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Make some nice drawn butter with milk. Flavor it with powdered mace. Pound some spinach in a mortar to extract the juice. Strain the spinach juice, and stir a small tea-cupful into the butter to give it a fine green color. Have ready some well-boiled broccoli. Divide one or two heads of the broccoli into tufts or sprigs. Put them into the melted butter, and when it comes to a boil, take it off, and transfer it to a sauce-boat. Serve it up with boiled poultry or fresh fish.
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Strip from the stalks the leaves of some fresh green parsley; allow plenty of it. Chop it slightly; and while the drawn butter is hot, stir into it the parsley, till the butter looks very green. Serve it up with boiledfowls, rabbits, or boiled fish. The appearance of parsley sauce will be much improved by stirring in some spinach juice. The whole will be then a fine green.
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Pick the small sprigs of parsley from the large stalks. Wash it, and then throw it into clean cold water. After the meat or fish that it is to accompany has been fried and taken out of the pan, give the fat that remains a boil up, and lay the parsley into it. It will crimp and still continue green, if not kept frying too long. Take it out, drain it, and place it before the fire a few minutes, to dry it from the fat. Dish it laid on the top of the fish or steaks.
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The fennel should be young and fresh. Take a large handful, or more, and having washed it clean, strip the leaves from the stems, and boil it till quite tender. Put it into a sieve, and press the water well from it. Mince it very small, and stir it into drawn butter.
It is served up with boiled fish.
Instead of melted butter, you may put the fennel into veal gravy, thickened with butter dredged with flour.
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Take a bunch of fresh sage leaves. Wash and drain them. Pick them from the stems, and put them to boil in a small sauce-pan, with just water enough tocover them. Boil them fast about ten minutes. Take them out, and press them in a sieve to drain them dry. Then mince or chop them small. Have ready two onions, boiled tender in another sauce-pan; chop them also, and mix them well with the minced sage. While warm, mix in a small bit of nice butter—season with pepper. Put this sauce into a little tureen, and serve it up with roast goose, roast duck, or roast pork, that has been stuffed with potato, bread, or other stuffing. The sage and onion sauce is for those who prefer their flavor to any other seasoning for those dishes.
This sauce will be greatly improved if moistened with some of the gravy of the duck or goose.
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Peel some nice mild onions, and boil them in plenty of milk, skimming them well. When done, take them out of the milk, (saving it,) and slice them very thin, cutting the slices across, so as to make the pieces of onion very small. Return them to the sauce-pan of milk, (adding some fresh butter dredged with flour;) season them with powdered mace or nutmeg, and give the onions another boil, till they are soft enough to mash, and to thicken the milk all through. Eat this sauce with steaks, cutlets, rabbits, or chickens.
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Peel some very small onions, and boil them whole in milk, (seasoned slightly with pepper and salt,) and put in some bits of butter rolled in flour. Let them boil till tender all through, but not till they loose their shape. Eat them with any sort of boiled meat.
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This is eaten with boiled mutton; is superior to caper sauce, and costs almost nothing, if you have nasturtions in your garden. Gather the green seeds as soon as they are full grown, and throw them (without the stems) into a jar of cider vinegar. They require no cooking, but keep a muslin bag of spice in the jar, (mace and nutmeg broken small, and a little piece of root ginger.) To use them for sauce, make some nice drawn butter, and as it simmers throw in plenty of nasturtions from the jar. The seeds, when gathered, should be full grown, but by no means hard; and the color a fine green. If there is the slightest brown tinge, the nasturtion seeds are too old, and should be kept for planting.
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Have ready some excellent drawn butter, and thicken it with small button mushrooms that have been pickled. Or, take freshly-gathered mushrooms of good size, rub off the outer skin with a clean flannel, and cut off the stems close to the flaps. Wash the mushrooms in a cullender. Have ready some bits offresh butter dredged all over with flour. Lay them among the mushrooms, (which, if very large, should be quartered,) and put them into a stew-pan. Cover the pan, and let them stew till the mushrooms are all tender. When you take off the lid to try them, replace it immediately, keeping in as much of the aroma as possible. If fresh, they will yield a great deal of juice. When done, transfer them to a sauce-tureen, and serve them up with any nice dish of meat or poultry.
