsley.

MEAT SOUPS.

Beef Soup (à la Julienne). ✠

• 6 lbs. of lean beef. The shin is a good piece for this purpose. Have the bones well cracked, carefully extracting the marrow, every bit of which should be put into the soup.
• 6 qts. of water.

The stock must be prepared the day before the soup is needed. Put the beef, bones and all, with the water in a close vessel, and set it where it will heat gradually. Let it boil very slowly for six hours at least, only uncovering the pot once in a great while to see if there is danger of the water sinking too rapidly. Should this be the case, replenish with boiling water, taking care not to put in too much. During the seventh hour, take off the soup and set it away in a cool place, until next morning. About an hour before dinner, take out the meat, which you can use for mince-meat, if you wish; remove the cake of fat from the surface of the stock, set the soup over the fire, and throw in a little salt to bring up the scum. When this has been skimmed carefully off, put in your vegetables. These should be:—

• 2 carrots.
• 3 turnips.
• Half a head of white cabbage.
• 1 pt. green corn—or dried Shaker corn, soaked over night.
• 1 head celery.
• 1 qt. tomatoes.

These should be prepared for the soup by slicing them very small, and stewing them in barely enough water to cover them, until they break to pieces. Cook the cabbage by itself in two waters—throwing the first away. The only exception to the general dissolution, is in the case of a single carrot, which should likewise be cooked alone and whole, until thoroughly done, and set aside to cool, when the rest of the vegetables, with the water in which they were boiled, are added to the soup. Return the pot to the fire with the vegetables and stock, and boil slowly for half an hour from the time ebullition actually begins. Strain without pressing, only shaking and lightly stirring the contents of the cullender. The vegetables having been added with all their juices already cooked, much boiling and squeezing are not needed, and only make the soup cloudy. Cut the reserved carrot into dice and drop into the clear liquor after it is in the tureen,—also, if you like, a handful of vermicelli, or macaroni which has been boiled tender in clear water.

The seasoning of this excellent soup is a matter of taste. Some use only salt and white pepper. Others like with this a few blades of mace, and boil in the stock a handful of sweet herbs. And others fancy that, in addition to these, a glass of brown sherry imparts a flavor that renders it peculiarly acceptable to most palates. Send to table very hot, and have the soup-plates likewise heated.

Veal Soup with Macaroni. ✠

• 3 lbs. of veal knuckle or scrag, with the bones broken and meat cut up.
• 3 qts. water.
• ¼ lb. Italian macaroni.

Boil the meat alone in the water for nearly three hours until it is reduced to shreds; and the macaroni until tender, in enough water to cover it, in a vessel by itself. The pieces should not be more than an inch in length. Add a little butter to the macaroni when nearly done. Strain the meat out of the soup, season to your taste, put in the macaroni, and the water in which it was boiled; let it boil up, and serve.

You can make macaroni soup of this by boiling a pound, instead of a quarter of a pound, in the second vessel, and adding the above quantity of veal broth. In this case, send on with it a plate of grated cheese, that those who cannot relish macaroni without this accompaniment may put it into their soup. Take care that the macaroni is of uniform length, not too long, and that it does not break while stewing. Add butter in proportion to the increased quantity of macaroni.

Beef Soup (brown).

• 3 lbs. beef cut into strips.
• 3 onions.
• 3 qts. water.

Put beef and water into the saucepan and boil for one hour. Meanwhile, slice the onions and fry them in butter to a light brown. Drop into the pot with a teaspoonful of cloves, half as much pepper, same quantity of mace as pepper, a pinch of allspice, and a teaspoonful of essence of celery, if you cannot get a head of fresh celery; also half a teaspoonful of powdered savory or sweet marjoram, and a teaspoonful of Worcestershire sauce. Stew all for two hours more, or until the beef has boiled to pieces. Strain the soup and return to the fire. Salt to taste, and just before taking it off, pour in a glass of brown sherry or Madeira wine.

Mutton or Lamb Broth. ✠

• 4 lbs. mutton or lamb—lean—cut into small pieces.
• 1 gallon water.
• ½ teacupful rice.

Boil the unsalted meat for two hours, slowly, in a covered vessel. Soak the rice in enough warm water to cover it, and at the end of this time add it, water and all, to the boiling soup. Cook an hour longer, stirring watchfully from time to time, lest the rice should settle and adhere to the bottom of the pot. Beat an egg to a froth and stir into a cup of cold milk, into which has been rubbed smoothly a tablespoonful rice or wheat flour. Mix with this, a little at a time, some of the scalding liquor, until the egg is so far cooked that there is no danger of curdling in the soup. Pour into the pot, when you have taken out the meat, season with parsley, thyme, pepper, and salt. Boil up fairly, and serve. If allowed to stand on the fire, it is apt to burn.

This soup may be made from the liquor in which a leg of mutton has been boiled, provided too much salt was not put in with it. It is especially good when the stock is chicken broth. For the sick it is palatable and nutritious with the rice left in. When strained it makes a nice white table soup, and is usually relished by all.

Vermicelli Soup. ✠

• 4 lbs. lamb, from which every particle of fat has been removed.
• 1 lb. veal.
• A slice of corned ham.
• 5 qts. water.

Cut up the meat, cover it with a quart of water, and set it back on the range to heat very gradually, keeping it covered closely. At the end of an hour, add four quarts of boiling water, and cook until the meat is in shreds. Season with salt, sweet herbs, a chopped shallot, two teaspoonfuls Worcestershire sauce, and when these have boiled in the soup for ten minutes, strain and return to the fire. Have ready about a third of a pound of vermicelli (or macaroni), which has been boiled tender in clear water. Add this; boil up once, and pour out.

