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
will cut out very bright and fine.
BUNS. To make a good plain bun, that may be eaten with or without toasting and butter, rub four ounces of butter into two pounds of flour, four ounces of sugar, a nutmeg, a few Jamaica peppers, and a dessert-spoonful of caraways. Put a spoonful or two of cream into a cup of yeast, and as much good milk as will make the above into a light paste. Set it to rise by the fire till the oven be ready, and bake the buns quickly on tins. – To make some of a richer sort, mix one pound and a half of dried flour with half a pound of sugar. Melt eighteen ounces of butter in a little warm water, add six spoonfuls of rose-water, and knead the above into a light dough, with half a pint of yeast. Then mix in five ounces of caraway comfits, and put some on them.
BURNS. In slight cases, the juice of onions, a little ink or brandy rubbed immediately on the part affected, will prevent blisters. The juice of burdock, mixed with an equal quantity of olive oil, will make a good ointment for the purpose, and the fresh leaves of that plant may also be applied as a kind of plaster. Houseleek used by itself, or mixed with cream, will afford quick relief in external inflammations. A little spirit of turpentine, or linseed oil, mixed with lime water, if kept constantly to the part will remove the pain. But warm vinegar and water, frequently applied with a woollen cloth, is most to be depended on in these cases.
BURNT CREAM. Boil a pint of cream with a stick of cinnamon, and some lemon peel. Take it off the fire, and pour it very slowly into the yolks of four eggs, stirring it till half cold. Sweeten it, take out the spice, and pour it into a dish. When cold, strew over it some white pounded sugar, and brown it with a salamander. Or, make a rich custard without sugar, and boil in it some lemon peel. When cold, sift over it plenty of white sugar, and brown the top with a salamander.
BUTTER. No one article of family consumption is of greater consequence than butter of a superior quality, and no one requires more care and management. It possesses various degrees of goodness, according to the food on which the cows are pastured, and the manner in which the dairy is conducted; but its sweetness is not affected by the cream being turned, of which it is made. When cows are in turnips, or eat cabbages, the taste is strong and disagreeable; and to remedy this, the following methods have been tried with advantage. When the milk is strained into the pans, put to every six gallons one gallon of boiling water. Or dissolve one ounce of nitre in a pint of spring water, and put a quarter of a pint to every fifteen gallons of milk. Or, in churning, keep back a quarter of a pint of sour cream, and put it into a well-scalded pot, into which the next cream is to be gathered. Stir that well, and do so with every fresh addition. – To make Butter, skim the milk in the summer, when the sun has not heated the dairy. At that season it should stand for butter twenty-four hours without skimming, and forty-eight in winter. Deposit the cream-pot in a very cold cellar, unless the dairy itself is sufficiently cold. If you cannot churn daily, shift the cream into scalded fresh pots; but never omit churning twice a week. If possible, place the churn in a thorough air; and if not a barrel one, set it in a tub of water two feet deep, which will give firmness to the butter. When the butter is come, pour off the buttermilk, and put the butter into a fresh scalded pan, or tubs, which have afterwards been in cold water. Pour water on it, and let it lie to acquire some hardness before it is worked; then change the water, and beat it with flat boards so perfectly, that not the least taste of buttermilk remain, and that the water which must be often changed, shall be quite clear. Then work some salt into it, weigh, and make it into forms; throw them into cold water, in an earthen pan with a cover. Nice cool butter will then be had in the hottest weather. It requires more working in hot than in cold weather; but care should be taken at all times not to leave a particle of buttermilk, or a sour taste, as is too often done. – To preserve Butter, take two parts of the best common salt, one part of fine loaf-sugar, and one of saltpetre; beat them well together. To sixteen ounces of butter, thoroughly cleansed from the milk, add one ounce of this mixture: work it well, and pot down the butter when it becomes firm and cold. Butter thus preserved is the better for keeping, and should not be used under a month. This article should be kept from the air, and is best in pots of well-glazed ware, that will hold from ten to fourteen pounds each. Put some salt on the top; and when that is turned to brine, if not enough to cover the butter entirely, add some strong salt and water. It then requires only to be covered from the dust, and will be good for winter use. – In purchasing Butter at market, recollect that if fresh, it ought to smell like a nosegay, and be of an equal colour throughout. If sour in smell, it has not been sufficiently washed: if veiny and open, it is probably mixed with stale butter, or some of an inferior quality. To ascertain the quality of salt butter, put a knife into it, and smell it when drawn out: if there is any thing rancid or unpleasant, the butter is bad. Salt butter being made at different times, the layers in casks will greatly vary; and it is not easy to ascertain its quality, except by unhooping the cask, and trying it between the staves.