The best mushrooms are found in pure open air or rather high ground, and where there is no swamp or woodland. On the upper side of their top they are not white, but of a pale grayish tint; the under side is invariably light red, pinkish, or pale salmon color, which in a few hours, or after being gathered, turns brown. The false mushrooms are poisonous. They are entirely white above and below. The fungi that grow in forests or marshes can never be mistaken for real mushrooms. They are of various colors, chiefly bright yellow and red, and originate in foul air. By boiling a silver tea-spoon with your mushrooms, you may test their goodness. If the silver turns black, throw the mushrooms away. An onion will also blacken from the same cause. Mushrooms should be cooked as soon as possible. If kept two or three days, worms will be found in them. Never give mushrooms to children. Even in their best state they are not wholesome. The taste for mushrooms is an acquired one, and it is best not to acquire it.
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Scald some large ripe tomatos, to make them peel easily. Then quarter them, and press them through a sieve to divest them of their seeds. Put the juice into a stew-pan, adding some bits of fresh butter dredged with flour; add finely grated bread-crumbs, and season with a little pepper, and, if liked, a little onion boiled and minced. Set the pan over a moderate fire, and let the tomatos simmer slowly till it comes to a boil. Continue the boiling ten minutes longer. Serve it up in a sauce-tureen. It will be mellowed and improved by stirring in (as soon as it comes to a boil) a table-spoonful or a lump of white sugar.
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Put into a sauce-pan a large half pint of any nice gravy that is at hand. After it has boiled five minutes, have ready a handful of fresh green tarragon leaves, minced, and moistened with plenty of cider vinegar. Add this to the gravy, and let it simmer five minutes. Then take it out, and serve it up with any kind of boiled poultry.
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Take two pounds of the lean of veal, or of very nice beef. Cut it into small bits, and lay it in a sauce-pan with only as much water as will cover it. Stew it slowly, (skimming it well) till the meat is all rags. Then strain the gravy, and thicken it with some bits of fresh butter dredged all over with browned flour,and give it another simmer. You may flavor it with any seasoning you like.
For made gravies, you can use any small pieces of fresh meat that has never been cooked, and the feet of calves and pigs. Boil in it also such vegetables as you like, cut small. Strain out every thing before it goes to table. For gravies, use nothing that has been cooked before. They will not add to its goodness, but only render it flat and washy.
White gravy is made with fresh veal boiled in milk; and after straining, thickened arrow-root, or rice flour, mixed with fresh butter, if real cream cannot be obtained.
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Let the mushrooms be large and freshly-gathered, for they soon become worm-eaten if not speedily salted. They should be well examined. Cut off the stalks of four quarts of nice mushrooms. Put the flaps into a deep earthen pan, and break them up with your hands. Strew among them half a pound of salt, reserving the largest portion of it for the top. Let them stand for three days, stirring them gently every morning. The fourth day, put them into a sieve, and draw off the liquor without pressing the mushrooms. When all the liquor has drained through, measure it, allowing to each quart a tea-spoon of cayenne, a dozen blades of mace, and a nutmeg broken up. Put the whole into a porcelain kettle, and boil it slowly till reduced one half. Then pour it into a clean white-ware pitcher, cover it with a folded napkin, and keep it in a cool dry place till next day. Then, through a funnel, pour it gently from the sediment into small bottles. Finish with a tea-spoonful of sweet oil on the top of each. Cork the bottles tightly, and seal the corks.
The next time you make catchup, proceed as above with the new mushrooms, and other ingredients; and, when it is done, strain it, and put it into a clean kettle. Then add to it a quart oflast year'smushroom catchup, and boil it a quarter of an hour. Then bottle it as above.
