A Course of Lectures on the Principles of Domestic Economy and Cookery Part 5

CHEESE CRUSTS.

For cheese crusts use bread that is a day or two old, baker's bread or home-made bread; baker's bread is the best for toast of all kinds, and this is a sort of toast. Cut the bread in even slices, rather small, cutting off the crusts. There is no waste in doing that, for I have already told you how to use up pieces of stale bread by making them into crumbs. Grate some cheese so that you have a tablespoonful of cheese for each little slice of bread. On each of the little pieces of bread put a tablespoonful of the grated cheese, a very little dust of pepper and salt and a small piece of b.u.t.ter not larger than a white dried bean. Put the pieces of bread in a pan, set the pan in a rather quick oven, and just brown the cheese crusts. If the oven is in a good condition it will toast the bread and brown the cheese in about ten minutes, or even less; they are very good, those little cheese crusts. You can use them either hot or cold. They are a very nice supper dish. They are very good with salad at dinner, with any green salad. Of course, if you serve them hot the cheese is a little more tender. Any kind of cheese will answer for making the crusts. I think that the ordinary American factory cheese is about as good as any other cheese. You do not want a rich expensive cheese for cheese crusts.

(At this point the stuffed shoulder of mutton was brought forth, done, the fan-shaped shoulder blade being stuck in to represent the tail of the duck, which the whole dish strongly resembled.)

GRAVY FOR MEAT.

There are about two tablespoonfuls of drippings in the pan. I am going to put a heaping tablespoonful of flour with it and stir until it is brown; then I am going to stir in gradually about a pint of boiling water, and season it with salt and pepper, and then I will send it down and show it to you. Make gravy in this way for any baked meat.

LECTURE SIXTH.

Our first dish this afternoon, ladies, will be roast chicken. The lesson will include fish and poultry. First, to choose a tender chicken, examine the tip end of the breastbone--the lower end of the breast bone, to see if it is soft; if it bends without breaking under pressure; in other words, if the cartilage has not hardened into bone, you may be sure that the chicken is young, and consequently probably tender. The market people have a favorite way of showing you that the chicken is tender by taking hold of the wing and giving the joint a twist. They say, "You see how tender it is!" But that is no test except of strength.

But there is no ingenuity which can simulate that soft cartilage on the end of the breast bone. That is always a sure test. After choosing the chicken--of course now I am speaking of dressed chicken, or chickens that are killed--after choosing the chicken, have it carefully picked and singed; then, if it is undrawn, wipe it with a wet towel, and proceed to draw it carefully without breaking the intestines. If it is drawn already the chances are that it will be imperfectly drawn and you will have to wash it. There is the disadvantage of having poultry drawn before it goes to the market, because where people draw poultry in large quant.i.ties they are very apt to do it carelessly. In that case it is necessary to wash it, but if you draw it carefully yourself you will not have to do that. By was.h.i.+ng, you of course take away the flavor, as I told you the other day, because you lose more or less of the blood.

Cut the skin of the back of the neck and take out the crop, then out off the neck close to the body, that leaves the skin so that you can draw it up and fasten it back. If this chicken was not already cut for drawing I should cut it at one side under one of the legs, so that when I came to sew it up and dress it I could hide the cut. This chicken has been drawn carefully and does not seem to need was.h.i.+ng. The liver and gizzard have been laid back inside. The entrails are all taken away. You can always tell by looking at the chicken whether the entrails are broken and whether it needs was.h.i.+ng. After you have drawn the chicken very carefully separate the gall from the liver. The gall is that little greenish bag that lies on one side of the liver; and you want to cut it off without breaking, because if you break it it will make bitter everything that it touches. Save whatever fat there is about the entrails, and put it in the baking pan with the chicken. The gizzard has been cut open from one side and the inside bag which contains gravel and straw taken out. But a very much easier way to dress the gizzard instead of opening it, is to cut away the bluish skin which lies on the outside, on both sides, without opening the gizzard at all, and cut out that piece of flesh. That is the only valuable portion of the gizzard; if you dress the gizzard in this way when it is not already opened you save yourself a great deal of trouble, for it is a very hard matter to open a gizzard like that and take away the bag which contains the gravel, especially if the poultry has been frozen, as the bag is apt to break and let out the gravel. Use the gizzard and liver for making gravy, and the neck also. Cut out the oil sac or bag which lies at the back of the tail. Then the chicken is ready for stuffing. In cutting off the feet cut them below the joint, not just at the joint. If you cut them just at the joint the skin and flesh will draw up in cooking. But if you cut them just below the joint you will find that they do not draw up. After cutting off the feet sc.r.a.pe the skin all round to make sure that there are no bits of feather or anything of that sort, and wipe it with a wet towel and you have the chicken in readiness to stuff.