Mock-Turtle or Calf’s Head Soup. ✠

• 1 large calf’s head, well cleaned and washed.
• 4 pig’s feet, well cleaned and washed.

This soup should always be prepared the day before it is to be served up. Lay the head and feet in the bottom of a large pot, and cover with a gallon of water. Let it boil three hours, or until the flesh will slip easily from the bones. Take out the head, leaving in the feet, and allow these to boil steadily while you cut the meat from the head. Select with care enough of the fatty portions which lie on the top of the head and the cheeks to fill a teacup, and set them aside to cool. Remove the brains to a saucer and also set aside. Chop the rest of the meat with the tongue very fine, season with salt, pepper, powdered marjoram and thyme, a teaspoonful of cloves, the same of mace, half as much allspice, and a grated nutmeg, and return to the pot. When the flesh falls from the bones of the pig’s feet, take out the latter, leaving in the gelatinous meat. Let all boil together slowly, without removing the cover, for two hours more; take the soup from the fire and set it away until the next day. An hour before dinner, set on the stock to warm. When it boils strain carefully, and drop in the meat you have reserved, which, when cold, should be cut into small squares. Have these all ready as well as the force-meat balls. To prepare these, rub the yolks of five hard-boiled eggs to a paste in a Wedgewood mortar, or in a bowl, with the back of a silver tablespoon, adding gradually the brains to moisten them, also a little butter and salt. Mix with these two eggs beaten very light, flour your hands, and make this paste into balls about the size of a pigeon’s egg. Throw them into the soup five minutes before you take it from the fire; stir in three large tablespoonfuls of browned flour rubbed smooth in three great spoonfuls of melted butter, let it boil up well, and finish the seasoning by the addition of a glass and a half of good wine—Sherry or Madeira—and the juice of a lemon. It should not boil more than half an hour on the second day. Serve with sliced lemon. Some lay the slices upon the top of the soup, but the better plan is to pass to the guests a small dish containing these.

If the directions be closely followed, the result is sure to be satisfactory, and the task is really much less troublesome than it appears to be.

Giblet Soup.

• Feet, neck, pinions, and giblets of three chickens, or of two ducks or two geese.
• 1½ lb. veal.
• ½ lb. ham.
• 3 qts. water.

Crack the bones into small pieces, and cut the meat into strips. Put all together with the giblets over the fire, with a bunch of sweet herbs and a pinch of allspice. Stew slowly for two hours. Take out the giblets and set them aside in a pan where they will keep warm. Take up a teacupful of the hot soup and stir into this a large tablespoonful of flour which has been wet with cold water and rubbed to a smooth paste; then, two tablespoonfuls of butter. Return to the pot and boil for fifteen minutes; season at the last with a glass of brown sherry and a tablespoonful of tomato or walnut catsup. A little Worcestershire sauce is an improvement. Finally, chop and add the giblets, and boil up once.

Brown Gravy Soup.

• 3 lbs. beef.
• 1 carrot.
• 1 turnip.
• 1 head of celery.
• 6 onions, if small button onions—one, if large.
• 3½ qts. water.

Have ready some nice dripping in a frying-pan. Slice the onions and fry them brown. Take them out and set them by in a covered pan to keep warm. Cut the beef into bits an inch long and half an inch thick, and fry them brown also, turning frequently lest they should burn. Chop the vegetables and put them with the meat and onions into a covered pot. Pour on the water and let all stew together for two hours. Then throw in salt and pepper and boil one hour longer, skimming very carefully. Strain; put back over the fire; boil up once more to make the liquid perfectly clear, skim, and add a handful of vermicelli that has been boiled separately and drained dry. The safest plan is to put in the vermicelli after the soup is poured into the tureen. Do not stir before it goes to table. The contents of the tureen should be clear as amber. Some add half a glass of pale Sherry. This is a fine show soup, and very popular.

Veal and Sago Soup.

• 2½ lbs. veal chopped fine.
• ¼ lb. pearl sago.
• 1 pt. milk.
• 4 eggs.
• 3 qts. water.

Put on the veal and water, and boil slowly until the liquid is reduced to about one-half the original quantity. Strain out the shreds of meat, and put the soup again over the fire. Meanwhile the sago should be washed in several waters, and soaked half an hour in warm water enough to cover it. Stir it into the strained broth and boil—stirring very often to prevent lumping or scorching—half an hour more. Heat the milk almost to boiling; beat the yolks of the eggs very light; mix with the milk gradually, as in making boiled custard, and pour—stirring all the while—into the soup. Season with pepper and salt; boil up once to cook the eggs, and serve. Should the liquid be too thick after putting in the eggs, replenish with boiling water. It should be about the consistency of hot custard.

This soup is very good, if chicken broth be substituted for the veal. It is very strengthening to invalids, and especially beneficial to those suffering from colds and pulmonary affections.

Chicken Soup. ✠

• 2 young fowls, or one full-grown.
• ½ lb. corned ham.
• 1 gallon of water.