This double catchup is very fine.
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Take two hundred walnuts or butter-nuts, while the green shell is still so soft that you can pierce it with the head of a pin. Bruise them to small pieces, in a marble mortar. Transfer them to a broad stone-ware pan, and stew among them six handfuls of salt. Stir them three times a day, for ten days or two weeks. Then squeeze and strain them through a cloth, pressing them very dry, till no more juice comes out. Boil up the liquor with two quarts of cider vinegar, half an ounce of mace, half an ounce of whole pepper, half an ounce of nutmegs broken up, and two roots of ginger cut small, and half a dozen shalots or small onions, peeled and cut up, and a large bunch of sweet herbs. Let the whole boil for half an hour. Then pour offthe liquor into a large pitcher, leaving out the bunch of sweet herbs. Pour off the liquor (through a funnel,) into small bottles, having first put into the bottom of each bottle a portion of the spice. Fill the bottle up to the top with the catchup, finishing with a tea-spoonful of salad oil, which will greatly assist in keeping the catchup good. Cork the bottles very closely, and seal the corks.
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Take a peck of large ripe tomatos. In the middle States they are in perfection the last of August. Late in the autumn they are comparatively insipid and watery. Cut a slit down the side of every tomato. Put them into a large preserving kettle without any water. Their own juice is sufficient. On no account boil tomatos in brass or copper, their acid acting on those metals produces verdigris, and renders them poisonous. Boil them till they are quite soft, and easily mashed, stirring them up frequently from the bottom. Press and mash them through a hair sieve, till all the pulp has run out into the pan below, leaving in the sieve only the skins and seeds. Season the liquid with a little salt, some cayenne, and plenty of powdered nutmeg and mace. Mix it well, and when cold put up the catchup in small jars, the covers pasted all round with bands of white paper. This catchup, when done, should be very thick and smooth.
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Take six fine large ripe lemons, and roll them under your hand to increase the quantity of juice. Grate off all the yellow rind, and squeeze the juice into a pitcher, removing all the seeds. Prepare two ounces of finely scraped horse-radish, and two ounces of minced shalots, or very small onions. Put them into a pint of boiling vinegar, in which half an ounce of bruised ginger and a quarter of an ounce of mace have been simmered for five minutes. Add to this the lemon-juice and the grated peel, and two grated nutmegs. Boil all together for half an hour, and then transfer it with all the ingredients to a glass jar with a lid. Paste a band of strong white paper round the lower part of the lid. Set it in a dry cool place, and leave it undisturbed for three months. Then, through a funnel, pour off the liquid into small bottles, putting a tea-spoonful of salad oil at the top of each. Cork and seal them.
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For a small quantity of this catchup, take twelve fine full-grown cucumbers, and lay them an hour in cold water. Then pare them, and grate them down into a deep dish. Grate also two small onions, and mix them with the grated cucumber. Season the mixture to your taste with pepper, salt, and vinegar, making it of the consistence of very thick marmalade or jam. When thoroughly amalgamated, transfer it to a glass jar. Cover it closely, tying over it apiece of bladder, so as to render it perfectly air-tight.
It will be found very nice, (when fresh cucumbers are not in season,) to eat with beef or mutton. And if properly made, and securely covered, will keep well. It should be grated very fine, and the vinegar must be of very excellent quality—real cider vinegar.
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Take a pint or quart of strong ale or porter, and a pint of white wine; half a dozen shalots, or very small onions, peeled and minced; half an ounce of mace, half an ounce of nutmeg, broken up; and two large roots or races of ginger, sliced. Put all together, over a moderate fire, into a porcelain-lined kettle, and boil it slowly till one-third of the liquid is wasted. Next day transfer it to small bottles, putting a portion of the seasoning in the bottom of each, and filling them to the top with the liquid. Finish with a tea-spoonful of salad oil at the top. Cork the bottles with good corks, and seal them. In a dry place this catchup will keep for years.