Stuff it with any force meat that you like. You remember this morning that we made force meat by chopping a teaspoonful of onion and frying it in a tablespoonful of b.u.t.ter, then putting in with the fried onion a cupful of stale bread soaked in cold water, seasoning with salt and pepper and sweet herbs. I said also that you could add chopped meat, cold meat or eggs, or to make any desired addition to the force meat in the way of seasoning. A little grated cheese in stuffing is very nice.

You scarcely will realize what the seasoning is. I will use a little grated cheese this afternoon to make a force meat--very like what I made this morning, except in addition to the chopped onion, fried in a tablespoonful of b.u.t.ter, seasoned with salt and pepper, I shall put in half a cupful of grated cheese. You may like to know my way of chopping onion. In the first place, I make a lot of little cuts in one direction as far down as I think I shall need in order to get my teaspoonful; then I make little cuts in the other direction, and then by slicing it across you get your chopped onion. A very nice addition to force meat is chestnuts, either our ordinary American chestnut, or French or Italian chestnuts. These are quite large. I presume they are for sale at the fruit stores here. Our ordinary American chestnut is very good. Choose rather large chestnuts and either roast or boil them; take off the husks and skins and thus use them to stuff the chicken with, either simply using the chestnuts seasoned with salt, pepper and b.u.t.ter, or if you have boiled or roasted and skinned them, mix them with bread and seasoning. Then, after having prepared the force meat, you put it into the chicken, sew it up and truss it into shape. I will show you directly how to do that so as to keep the chicken plump, and so that it does not, in roasting, spread apart. I shall sew it with a trussing needle and a cord, or you might accomplish the same purpose, by using skewers, putting the skewers just where I put the cords. In sewing up a chicken after it is stuffed, remember what I said this morning; take large st.i.tches with coa.r.s.e cord so that you can easily see where to take the threads out when the chicken is done. After the chicken is trussed, if you are going to bake it, put it into a pan without any water, for the same reason that I gave you this morning. The water will soak it, half simmer it; you do not need water to keep it from burning, because a little drippings will soon come from the chicken; brown it and then dredge it with flour, and baste it every fifteen minutes or so. Bake it until it is tender and nicely brown; the time of course depends upon the heat of the oven. Truss the chicken first, pus.h.i.+ng the legs as far up as you can towards the breast, and run the trussing needle, which is simply a long needle, through so as to hold the legs fast. Then either bend the wings back in turning them, or simply fold them together and secure them with the same string. By drawing the string tight, you keep the bird plump; keep it drawn together, and when the bird is done all you have to do is to take these two ends of string in one hand, make one cut and pull the string out.

The liver, the gizzard, the heart, the neck and the feet, use in making gravy. Of course the gizzard, liver and heart are all right as they are now prepared. If you wish to add the feet, you will scald them and sc.r.a.pe off the skin. Then cut off the ends of the claws, and you have the feet perfectly clean; put them with the gizzard, liver and heart to boil as the basis of your gravy. The French people always save all the feet of all kinds of poultry. They prepare them in this way and put them into soups; sometimes they cook them till the bones grow gelatinous, till they are very soft and tender; they dress them with sauce and serve them as what they call an _entree_ or side dish. They make a dish which is more delicate than pigs' feet. Of course in a large kitchen where a great deal of poultry is used it is possible to make a very good-sized dish of them.

FRICa.s.sEED CHICKEN.

I shall use this chicken for frica.s.see; it has been singed, picked and wiped with a wet towel.

First, cut the skin down back of the neck, and cut off the neck. I shall talk about this chicken as if it was not drawn at all. Showing you how to cut it up and draw it at the same time. Cut off the neck and take out the crop, as I showed you with the other chicken. Then cut off the wings, taking a little of the breast with the wings. Find the joint where the wings join the body, cut at that joint; then, instead of cutting the wing right off short, take a little piece of the breast with it. That gives you a nice piece. Then cut the wing in two, and cut off the tip, which is dry; that you can cook in the frica.s.see, or not, as you please. It flavors, but there is very little meat on it. The other part of the wing you want, of course, to use. Put the pieces of chicken on two plates, putting the good pieces on one plate and the inferior pieces on the other. Having taken off the wing, take off what is called the wing side bone. Then cut forward and break off the shoulder bone.

The idea is to cut the breast into several good-sized pieces. Cutting in this way you sacrifice what is called the merry-thought or wishbone. You either can cut off the side bone or not. Cut off the other wing in the same way. Then cut off the leg and second joint together. Instead of cutting the leg in two pieces at both joints, cut it in three pieces, that gives you two pieces of the second joint. In cooking chicken for frica.s.see you want to have the pieces about one size, so that they will cook easily. Then if they are one size they are much easier to help.

