The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, Adapted to the Use of Private Families. Eaton Mary
a little flour. If done white, a little white gravy and cream.
BUTTERED ORANGES. Grate off a little of the outside rind of four Seville oranges, and cut a round hole at the blunt end opposite the stalk, large enough to take out the pulp and seeds and juice. Then pick the seeds and skin from the pulp, rub the oranges with a little salt, and lay them in water for a short time. The bits cut out are to be saved. Boil the fruit in fresh water till they are tender, shifting the water to take out the bitterness. In the meantime make a thin syrup with fine sugar, put the oranges into it, and boil them up. As the quantity of syrup need not be enough to cover them, turn them round, that each part may partake of the syrup, and let them remain in it hot till they are wanted. About half an hour before serving, put some sugar to the pulp, and set it over the fire; mix it well, and let it boil. Then add a spoonful of white wine for every orange, give it a boil, put in a bit of fresh butter, and stir it over the fire to thicken. Fill the oranges with it, and serve them with some of the syrup in the dish, with the bits on the top.
BUTTERED ORANGE-JUICE. Mix the juice of seven Seville oranges with four spoonfuls of rose-water, and add the yolks of eight and the whites of four eggs well beaten. Strain the liquor on half a pound of sugar pounded, stir it over a gentle fire; and when it begins to thicken, add a piece of butter the size of a small walnut. Keep it over the fire a few minutes longer, then pour it into a flat dish, and serve it to eat cold. If no silver saucepan for the purpose, do it in a china bason in a saucepan of boiling water, the top of which will just receive the bason.
BUTTERED PRAWNS. Take them out of the husk; warm them with a little good gravy, a bit of butter and flour, a taste of nutmeg, pepper and salt. Simmer them together a minute or two, and serve with sippets; or with cream sauce, instead of brown. Shrimps are done in the same manner.
BUTTERED RICE. Wash and pick some rice, drain, and set it on the fire, with new milk sufficient to make it swell. When tender, pour off the milk, and add a bit of butter, a little sugar and pounded cinnamon. Shake and keep it from burning on the fire, and serve it up as a sweet dish.
C
Cabbage. Wash and pick it carefully, and if very large, quarter it. Put it into a saucepan with plenty of boiling-water, and a large spoonful of salt; if any scum rises, take it off, and boil it till the stalk is tender. Keep the vegetable well covered with water all the time of boiling, and see that no smoke or dirt arises from stirring the fire. With careful management the cabbage will look as beautiful when dressed, as it did when growing. The flavour of an old cabbage may be much improved, by taking it up when half done, and putting it directly into another saucepan of fresh boiling water. When taken up, drain it in a cullender. It may be chopped and warmed with a piece of butter, pepper and salt, or sent to table whole with melted butter. Savoys and greens in general are dressed in the same way.
CAKES. In making and baking cakes the following particulars should be attended to. The currants should be nicely picked and washed, dried in a cloth, and set before the fire. If damp, they will make cakes or puddings heavy. Before they are added, a dust of dry flour should be scattered among them, and then shaken together, which will make the cake or pudding lighter. Eggs should be beaten a long time, whites and yolks apart, and always strained. Sugar should be rubbed to a powder on a clean board, and sifted through a fine hair or lawn sieve. Lemon peel requires to be pared very thin, and with a little sugar beaten to a paste in a marble mortar. It should then be mixed with a little wine or cream, so as to divide easily among the other ingredients. After all the articles are put into the pan, they should be long and thoroughly beaten, as the lightness of the cake depends much on their being well incorporated. Both black and white plumb cakes, being made with yeast, require less butter and eggs, and eat equally light and rich. If the leaven be only of flour, milk and water, and yeast, it becomes more tough, and is less easily divided, than if the butter be first put with those ingredients, and the dough afterwards set to rise by the fire. The heat of the oven is of great importance for cakes, especially large ones. If not pretty quick, the batter will not rise; and if too quick, put some white paper over the cake to prevent its being burnt. If not long enough lighted to have a body of heat, or it is become slack, the cake will be heavy. To know when it is soaked, take a broad-bladed knife that is very bright, and thrust it into the centre; draw it out instantly, and if the paste in any degree adheres, return the cake to the oven, and close it up. If the heat is sufficient to raise but not to soak the baking, a little fresh fuel should be introduced, after taking out the cakes and keeping them hot, and then returning them to the oven as quickly as possible. Particular care however should be taken to prevent this inconvenience, when large cakes are to be baked.