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The fresh leaves of the tarragon plant are in perfection in July and August, and impart a new and pleasant taste to soups, hashes, gravies, &c. To use it fresh, wash a bunch of tarragon in cold water. Afterwards strip off the green leaves, chop or mince them, and boil a tea-spoonful or more in the dish you intendto flavor. The best way of keeping tarragon is to strip off as many fresh leaves as will half fill a glass jar that holds a quart. Pour on as muchrealcider vinegar as will fill up the jar. Cover it closely, and let the tarragon infuse in it for a week, shaking the jar every day. Then pour off that vinegar carefully, and throw away the tarragon leaves that have been steeping in it. Wash that jar, or take another clean one, put into it the same quantity of fresh tarragon leaves, and fill up with the same vinegar in which you have infused the first supply. Let the second leaves remain in the jar of vinegar. A tarragon bush is well worth planting; even in a small city garden.
Tarragon is the chief ingredient of French mustard.
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Take a jill or two large wine-glasses of tarragon vinegar, (strained from the leaves,) and mix with it an equal quantity of salad oil, stirring them well together. Pound in a mortar, two ounces of mustard seed till it becomes a fine smooth powder, and mix it thoroughly. Add to it one clove of garlic (not more) peeled, minced and pounded. Make the mixture in a deep white-ware dish. If the mustard affects your eyes, put on glasses till you have finished the mixture. When done, put it up in white bottles, or gallipots. Cork them tightly, and seal the corks. Send it to table in those bottles.
This mustard is far superior to any other, the tarragon imparting a peculiar and pleasant flavor.
It is excellent to eat with any sort of roast meat, particularly beef or mutton, and an improvement to almost all plain sauces, stews, soups, &c.
French mustard is to be purchased very good, at all the best grocery stores.
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Peel five large onions, and parboil them to take off some of the strength. Cut them into small dice, and put them into a stew-pan with a quarter of a pound of fresh butter, divided into four, and dredged with flour. When they are well browned, pour on them half a pint of beef or veal gravy, and let it simmer for a quarter of an hour. Season it slightly with cayenne. Just before it goes to table, stir in a table-spoonful of French mustard.
This is a good sauce for any sort of roast meat, or poultry.
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This is a fine accompaniment to cold poultry, which must be cut into small pieces as for chicken salad, using only the white meat. To begin the mayonnaise. Put into a shallow pan the yolks only of three fresh eggs, having strained out the specks. Having beaten them till light and thick, add, by degrees, a half pint of salad oil, stirring it in gradually, so that no oil whatever is to be seen on the surface. Then add two table-spoonfuls of tarragon vinegar. Next a few drops of shalot vinegar, or avery smallonion minced as finely as possible. If you have at handany clear meat gravy (for instance, veal,) stir in two or three table-spoonsful. Add the grated yellow rind, and the juice of a lemon. Pound as much spinach as will yield a small tea-cupful of green juice. Give it a short boil up, to take off the rawness, and mix it with the mayonnaise. When cool, pour it over the dish of cold poultry.
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Pound in a mortar five or six anchovies; a heaped table-spoonful of minced tarragon leaves; a shalot, or very small onion, two or three pickled gherkins, finely minced; the yolks of four hard-boiled eggs, a quarter of a pound of fresh butter, and a large table-spoonful of French mustard. If you have no good butter, mix a sufficient portion of olive oil to moisten it well. Let the whole be thoroughly mixed. Put it into a bowl, and set it on ice till wanted. Then mould it into pats of equal size. Arrange them on small glass or china plates, and send them to table for dinner company, to eat with the cheese.
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Mix well together a jill of India soy; a jill of chili vinegar; half a pint of walnut catchup, and a pint of mushroom-catchup. Shake the whole hard, and transfer it to small green bottles, putting a tea-spoonful of sweet oil at the top of each, and keep the sauce in a cool dry place. If you have not a fish castor, bring the store sauces to table in thesmall bottles they are kept in. When eating fish, mix a little of this with the melted butter on your plate.