Cut the fowls into pieces as for fricassee. Put these with the ham into the pot with a quart of water, or enough to cover them fairly. Stew for an hour, if the fowls are tender; if tough, until you can cut easily into the breast. Take out the breasts, leaving the rest of the meat in the pot, and add the remainder of the water—boiling hot. Keep the soup stewing slowly while you chop up the white meat you have selected. Rub the yolks of four hard-boiled eggs smooth in a mortar or bowl, moistening to a paste with a few spoonfuls of the soup. Mix with these a handful of fine bread-crumbs and the chopped meat, and make it into small balls. When the soup has boiled in all, two hours and a half, if the chicken be reduced to shreds, strain out the meat and bones. Season with salt and white pepper, with a bunch of chopped parsley. Drop in the prepared force-meat, and after boiling ten minutes to incorporate the ingredients well, add, a little at a time, a pint of rich milk thickened with flour. Boil up once and serve.

A chicken at least a year old would make better soup than a younger fowl.

Venison Soup. ✠

• 3 lbs. of venison. What are considered the inferior pieces will do.
• 1 lb. corned ham or salt pork.
• 1 onion.
• 1 head of celery.

Cut up the meat; chop the vegetables, and put on with just enough water to cover them, keeping on the lid of the pot all the while, and stew slowly for one hour. Then add two quarts of boiling water, with a few blades of mace and a dozen whole peppers. Or, should you prefer, a little cayenne. Boil two hours longer, salt, and strain. Return the liquor to the pot; stir in a tablespoonful of butter, thicken with a tablespoonful of browned flour wet into a smooth thin paste with cold water; add a tablespoonful of walnut or mushroom catsup, a teaspoonful of Worcestershire or other pungent sauce, and a generous glass of Madeira or brown Sherry.

Hare or Rabbit Soup.

Dissect the rabbit, crack the bones, and prepare precisely as you would the venison soup, only putting in three small onions instead of one, and a bunch of sweet herbs. Hares which are too tough to be cooked in any other way, make excellent game soup. Also, the large gray squirrel of the Middle and Southern States.

Ox-Tail Soup.

• 1 ox-tail.
• 2 lbs. lean beef.
• 4 carrots.
• 3 onions.
• Thyme.

Cut the tail into several pieces and fry brown in butter. Slice the onions and two carrots, and when you remove the ox-tail from the frying-pan, put in these and brown them also. When done, tie them in a bag with a bunch of thyme and drop into the soup-pot. Lay the pieces of ox-tail in the same; then the meat cut into small slices. Grate over them the two whole carrots, and add four quarts of cold water, with pepper and salt. Boil from four to six hours, in proportion to the size of the tail. Strain fifteen minutes before serving it, and thicken with two tablespoonfuls of browned flour. Boil ten minutes longer.

FISH SOUPS.

Oyster Soup (No. 1). ✠

• 2 qts. of oysters.
• 1 qt. of milk.
• 2 tablespoonfuls butter.
• 1 teacupful water.

Strain the liquor from the oysters, add to it the water, and set it over the fire to heat slowly in a covered vessel. When it is near boiling, season with pepper and salt; add the oysters, and let them stew until they “ruffle” on the edge. This will be in about five minutes. Then put in the butter with the milk which has been heated in a separate vessel, and stir well for two minutes.

Serve with sliced lemon and oyster or cream crackers. Some use mace and nutmeg in seasoning. The crowning excellence in oyster soup is to have it cooked just enough. Too much stewing ruins the bivalves, while an underdone oyster is a flabby abomination. The plumpness of the main body and ruffled edge are good indices of their right condition.

Oyster Soup (No. 2).

• 2 qts. of oysters.
• 2 eggs.
• 1 qt. of milk.
• 1 teacupful of water.

Strain the liquor from the oysters into a saucepan, pour in with it the water. Season with cayenne pepper and a little salt, a teaspoonful of mingled nutmeg, mace, and cloves. When the liquor is almost boiling, add half the oysters chopped finely and boil five minutes quite briskly. Strain the soup and return to saucepan. Have ready some force-meat balls, not larger than marbles, made of the yolks of the eggs boiled hard and rubbed to a smooth paste with a little butter, then mix with six raw oysters chopped very finely, a little salt, and a raw egg well beaten, to bind the ingredients together. Flour your hands well and roll the force-meat into pellets, laying them upon a cold plate, so as not to touch one another until needed. Then put the reserved whole oysters into the hot soup, and when it begins to boil again, drop in the force-meat marbles. Boil until the oysters “ruffle,” by which time the balls will also be done. Add the hot milk.

Serve with sliced lemon and crackers. A liberal tablespoonful of butter stirred in gently at the last is an improvement.

Clam Soup.

• 50 clams.
• 1 qt. milk.
• 1 pint water.
• 2 tablespoonfuls butter.

Drain off the liquor from the clams and put it over the fire with a dozen whole peppers, a few bits of cayenne pods, half a dozen blades of mace, and salt to taste. Let it boil for ten minutes, then put in the clams and boil half an hour quite fast, keeping the pot closely covered. If you dislike to see the whole spices in the tureen, strain them out before the clams are added. At the end of the half hour add the milk, which has been heated to scalding, not boiling, in another vessel. Boil up again, taking care the soup does not burn, and put in the butter. Then serve without delay. If you desire a thicker soup stir a heaping tablespoonful of rice-flour into a little cold milk, and put in with the quart of hot.

Cat-fish Soup. ✠

Those who have only seen the bloated, unsightly “hornpouts” that play the scavengers about city wharves, are excusable for entertaining a prejudice against them as an article of food. But the small cat-fish of our inland lakes and streams are altogether respectable, except in their unfortunate name.

• 6 cat-fish, in average weight half a pound apiece.
• ½ lb. salt pork.
• 1 pint milk.
• 2 eggs.
• 1 head of celery, or a small bag of celery seed.