CAKE TRIFLE. Bake a rice cake in a mould; and when cold, cut it round with a sharp knife, about two inches from the edge, taking care not to perforate the bottom. Put in a thick custard, and some spoonfuls of raspberry jam; and then put on a high whip.
CALF'S FEET BROTH. Boil two feet in three quarts of water till reduced to half the quantity; strain it, and set it by. When to be used, take off the fat, put a large tea-cupful of the jelly into a saucepan, with half a glass of sweet wine, a little sugar and nutmeg, and heat it up till it be ready to boil. Then take a little of it, and beat it by degrees to the yolk of an egg, adding a bit of butter the size of a nutmeg; stir it all together, but do not let it boil. Grate a little fresh lemon peel into it. – Another way is to boil two calves' feet with two ounces of veal, and two of beef, the bottom of a penny loaf, two or three blades of mace, half a nutmeg, and a little salt, in three quarts of water, till reduced to half the quantity. Then strain it, and take off the fat.
CALF'S FEET JELLY. Boil two feet, well cleaned, in five pints of water till they are broken, and the water half wasted. Strain it, take off the fat when cold, and remove the jelly from the sediment. Put it into a saucepan, with sugar, raisin wine, lemon juice and lemon peel. When the flavour is rich, add the whites of five eggs well beaten, and their shells broken. Set the saucepan on the fire, but do not stir the jelly after it begins to warm. Let it boil twenty minutes after it rises to a head, then pour it through a flannel bag, first dipping the jelly bag in hot water to prevent waste, and squeezing it quite dry. Run the jelly repeatedly through the bag, until it is quite clear, and then put it into glasses or forms. The following method will greatly facilitate the clearing of the jelly. When the mixture has boiled twenty minutes, throw in a tea-cupful of cold water; let it boil five minutes longer, then take the saucepan off the fire covered close, and keep it half an hour. It will afterwards be so clear as to need only once running through the bag, and much waste will be prevented. – Another way to make jelly is to take three calf's feet, or two cow-heels, that have been only scalded, and boil them in four quarts of water, till it be half wasted. Remove the jelly from the fat and sediment, mix with it the juice of a Seville orange and twelve lemons, the peels of three ditto, the whites and shells of twelve eggs, brown sugar to taste, nearly a pint of raisin wine, one ounce of coriander seed, a quarter of an ounce of allspice, a bit of cinnamon, and six cloves, all bruised and previously mixed together. The jelly should boil fifteen minutes without stirring, and then be cleared through a flannel bag. Take a little of the jelly while running, mix it with a tea-cupful of water in which a piece of beet root has been boiled, and run it through the bag when all the rest is run out. The other jelly being cooled on a plate, this will serve to garnish it. Jelly made in this way will have a fine high colour and flavour. But in all cases, to produce good jelly, the feet should only be scalded to take off the hair. Those who sell them ready prepared generally boil them too long, and they become in consequence less nutricious. If scalded only, the liquor will require greater care in removing the fat; but the jelly will be far stronger, and of course allow more water. Jelly is equally good if made of cow-heels nicely cleaned, and will be much stronger than what is made from calf's feet.
CALF'S FEET PUDDING. Boil four feet quite tender, pick off the meat, and chop it fine. Add some grated bread, a pound of chopped suet, half a pint of milk, six eggs, a pound of currants, four ounces of citron, two ounces of candied peel, a grated nutmeg, and a glass of brandy. Butter the cloth and flour it, tie it close, and boil it three hours.
CALF'S HEAD BOILED. Clean it carefully and soak it in water, that it may look very nice, and take out the brains for sauce. Wash them well, tie them up in a cloth, with a little sage and parsley; put them into the pot at the same time with the head, and scum the water while boiling. A large head will take two hours, and when the part which joined the neck becomes