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Curry powder originates in India, where it is much used as a peculiar flavoring for soups, stews, and hashes. With curry dishes, boiled rice is always served up, not only in a separate dish, but also heaped round the stew in a thick even border. To make curry powder, pound in a marble mortar three ounces of turmeric, three ounces of coriander seed, and a quarter of an ounce of cayenne; one ounce of mustard, one ounce of cardamoms, a half ounce of cummin seed, and half an ounce of mace. Let all these ingredients be thoroughly mixed in the mortar, and then sift it through a fine sieve, dry it for an hour before the fire, and put it into clean bottles, securing the corks well. Use from two to three table-spoonfuls at a time, in proportion to the size of the dish you intend to curry.
It may be mixed into the gravy of any of the preceding receipts for stews. Two ounces of finely grated cocoa-nut is a pleasant improvement to curried dishes, and is universally liked.
The curry powder you buy is frequently much adulterated with inferior articles. The best curry powder imported from India is of a dark green color, and not yellow or red. It has among its ingredients, tamarinds,notpreserved, as we always get them—but raw in the shell. These tamarindsimpart a pleasant acid to the mixture. For want of them use a lemon.
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Pound separately, and sift, six ounces of coriander seed, three of turmeric, one of black pepper, two of cummin, one of fennel seed, and half an ounce of cayenne. Mix all together, put them into a glass jar or bottle, and seal the cover.
With less turmeric, you may use ginger or sassafras.
Curry powder may be added to any stew of meat, poultry, or game. Boiled rice must always accompany a dish of curry.
The ingredients indispensable to all curries (and you may make a curry of any nice meat, or poultry, or even of oysters) is a very pungent powder, prepared for the purpose with turmeric. Also onions and boiled rice. In India there is always something acid in the mixture, as lemons, sour apple juice, or green tamarinds. The turmeric has a peculiar flavor of its own.
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The celebrated English sauces, for fish and game, Harvey's sauce, (which is the best,) Quin's, Reading's, Kitchener's, Soyer's, &c., are all very good, and keep well, if genuine. They are imported in small sealed bottles, and are to be had of all the best grocers. To make them at home, is so troublesome and expensive, that it isbetter to buy them. They are, however, very nice, and are generally introduced at dinner parties; a little being mixed on your plate with the melted butter. If you have no fish castors, bring these sauces to table in their own bottles, to be carried round by a servant.
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Take a pint of excellent port wine, the juice and grated yellow rinds of four large lemons, two dozen blades of mace and a large nutmeg, broken up; with a quarter of an ounce of prepared cochineal, or a small tea-spoonful of alkanet chips. Add a table-spoonful of fresh salad oil. Mix the whole well in a wide-mouthed glass jar with a lid. Let the ingredients infuse a fortnight; stirring it several times a day. Then strain it, pour it through a funnel into small bottles, and seal the corks. It will give a fine pink color to drawn butter. Eat it with any sort of fish or game.
Alkanet produces a much finer color than cochineal, but it must unite with some substance of an oily nature to give out its color to advantage. It is very cheap, and very beautiful, and to be had at the druggist's. Infuse it tied in a thin muslin bag.
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Take the half of a sixpenny loaf of bread. Cut off all the crust. Put the crumb (or soft part) into a bowl, and pour on sufficient good port wine to steep it. Soak the bread in the wine till dissolved.Then add two heaped table-spoonsful of fresh butter, and two heaped spoonsful of sugar; seasoning with powdered mace and nutmeg, and the grated yellow rind and juice of a lemon. Beat all together till very smooth. Put it into a sauce-pan, and give it one boil up; taking it off as soon as it comes to a boil. Send it to table hot. It is a fine company sauce for venison, or hare, or any sort of game.