Next, to separate the breast from the back bone, cut down through the ribs on each side. If the chicken has not been drawn be careful with your knife, not to cut into the entrails. Then you can take the breast off, and if the chicken is not drawn, all the entrails will be exposed, and you can draw it with perfect ease. The lungs of the chicken, which are those light red organs on the side of the back bone, are always used by the French in cookery, not only those organs in chicken but in the larger carca.s.ses of meat. They are quite as much food as the heart or liver. I am not in the habit of using them, but they are quite as available. After the breast has been taken off, cut it up in several pieces. First, cut off the entire tip, leaving that in one piece. Then cut the remainder in two or four pieces, according to its size. Next cut the back bone. There is a natural division in the upper part of the back bone that breaks there; cut that off and trim off the ribs. In cutting the lower part of the back bone, instead of cutting it just in two, making rather queer pieces to help, cut off the upper part of it leaving it entire, not splitting that part of it. In that way, cut off the portion called the "oysters,"--two little pieces of flesh in the upper part of the back bone, that are considered very nice. On one plate we have the inferior parts, on the other the nice parts of the chicken, being all cut in pieces of one size. It is easy to help, it cooks more evenly, and is rather nicer than if you had it in two or three sizes.

Part of the chicken I am going to make into a brown frica.s.see, and part of it I am going to fry. There would be thirteen pieces if we counted the two pieces of the back bone. There are half a dozen of the poor pieces, not counting the wing pieces or neck. The question is asked whether the cords or sinews should be drawn from the legs. You can do that with old poultry if you want to, because those cords never get very tender. It is not necessary to do it with medium tender poultry.

First brown the chicken, using either some of the chicken fat, or b.u.t.ter, or salad oil for browning it. Now, since the question of using salad oil in cooking has come up, suppose I cook this chicken with salad oil so that you can taste it. After all, that is the best test you possibly can have as to whether you like salad oil in cooking. I shall put in just salad oil enough to cover the bottom of the sauce pan. That is enough to prevent sticking. For a chicken of three pounds take about three or four tablespoonfuls of salad oil; just enough to cover the bottom of the sauce pan. First put the sauce pan containing the salad oil over the fire and let it get hot; then put in the chicken and brown it. Now, can you notice the slightly aromatic odor? That is the oil, and directly you notice that odor, and the oil begins to smoke, it is hot enough. As soon as the chicken is brown,--and you can brown it just as fast as you want to,--then put a heaping tablespoonful of flour over it--some of the ladies will have seen the same process in making the brown stew of meat the other day--and stir the chicken until the flour is brown. When the flour is brown on the chicken,--and that will be by the time you get it well stirred up,--then add boiling water enough to cover it. When the flour is brown among the chicken, put in boiling water enough to cover it, season it with pepper and salt, palatably, and let it cook until it is tender. That will take from half an hour to two hours, according to the toughness of the chicken. Remember the more slowly you cook it after it once begins to cook, the nicer it will be.

Cover up the sauce pan after the frica.s.see is seasoned, and cook it until it is tender. In the cooking of chicken the gravy that you make by putting boiling water on seems to boil away, and you may want to add a little more; just keep enough gravy over it to cover it, and when it is tender it is ready to serve. The odor you notice now is the aromatic odor of that salad oil, and is all that you will get in cooking with olive oil.

FRIED CHICKENS.

Next the fried chicken, Maryland style, will be prepared. We will fry the chicken, and then I will tell you about hominy. The Southern cooks use lard for frying, either lard entirely or half lard and half b.u.t.ter; enough to cover the bottom of the frying pan about half an inch. Let the fat get hot, put some flour on a plate, season it with salt and pepper, and roll the pieces of chicken in it. When the fat is hot in the pan and the chicken has been rolled in the flour, put it into the hot fat and fry it brown, first on one side and then on the other. Of course tender chicken is generally used for this dish so that by the time it is fried brown it is done. Fry the chicken until it is tender and brown. Take up the chicken when it is brown, put it on a hot dish; in the frying pan where it was fried, put enough cream to make a good gravy, stirring it constantly. You see there will be flour on the pan off the fried chicken that will thicken the gravy. Season the gravy with salt and pepper, pour it over the chicken and serve it. Some of the colored cooks whom I have seen prepare this dish first dip their chicken in water before rolling it in the b.u.t.ter and flour. That is for the purpose of making more flour stick to it; but there is always this disadvantage, if you do that there will be some particles of water remaining, and when you put it in the hot fat it will sputter very much. You can do that or not as you like.

While the chicken is being browned I will tell you how to prepare the hominy. Of course the chicken is to be seasoned with more pepper and salt if you wish, in addition to what you put on in the first place with the flour.

HOMINY.