Skin and clean the fish and cut them up. Chop the pork into small pieces. Put these together into the pot, with two quarts of water, chopped sweet herbs, and the celery seasoning. Boil for an hour, or until fish and pork are in rags, and strain, if you desire a regular soup for a first course. Return to the saucepan and add the milk, which should be already hot. Next the eggs, beaten to a froth, and a lump of butter the size of a walnut. Boil up once, and serve with dice of toasted bread on the top. Pass sliced lemon, or walnut or butternut pickles with it.

Eel Soup.

Eel soup is made in precisely the same manner as cat-fish, only boiled longer. A chopped onion is no detriment to the flavor of either, and will remove the muddy taste which these fish sometimes acquire from turbid streams.

Lobster Soup.

• 2 qts. veal or chicken broth, well strained.
• 1 large lobster.
• 2 eggs—boiled hard.

Boil the lobster and extract the meat, setting aside the coral in a cool place. Cut or chop up the meat found in the claws. Rub the yolks of the eggs to a paste with a teaspoonful of butter. Pound and rub the claw-meat in the same manner, and mix with the yolks. Beat up a raw egg, and stir into the paste; season with pepper, salt, and, if you like, mace; make into force-meat balls, and set away with the coral to cool and harden. By this time the stock should be well heated, when, put in the rest of the lobster-meat cut into square bits. Boil fifteen minutes, which time employ in pounding the coral in a Wedgewood mortar, or earthenware bowl, rubbing it into a fine, even paste, with the addition of a few spoonfuls of the broth, gradually worked in until it is about the consistency of boiled starch. Stir very carefully into the hot soup, which should, in the process, blush into a roseate hue. Lastly, drop in the force-meat balls, after which do not stir, lest they should break. Simmer a few minutes to cook the raw egg; but, if allowed to boil, the soup will darken.

Crab soup may be made in the same way, excepting the coralline process, crabs being destitute of that dainty.

Green Turtle Soup.

• A glass of Madeira.
• 2 onions.
• Bunch of sweet herbs.
• Juice of one lemon.
• 5 qts of water.

Chop up the coarser parts of the turtle-meat, with the entrails and bones. Add to them four quarts of water, and stew four hours with the herbs, onions, pepper, and salt. Stew very slowly, but do not let it cease to boil during this time. At the end of four hours strain the soup, and add the finer parts of the turtle and the green fat, which has been simmered for one hour in two quarts of water. Thicken with browned flour; return to the soup-pot, and simmer gently an hour longer. If there are eggs in the turtle, boil them in a separate vessel for four hours, and throw into the soup before taking it up. If not, put in force-meat balls; then the juice of the lemon and the wine; beat up once and pour out. Some cooks add the finer meat before straining, boiling all together five hours; then strain, thicken, and put in the green fat, cut into lumps an inch long. This makes a handsomer soup than if the meat is left in.

For the mock eggs, take the yolks of three hard-boiled eggs, and one raw egg well beaten. Rub the boiled eggs into a paste with a teaspoonful of butter, bind with the raw egg, roll into pellets the size and shape of turtle-eggs, and lay in boiling water for two minutes before dropping into the soup.

Force-meat balls for the above.

Six tablespoonfuls turtle-meat chopped very fine. Rub to a paste with the yolks of two hard-boiled eggs; tablespoonful of butter, and, if convenient, a little oyster-liquor. Season with cayenne, mace, and half a teaspoonful of white sugar. Bind with a well-beaten egg; shape into balls; dip in egg, then powdered cracker, fry in butter, and drop into the soup when it is served.

Green turtle for soups is now within the reach of every private family, being well preserved in air-tight cans.

FISH.

Boiled Codfish. (Fresh.) ✠

Lay the fish in cold water, slightly salted, for half an hour before it is time to cook it. When it has been wiped free of the salt and water, wrap it in a clean linen cloth kept for such purposes. The cloth should be dredged with flour, to prevent sticking. Sew up the edges in such a manner as to envelop the fish entirely, yet have but one thickness of the cloth over any part. The wrapping should be fitted neatly to the shape of the piece to be cooked. Put into the fish-kettle, pour on plenty of hot water, and boil briskly—fifteen minutes for each pound.

Have ready a sauce prepared thus:—

To one gill boiling water add as much milk, and when it is scalding-hot, stir in—leaving the sauce-pan on the fire—two tablespoonfuls of butter, rolled thickly in flour; as this thickens, two beaten eggs. Season with salt and chopped parsley, and when, after one good boil, you withdraw it from the fire, add a dozen capers, or pickled nasturtium seeds, or, if you prefer, a spoonful of vinegar in which celery-seeds have been steeped. Put the fish into a hot dish, and pour the sauce over it. Some serve in a butter-boat; but I fancy that the boiling sauce applied to the steaming fish imparts a richness it cannot gain later. Garnish with sprigs of parsley and circles of hard-boiled eggs, laid around the edge of the dish.

Rock-Fish.

Rock-fish and river-bass are very nice, cooked as above, but do not need to be boiled so long as codfish.

Boiled Codfish. (Salt.)

Put the fish to soak over night in lukewarm water—as early as eight o’clock in the evening. Change this for more warm water at bed-time and cover closely. Change again in the morning and wash off the salt. Two hours before dinner plunge into very cold water. This makes it firm. Finally, set over the fire with enough lukewarm water to cover it, and boil for half an hour. Drain well; lay it on a hot dish, and pour over it egg-sauce prepared as in the foregoing receipt, only substituting the yolks of two hard-boiled eggs, rubbed to a paste with butter, for the beaten raw egg.