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Take a large half-pint cup of the best fresh butter, and the same quantity of powdered loaf-sugar. Put them together in an earthen pan, and beat them to a light thick cream. Then mix a jill or wine-glass of boiling water, and a large wine-glass of the best brandy, with the grated yellow rind and juice of a large lemon or orange; and a small nutmeg, grated. Mix these ingredients, gradually, with the beaten butter and sugar; and transfer the sauce to a small tureen, putting a spoon or ladle into it.
If designed for sauce to a plum-pudding or any other large one, you will require a pint of butter, a pint of sugar, half a pint of boiling water with half a pint of brandy, two lemons or oranges, and alargenutmeg, or two small ones. Divide the sauce in two tureens. A boiled pudding for company requires no finer sauce than this.
Whererealcream is plenty, a bowl of it well sweetened with sugar, and flavored with nutmeg, is nice for any boiled pudding. If you add wine or lemon juice to cream sauce, previously mix theacid with the sugar, and make it very sweet before you put them to the cream, lest it should curdle.
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Split and break up a small stick of vanilla, and boil it in a very little milk, till all the vanilla flavor is extracted. Then strain it through very fine muslin, and stir it into the cream. Give it one boil up in a small porcelain sauce-pan; and sweeten it well with white sugar.
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Stir together (as in making pound cake) equal quantities of fresh butter and white sugar. This is the usual proportion; but if you can stir or beat it easily, try a little less butter, and a little more of the sugar. Grate in some nutmeg, and the yellow rind of a fresh lemon, and send it to table heaped on a small plate, with a tea-spoon near it.[E]
Many persons prefer, with plain puddings, cold butter on a butter plate, and sugar from the sugar-bowl; mixing it for themselves on their own plate. This is best for boiled fruit pudding or dumplings; and for egg or batter puddings, molasses or syrup is very good; and costs but little.
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Pick the cranberries clean, seeing that no stems, sticks, or dead leaves are left among them. Put them into a cullender, or sieve, and wash them through two waters. Cook them in a porcelain-lined, or enameled stew-pan, without any additional water. The water that remains about them after washing is quite sufficient for stewing them properly. No stewed fruit should be too thin or liquid. Keep a steady heat under the cranberries, stirring them up from the bottom frequently: and when they are soft, mash them with the back of the spoon. When they are quite shapeless, take them off the fire, and while they are very hot, stir in, gradually, an ample quantity of nicebrownsugar. They require much sweetening. Season them with nothing else. Their natural flavor is sufficient (if well sweetened) and cannot be improved by spice, lemon, or any of the usual condiments. Always buy the largest and ripest cranberries. The best things are cheapest in the end.
In stewing any sort of fruit, do not add the sugar till the fruit is done, and taken from the fire. If sweetened at the beginning, much of the strength of the sugar evaporates in cooking; besides rendering the fruit tough and hard, and retarding the progress of the stew.
In America, sweet sauce is eaten with any sort of roast meat. Send it to table cold. For company, put it into a blanc-mange mould, and turn it out in a shape, first dipping the mould, for a minute, in warm water to loosen it.
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Get fine juicy apples—bellflowers are the best for cooking. Sweet apples cook very badly—becoming tough, dry and tasteless. Green apples, if full grown, cook well, and have a pleasant acid.
For sauce, pare, core, and quarter or slice the apples. Wash the pieces in a cullender, and put them to stew, with only water enough to wet them a little. Apple stews that are thin and watery are disgraceful to the cook, or to the cook's mistress. Let them stew till you can mash them easily all through. Then take them off the fire, and sweeten them, adding the seasoning while the apples are warm. Season with rose-water, lemon juice, nutmeg; or with all these if for company. If you can get fresh lemon-peel, cut it into very thin slips, and put it in to stew with the apples at first. It is still better, and little more trouble, to grate the lemon-peel.
Fruit for pies should be stewed in the same manner as for sauce, and not sweetened till taken from the fire. Let the paste be baked empty in large deep plates, and when cool, filled to the brim with stewed fruit. A pie, (as we have seen them,) only half or one third full, looks very meanly—and tastes so.