BUTTER DISH. Roll butter in different forms, like a cake or a pine, and mark it with a tea-spoon. Or roll it in crimping rollers, work it through a cullender, or scoop it with a tea-spoon; mix it with grated beef, tongue, or anchovies. Garnish with a wreath of curled parsley, and it will serve as a little dish.
BUTTERMILK, if made of sweet cream, is a delicious and very wholesome article of food. Those who can relish sour buttermilk, will find it still more light, and it is reckoned very beneficial in consumptive cases. If not very sour, it is also as good as cream to eat with fruit; but it should be sweetened with white sugar, and mixed with a very little milk. It does equally well for cakes and rice puddings, and of course it is economical to churn before the cream is too stale for any thing but to feed pigs. – The celebrated Dr. Boerhaäve recommended the frequent use of sweet buttermilk in all consumptive cases, and that it should form the whole of the patient's drink, while biscuits and rusks, with ripe and dried fruits of various kinds, should chiefly be depended on as articles of food. For this purpose take the milk from the cow into a small churn; in about ten minutes begin churning, and continue till the flakes of butter swim about pretty thick, and the milk is discharged of all the oily particles, and appears thin and blue. Strain it through a sieve, and let the patient drink it as frequently as possible.
BUTTERMILK PUDDING. Warm three quarts of new milk, turn it with a quart of buttermilk, and drain the curd through a sieve. When dry pound in a marble mortar, with nearly half a pound of sugar, a lemon boiled tender, the crumb of a roll grated, a nutmeg grated, six bitter almonds, four ounces of warm butter, a tea-cupful of good cream, the yolks of five and whites of three eggs, a glass of sweet wine and a glass of brandy. When well incorporated, bake in small cups or bowls well buttered. If the bottom be not brown, use a salamander; but serve as quick as possible, and with pudding sauce.
BUTTERED CRABS. Pick out the inside when boiled, beat it up in a little gravy, with wine, pepper, salt, nutmeg, a few crumbs of bread, a piece of butter rolled in a little flour, and some vinegar or lemon juice. Serve it up hot.
BUTTERED EGGS. Beat four or five eggs, yolk and white together; put a quarter of a pound of butter in a bason, and then put that into boiling water. Stir it till melted, then put that butter and the eggs into a saucepan; keep a bason in your hand, just hold the saucepan in the other over a slow part of the fire, shaking it one way, as it begins to warm. Pour it into the bason and back again, then hold it over the fire, stirring it constantly in the saucepan, and pouring it into the bason, more perfectly to mix the egg and butter, until they shall be hot without boiling. Serve on toasted bread, or in a bason, to eat with salt fish or red herrings.
BUTTERED LOAF. Take three quarts of new milk, and add as much rennet as is sufficient to turn it; then break the curd, and drain off all the whey through a clean cloth. Pound it in a stone mortar, add the white of one and the yolks of six eggs, a good handful of grated bread, half as much of fine flour, and a little salt. Mix them well together with the hand, divide the whole into four round loaves, and place them upon white paper. After they are well buttered, varnish them all over with a feather, dipped in the yolk of an egg stirred up with a little beer. Set the loaves in a quick oven three quarters of an hour; while baking, take half a pound of new butter, add to it four spoonfuls of water, half a nutmeg grated, and sugar sufficient to sweeten it. Stir them together over the fire till they boil; when sufficiently thickened, draw the loaves from the oven, open their tops, pour in the butter and sugar, and send them up with sugar strewed over them.
BUTTERED LOBSTERS. Pick out the meat, cut and warm it, with a little weak brown gravy, nutmeg, salt, pepper, butter,