This is a useful receipt for country housekeepers who can seldom procure fresh cod. Salt mackerel, prepared in the same way, will repay the care and time required, so superior is it to the Friday’s dish of salt fish, as usually served.

Should the cold fish left over be used for fish-balls—as it should be—it will be found that the sauce which has soaked into it while hot has greatly improved it.

Codfish Balls. ✠

Prepare the fish precisely as for boiling whole. Cut in pieces when it has been duly washed and soaked, and boil twenty minutes. Turn off the water, and cover with fresh from the boiling tea-kettle. Boil twenty minutes more, drain the fish very dry, and spread upon a dish to cool. When perfectly cold, pick to pieces with a fork, removing every vestige of skin and bone, and shredding very fine. When this is done, add an equal bulk of mashed potato; work into a stiff batter by adding a lump of butter and sweet milk, and if you want to have them very nice, a beaten egg. Flour your hands and make the mixture into balls or cakes. Drop them into boiling lard or good dripping, and fry to a light brown. Plainer fish-cakes may be made of the cod and potatoes alone, moulded round like biscuit. In any shape the dish is popular.

Salt Codfish stewed with Eggs.

Prepare the fish as for balls. Heat almost to boiling a pint of rich, sweet milk, and stir into it, gradually and carefully, three eggs, well beaten, a tablespoonful of butter, a little chopped parsley and butter, with pepper, lastly the fish. Boil up once and turn into a deep covered dish, or chafing dish lined with buttered toast. Eat hot for breakfast or supper.

Codfish and Potato Stew. ✠

Soak, boil, and pick the fish, if salt, as for fish-balls. If fresh, boil and pick into bits. Add an equal quantity of mashed potatoes, a large tablespoonful of butter and milk, enough to make it very soft. Put into a skillet, and add a little boiling water to keep it from burning. Turn and toss constantly until it is smoking hot but not dry; add pepper and parsley, and dish.

Boiled Mackerel. (Fresh.) ✠

Clean the mackerel and wipe carefully with a dry, clean cloth; wash them lightly with another cloth dipped in vinegar; wrap each in a coarse linen cloth (floured) basted closely to the shape of the fish. Put them into a pot with enough salted water to cover them, and boil them gently for three quarters of an hour. Drain them well. Take a teacupful of the water in which they were boiled, and put into a saucepan with a tablespoonful of walnut catsup, some anchovy paste or sauce, and the juice of half a lemon. Let this boil up well and add a lump of butter the size of an egg, with a tablespoonful browned flour wet in cold water. Boil up again and serve in the sauce-boat. This makes a brown sauce. You can substitute egg-sauce if you like. Garnish with parsley and nasturtium blossoms.

Broiled Mackerel. (Fresh.)

Clean the mackerel, wash, and wipe dry. Split it open, so that when laid flat the backbone will be in the middle. Sprinkle lightly with salt, and lay on a buttered gridiron over a clear fire, with the inside downward, until it begins to brown; then turn the other. When quite done, lay on a hot dish and butter it plentifully. Turn another hot dish over the lower one, and let it stand two or three minutes before sending to table.

Broiled Mackerel. (Salt.)

Soak over night in lukewarm water. Change this early in the morning for very cold, and let the fish lie in this until time to cook. Then proceed as with the fresh mackerel.

Boiled Halibut. ✠

Lay in cold salt and water for an hour. Wipe dry and score the skin in squares. Put into the kettle with cold salted water enough to cover it. It is so firm in texture that you can boil without a cloth if you choose. Let it heat gradually, and boil from half to three-quarters of an hour, in proportion to the size of the piece. Four or five pounds will be enough for most private families. Drain and accompany by egg-sauce—either poured over the fish, or in a sauce-boat.

Save the cold remnants of the fish and what sauce is left until next morning. Pick out as you would cod, mix with an equal quantity of mashed potato, moisten with the sauce, or with milk and butter if you have no sauce, put it into a skillet, and stir until it is very hot. Do not burn. Season with pepper and salt.

Baked Halibut. ✠

Take a piece of halibut weighing five or six pounds, and lay in salt and water for two hours. Wipe dry and score the outer skin. Set in the baking-pan in a tolerably hot oven, and bake an hour, basting often with butter and water heated together in a saucepan or tin cup. When a fork will penetrate it easily it is done. It should be of a fine brown. Take the gravy in the dripping-pan—add a little boiling water should there not be enough—stir in a tablespoonful of walnut catsup, a teaspoonful of Worcestershire sauce, the juice of a lemon, and thicken with browned flour, previously wet with cold water. Boil up once and put into sauce-boat.

There is no finer preparation of halibut than this, which is, however, comparatively little known. Those who have eaten it usually prefer it to boiled and broiled. You can use what is left for the same purpose as the fragments of boiled halibut.

Halibut Steak. ✠

Wash and wipe the steaks dry. Beat up two or three eggs, and roll out some Boston or other brittle crackers upon the kneading-board until they are fine as dust. Dip each steak into the beaten egg, then into the bread crumbs (when you have salted the fish), and fry in hot fat, lard, or nice dripping.

Or, you can broil the steak upon a buttered gridiron, over a clear fire, first seasoning with salt and pepper. When done, lay in a hot dish, butter well, and cover closely.

Devilled Halibut.