All these fruit-sauces are good receipts for stewing fruit for pies or any other purpose.
We advise all families to have, among their kitchen utensils,bain maries, or double-kettles, putting the article to be stewed in the inner kettle, and the boiling water in the outside one. They are to be had of all sizes at the furnishing stores.They are also excellent for custards and boiled puddings.
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Core very nicely as many fine juicy apples as will fill a large baking-pan. All coring of apples should be done with a tin cover. This you can buy at a tinman's for a quarter dollar, and it is invaluable for the purpose. After coring the apples, pare them smooth and evenly. Put a large table-spoonful of cold water in the bottom of the baking-pan, and then put in the apples first, filling, with fine brown sugar, the hole from whence the core was taken out. To have them very nice, add some grated lemon-peel, or some rose-water. Set the pan into an oven, (not too hot,) close the oven, and bake till the apples are all broken and can be easily mashed. This way of making apple sauce, by baking in a close oven, will be found far superior to boiling or stewing them. They require no more water than is barely sufficient to give them a start at the bottom.
The flavoring (sugar, lemon, or rose,) may be deferred till the apples are baked, taken out of the oven and mashed. Then mix it in while hot.
Boiled apple sauce is usually spoiled with too much water, rendering it the consistence of thin pap, weak, washy, and mean.
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Get fine full-grown green gooseberries. Pick them over, and top andtail them. Wash them in a cullender or sieve through two waters. Put them into an enameled stew-pan, with only the water remaining on them after washing, and no sugar till after they are stewed to a mash, and taken from the fire. Then while hot, stir in brown sugar enough to make them very sweet. Serve them up cold. For company, before they are sweetened, press them through a sieve, using only the pulp. Then add the sugar; and mould the whole in a form.
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Take fine ripe currants, and strip them from the stems. Put them into a pan, and mash them with a large spoon, or a wooden beetle. Stew them in their own juice (no water,) and sweeten them when they are taken from the fire. For company, press the fruit through a sieve before you add the sugar, and shape it in a mould.
It will answer every purpose of regular currant jelly, to eat with game, venison, &c.
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Take juicy freestone peaches; pare and stone them, and cut them up. Save all the juice, and stew them in it. When quite soft, take them off the fire, and sweeten them. The flavor will be much improved by stewing with them a bunch of fresh peach leaves, to be taken out when the peaches are done. Or, if you cannot readily obtain the leaves, a handful of the freshpeach kernels, stewed with the fruit, (and to be taken out afterwards,) will answer the purpose.
It is well, even in the sunny side of a city garden, to plant two peach stones; so that when they grow into trees, you may have peach leaves at hand for improving the flavor of custards, and other things. Unless the trees are perfectly healthy, and the leaves green, do not use them.
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The richest and best dried peaches, are those that are dried with the skins on. The skins (however thick,) entirely dissolve in cooking, and become imperceptible when the fruit is well stewed. It is a great error to pare peaches for drying. Applesmustbe pared, for the skin is tougher than that of peaches, and does not dissolve in cooking.
To prepare dried peaches for stewing, pick them over carefully, throwing away all the imperfect pieces. Wash them in two cold waters, and then put them into a stew-pan, (adding no water,) and stew them till they are quite soft, and shapeless, and mash easily and smoothly in the pan. Sweeten them with plenty of brown sugar, as soon as they come off the fire.
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Wash the dried apples through a cullender, and puta very little waterwith them in the stew-pan. Being rather insipid, they require some additional flavor. Add cinnamon, or other spice of any sort you like, and the yellow rind of a fresh lemon or orange, pared very thin and cut into slips. When these apples are well stewed and mashed, sweeten them.
We believe, that when dried peaches can be procured, few will buy dried apples; they are so far inferior; being the poorest of dried fruit.
Dried cherries also are scarcely worth cooking, even if theyhavebeen stoned. Being tough and indigestible, they are very unwholesome, except for rough, hard-working people. If the stones are left in, dried cherries are fit for nothing.