Mince a pound of cold boiled or baked halibut, or the fragments of halibut steak, and make for it the following dressing: The yolks of three hard-boiled eggs rubbed smooth with the back of a silver spoon, or in a Wedgewood mortar, and when there remain no lumps in it, work into a soft paste with a tablespoonful salad oil. Next beat in two teaspoonfuls white sugar, a teaspoonful made mustard, a pinch of cayenne, teaspoonful salt, one of Worcestershire sauce, a little anchovy paste if you have it, and finally, a little at a time to prevent lumping, a small teacupful of vinegar in which celery-seed have been steeped. It is easy to keep a bottle of this on hand for salads and sauces. Stir all thoroughly into the minced fish, garnish with a chain of the whites of the eggs cut into rings, with a small round slice of pickled beet laid within each link, and you have a piquant and pretty salad for the supper-table.

Boiled Salmon. (Fresh.) ✠

Wrap the fish, when you have washed and wiped it, in a clean linen cloth—not too thick—baste it up securely, and put into the fish-kettle. Cover with cold water in which has been melted a handful of salt. Boil slowly, allowing about a quarter of an hour to each pound. When the time is up, rip open a corner of the cloth and test the salmon with a fork. If it penetrate easily, it is done. If not, hastily pin up the cloth and cook a little longer. Skim off the scum as it rises to the top. Have ready in another saucepan a pint of cream—or half milk and half cream will do—which has been heated in a vessel set in boiling water; stir into this a large spoonful of butter, rolled in flour, a little salt and chopped parsley, and a half-gill of the water in which the fish is boiled. Let it boil up once, stirring all the while. When the fish is done, take it instantly from the kettle, lay it an instant upon a folded cloth to absorb the drippings; transfer with great care, for fear of breaking, to a hot dish, and pour the boiled cream over it, reserving enough to fill a small sauce-boat. Garnish with curled parsley and circular slices of hard-boiled yolks—leaving out the whites of the eggs.

After serving boiled salmon with cream-sauce, you will never be quite content with any other. If you cannot get cream, boil a pint of milk and thicken with arrow-root. It is not so nice, but many will not detect the difference—real cream being a rare commodity in town.

You may pickle what is left, if it is in one piece. Or devil it, as I have directed you to treat cold halibut. Or mince, mixed with mashed potato, milk, and butter, and stir into a sort of stew. Or, once again, mix with mashed potato, milk, butter, and a raw egg well-beaten; make into cakes or balls, and fry in hot lard or dripping. At any rate, let none of it be lost, it being at once one of our most expensive and most delicious fish.

Baked Salmon. ✠

Wash and wipe dry, and rub with pepper and salt. Some add a soupçon of cayenne and powdered mace. Lay the fish upon a grating set over your baking-pan, and roast or bake, basting it freely with butter, and, toward the last, with its own drippings only. Should it brown too fast, cover the top with a sheet of white paper until the whole is cooked. When it is done, transfer to a hot dish and cover closely, and add to the gravy a little hot water thickened with arrow-root, rice, or wheat flour,—wet, of course, first with cold water,—a great spoonful of strained tomato sauce, and the juice of a lemon. Boil up and serve in a sauce boat, or you can serve with cream sauce, made as for boiled salmon. Garnish handsomely with alternate sprigs of parsley and the bleached tops of celery, with ruby bits of firm currant jelly here and there. This is a fine dish for a dinner-party. A glass of Sherry improves the first-named sauce.

Salmon Steaks. ✠

Dry well with a cloth, dredge with flour, and lay them upon a well-buttered gridiron, over clear hot coals. Turn with a broad-bladed knife slipped beneath, and a flat wire egg-beater above, lest the steak should break. When done to a light brown, lay in a hot dish, butter each steak, seasoning with salt and pepper, cover closely, and serve.

Pickled Salmon. (Fresh.) ✠

Having cleaned your fish, cut into pieces of a convenient size to go into the fish-kettle, and boil in salted water as for the table. Drain it very dry, wipe it with a clean cloth, and set it aside in a cool place until next morning.

Make pickle enough to cover it in the following proportions: 2 quarts vinegar, a dozen blades of mace, dozen white peppers, dozen cloves, two teaspoonfuls made mustard, three tablespoonfuls white sugar, and a pint of the water in which the fish was boiled. Let them boil up once hard, that you may skim the pickle. Should the spices come away with the scum in large quantities, pick them out and return to the kettle. Set the liquor away in an earthenware jar, closely covered, to keep in the flavor. Next morning hang it over a brisk fire in a bell-metal kettle (covered), and heat to boiling. Meanwhile, prepare the salmon by cutting into pieces an inch and a half long and half an inch wide. Cut cleanly and regularly with a sharp knife. When they are all ready, and the liquor is on the boil, drop them carefully into the kettle. Let the pickle boil up once to make sure the salmon is heated through. Have ready some air-tight glass jars, such as you use for canning fruit and tomatoes. Take the salmon from the kettle, while it is still on the stove or range, with a wire-egg-beater, taking care you do not break the pieces. Drop them rapidly into the jar, packing closely as you go on; fill with the boiling pickle until it overflows, screw on the top, and set away in a dark, cool place. Proceed in the same way with each can until all are full. Salmon thus put up will keep good for years, as I can testify from experience, and will well repay the trouble of preparation. You can vary the seasoning to your taste, adding a shallot or two minced very fine, some celery and small pods of cayenne pepper, which always look well in vinegar.

Be sure that the contents of the kettle are boiling when transferred to the cans, that they are not allowed time to cool in the transit, that the elastic on the can is properly adjusted, and the top screwed down tightly, and success is certain. I would call the attention of those who are fond of the potted spiced salmon, sold at a high price in grocery stores, to this receipt for making the same luxury at home. It costs less by one-half, is as good, and is always on hand.

Pickled Salmon. (Salt.)

Wash the salmon in two or three waters, rubbing it lightly with a coarse cloth to remove the salt-crystals. Then soak over night in tepid water. Exchange this in the morning for ice-cold, and let the fish lie in the latter for three hours. Take it out, wipe dry, and cut in strips as directed in the foregoing receipt. Drop these, when all are ready, in a saucepan of boiling water, placed alongside of a kettle of pickle prepared as for fresh salmon. Beside these have your air-tight jars, covers laid in readiness, and when the salmon has boiled five minutes—fairly boiled, not simmered—fish out the pieces with your wire spoon, pack rapidly into your can; fill up with the boiling pickle from the other kettle, and seal instantly. In two days the pickled salmon will be fit for use, and is scarcely distinguishable from that made of fresh fish. It has the advantage of being always procurable, and of comparative cheapness, and in the country is a valuable stand-by in case of unexpected supper company.

Smoked Salmon. (Broiled.)

Take a piece of raw smoked salmon the size of your hand, or larger in proportion to the number who are to sit down to supper. Wash it in two waters, rubbing off the salt. Lay in a skillet with enough warm—not hot—water to cover it; let it simmer fifteen minutes, and boil five. Remove it, wipe dry, and lay on a buttered gridiron to broil. When it is nicely browned on both sides, transfer to a hot dish; butter liberally, and pepper to taste. Garnish with hillocks of grated horse-radish interspersed with sprays of fresh or pickled fennel-seed, or with parsley.

Raw smoked salmon is in common use upon the supper-table, cut into smooth strips as long as the middle finger, and rather wider; arranged neatly upon a garnished dish, and eaten with pepper-sauce or some other pungent condiment.

Boiled Shad. (Fresh.) ✠

Clean, wash, and wipe the fish. A roe shad is best for this purpose. Cleanse the roes thoroughly, and having sprinkled both shad and eggs with salt, wrap in separate cloths and put into a fish-kettle, side by side. Cover with salted water, and boil from half an hour to three-quarters, in proportion to the size. Experience is the best rule as to the time. When you have once cooked fish to a turn, note the weight and time, and you will be at no loss thereafter. A good rule is to make a pencilled memorandum in the margin of the receipt-book opposite certain receipts.

Serve the shad upon a hot dish, with a boat of drawn butter mingled with chopped eggs and parsley, or egg-sauce. Lay the roes about the body of the fish. Garnish with capers and slices of hard boiled eggs.

Boiled Shad. (Salt.)

Soak the fish six or seven hours in warm water, changing it several times; wipe off all the salt and immerse in ice-cold water. When it has lain in this an hour, put into a fish-kettle with enough fresh water to cover it, and boil from fifteen to twenty minutes, in proportion to the size. Serve in a hot dish, with a large lump of butter spread over the fish.

Broiled Shad. (Fresh.) ✠

Wash, wipe, and split the fish. Sprinkle with salt and pepper, and lay it upon a buttered gridiron, inside downward. When the lower side is browned, turn the fish. One of medium size will be done in about twenty minutes. Serve upon a hot dish, and lay a good piece of butter upon the fish.

Broiled Shad. (Salt.)

Soak over night in lukewarm water. Take out in the morning and transfer to ice-cold for half an hour. Wipe very dry, and broil as you do fresh shad.

Fried Shad.

This is a popular dish upon Southern tables, and is good anywhere. Clean, wash, and wipe a fine roe-shad; split and cut each side into four pieces, leaving out the head, and removing fins and tail. Sprinkle with salt and pepper, and dredge with flour. Have ready a frying pan of boiling hot lard or drippings; put in the fish and fry brown, turning at the end of five minutes to cook the other side. Fry the roe in the same way; lay the fish in the middle of the dish, and the roe outside of it; garnish with water-cresses and sprigs of pickled cauliflower, and eat with catsup.

Baked Shad. ✠

Clean, wash, and wipe the fish, which should be a large one. Make a stuffing of grated bread-crumbs, butter, salt, pepper, and sweet herbs. Stuff the shad and sew it up. Lay it in the baking-pan, with a cupful of water to keep it from burning, and bake an hour, basting with butter and water, until it is tender throughout and well browned. Take it up, put in a hot dish and cover tightly, while you boil up the gravy with a great spoonful of catsup, a tablespoonful of browned flour which has been wet with cold water, the juice of a lemon, and, if you want to have it very fine, a glass of Sherry or Madeira. Garnish with sliced lemon and water-cresses. You may pour the gravy around the fish, or serve in a sauce-boat. Of course you take out the thread with which it has been sewed up before serving the fish.

Boiled Sea-Bass.

Clean and put the fish into the fish-kettle, with salted water enough to cover it when you have enveloped it in the fish-cloth. A medium-sized fish will be done in a little over half an hour. But do not boil too fast. When done, drain and serve in a hot dish. Lay sliced boiled eggs upon and about it, and serve with egg-sauce, mingled with capers and nasturtium seed.

Fried Sea-Bass.

Use smaller fish for this purpose than for boiling. Clean, wipe dry, inside and out, dredge with flour and season with salt. Fry in hot butter or dripping. A mixture, half butter, half lard, is good for frying fish. The bass should be done to a delicate brown—not to a crisp. The fashion affected by some cooks of drying fried fish to a crust is simply abominable.

Fried bass are a most acceptable breakfast dish.

Sturgeon Steak.

Skin the steaks carefully and lay in salted water (cold) for an hour, to remove the oily taste, so offensive to most palates. Then wipe each steak dry, salt, and broil over hot coals on a buttered gridiron. Serve in a hot dish when you have buttered and peppered them, and send up garnished with parsley and accompanied by a small glass dish containing sliced lemon.

Or,

You can pour over them a sauce prepared in this way:—

Put a tablespoonful of butter into a frying-pan, and stir until it is brown—not burned. Add a half-teacupful of boiling water in which has been stirred a tablespoonful of browned flour previously wet with cold water. Add salt, a teaspoonful Worcestershire sauce or anchovy, the juice of a lemon, and let it boil up well. Pour over the steaks when you have arranged them in the dish.

Baked Sturgeon.

A piece of sturgeon weighing five or six pounds is enough for a handsome dish. Skin it and let it stand in salt and water for half an hour. Parboil it to remove the oil. Make a dressing of bread-crumbs, minute bits of fat salt pork, sweet herbs, and butter. Gash the upper part of the fish quite deeply, and rub this force-meat well in; put in a baking-pan with a little water to keep it from burning, and bake for an hour.

Serve with a sauce of drawn butter, in which has been stirred a spoonful of caper sauce and another of catsup.

This is a Virginia receipt, and an admirable one.

Mayonnaise. (Fish.)

Take a pound or so of cold boiled fish (halibut, rock, or cod), cut—not chop—into pieces an inch in length. Mix in a bowl a dressing as follows: the yolks of four boiled eggs rubbed to a smooth paste with salad oil; add to these salt, pepper, mustard, two teaspoonfuls white sugar, and, lastly, six tablespoonfuls of vinegar. Beat the mixture until light, and just before pouring it over the fish, stir in lightly the frothed white of a raw egg. Serve the fish in a glass dish, with half the dressing stirred in with it. Spread the remainder over the top, and lay blanched lettuce-leaves around the edges, to be eaten with it.

Baked Salmon-Trout. ✠

Those who have eaten this prince of game fish in the Adirondacks, within an hour after he has left the lake, will agree with me that he never has such justice done him at any other time as when baked with cream.

Handle the beauty with gentle respect while cleaning, washing, and wiping him, and lay him at full length, still respectfully, in a baking-pan, with just enough water to keep him from scorching. If large, score the back-bone with a sharp knife, taking care not to mar the comeliness of his red-spotted sides. Bake slowly, basting often with butter and water. By the time he is done—and he should be so well-looked after that his royal robe hardly shows a seam or rent, and the red spots are still distinctly visible—have ready in a saucepan a cup of cream—diluted with a few spoonfuls of hot water, lest it should clot in heating—in which have been stirred cautiously two tablespoonfuls of melted butter and a little chopped parsley. Heat this in a vessel set within another of boiling water, add the gravy from the dripping-pan, boil up once to thicken, and when the trout is laid—always respectfully—in a hot dish, pour the sauce around him as he lies in state. He will take kindly to the creamy bath, and your guests will take kindly to him. Garnish with a wreath of crimson nasturtium blooms and dainty sprigs of parsley, arranged by your own hands on the edge of the dish, and let no sharply-spiced sauces come near him. They would but mar his native richness—the flavor he brought with him from the lake and wild-wood. Salt him lightly, should he need it, eat and be happy.

If the above savor of bathos rather than “common sense,” my excuse is, I have lately eaten baked salmon-trout with cream-gravy.

Boiled Salmon-Trout. ✠

Clean, wash, and dry the trout; envelop in a thin cloth fitted neatly to the shape of the fish, lay within a fish-kettle, cover with salted water (cold), and boil gently half an hour or longer, according to the size. When done, unwrap and lay in a hot dish. Pour around it cream-sauce made as for baked salmon-trout—only, of course, with the omission of the fish-gravy—and serve.

Fried Trout.

Brook trout are generally cooked in this way, and form a rarely delightful breakfast or supper dish.

Clean, wash, and dry the fish, roll lightly in flour, and fry in butter or clarified dripping, or butter and lard. Let the fat be hot, fry quickly to a delicate brown, and take up the instant they are done. Lay for an instant upon a hot folded napkin, to absorb whatever grease may cling to their speckled sides; then range side by side in a heated dish, garnish, and send to the table. Use no seasoning except salt, and that only when the fish are fried in lard or unsalted dripping.

Fried Pickerel. ✠

The pickerel ranks next to trout among game-fish, and should be fried in the same manner. Especially—and I urge this with groaning of spirit, in remembrance of the many times in which I have had my sense of fitness, not to say my appetite, outraged by seeing the gallant fish brought to table dried to a crisp throughout, all his juices wasted and sweetness utterly departed—especially, do not fry him slowly and too long; and when he is done, take him out of the grease!

Cream Pickerel. ✠

Reserve your largest pickerel—those over three pounds in weight—for baking, and proceed with them as with baked salmon-trout—cream-gravy and all. If you cannot afford cream, substitute rich milk, and thicken with rice or wheat flour. The fish are better cooked in this way than any other.

Fried Perch, and other Pan-fish.

Clean, wash, and dry the fish. Lay them in a large flat dish, salt, and dredge with flour. Have ready a frying-pan of hot dripping, lard, or butter; put in as many fish as the pan will hold without crowding, and fry to a light brown. Send up hot in a chafing-dish.

The many varieties of pan-fish—porgies, flounders, river bass, weak-fish, white-fish, etc., may be cooked in like manner. In serving, lay the head of each fish to the tail of the one next him.

Stewed Cat-fish. ✠