First pick the hominy over and wash it. Fine hominy is generally used for this dish. Put it over the fire in cold water, a cupful of hominy to about four cupfuls of water. Boil it and stir it often enough to prevent sticking, until it begins to be tender. Boil it for an hour, until it begins to grow tender. Then place it where there is no danger of burning, pour off the water, or leave off the cover of the sauce pan so that the water will evaporate. The hominy will need to cook pretty nearly an hour, and when it is done or nearly done it should be as thick as hasty pudding. If you have a double boiler you can put in very much less water, for there is no danger of burning. I think you would need only about half or a little more than half as much water. Only take care to leave the cover off the kettle if you find that the hominy is going to be thinner than hasty pudding when it is nearly done. If the hominy is used rather coa.r.s.e, about five minutes before it is done mix a tablespoonful of flour with just enough water or milk to make it a thin liquid, and stir it into the hominy. That will hold it together when it is cold, so that it can be cut into slices. In making hasty pudding you can put that tablespoonful of flour in to hold it together when it is cold. You want to allow long enough for the flour to boil thoroughly; before dis.h.i.+ng the hominy when it is tender pour it into an earthen dish or shallow tin pan wet with cold water, and let it get cold and hard.

Always make this in advance of your fried chicken. You want the hominy cold and solid so that you can cut it. Cut it in little cakes about an inch thick and two inches square. These little cakes of hominy are to be fried either in the pan with the chicken or in another pan by the side of the chicken, and served on a dish with the chicken.

FRIED FISH.

I have here some fish which I shall fry. We will not try broiled fish, because this has been frozen; we will do that some other day. In frying fish use either Indian meal or flour, seasoned with salt and pepper, to roll the fish in. Fry the fish in lard or the drippings from salt pork.

In case you use salt pork, fry it brown. Olive oil is one of the nicest fats for frying fish. You may have your choice whether I fry with lard or oil. We will fry in oil. If you use lard at all you want it to be very nice. In the frying pan I shall put about half an inch of oil; that is less than half a cupful. Put it over the fire and let it get hot, just as I did for the chicken. This is frozen fish that has been thawed.

Cut the fish in pieces about two inches square and roll them either in flour seasoned with pepper and salt, or Indian meal, as I told you; put them into the oil when the oil is hot. As soon as the fish is browned nicely it will be done. You can add more seasoning than there is in the flour. Use Indian meal with pork; it is particularly nice.

LECTURE SEVENTH.

Our lesson this morning, ladies, will begin with pea soup with crusts.

This soup I shall make with the addition of a little onion. You remember the other day we made pea soup perfectly plain. We shall cook salt codfish stewed in cream, venison with currant jelly, stewed carrots, and cabinet pudding. First the peas will be put on the fire to boil, and I shall begin to make the pudding.

CABINET PUDDING.

The cabinet pudding as I shall make it to-day will be rather elaborate.

You can make it more plainly. It is made of cake,--sponge cake is the best,--French candied fruit, eggs and milk. So that, first, I shall give you the recipe for the pudding as I make it to-day, and then I will give you the recipe for the plainer form. For the pudding use a pudding mould of the size I have in my hand (holding about a quart), about half a pound of French candied fruit, which you can get at the confectionaries here; I have to-day candied cherries, a little candied pear, a green lime candied, a small orange, and an apricot. I shall also use a very little citron, about an ounce of citron. That I want simply for the effect of the green part of the citron. Put the citron in the form of small leaves. The large fruits cut in slices, which you may leave round or cut in the form of stars or to imitate a flower bud. After you have cut the fruit, b.u.t.ter a perfectly plain tin pudding mould thickly with cold b.u.t.ter,--quite thickly. Have the b.u.t.ter cold; lay the fruit against the mould in the form of a wreath, or a star, or any fanciful form you like, some on the bottom of the mould and some on the sides. The cold b.u.t.ter will hold the fruit in place. After part of the fruit is laid against the sides and bottom of the mould, then cut the sponge cake in large slices about half an inch thick, one slice the size and shape of the bottom of the mould, and either one long slice that will go round the sides of the mould inside; or two or three pieces, according to the size of your cake. Generally, in cities where there are confectionaries, you can buy sponge cake baked in large thin sheets. You know the form in which it is used for the bakers' _charlotte russe_. This is baked in large sheets; cut it in small sheets and fit it into the moulds.

Because it is very thin you can work with it very much better than you can with that which is thicker. This will be very apt to break, because it is very stiff. If you are to shape the cake to your mould the cake should be perfectly soft and flexible.

After the first layer of cake is put against the mould, then use the rest of the cake cut in small pieces, or broken, and put into the mould in layers with the rest of the fruit. You see, first you use some of the fruit to ornament the inside of the mould, then some of the cake to line the inside of the mould. That gives you what will be the outside of your pudding when it is done. Then when the mould is decorated with fruit and lined with cake, put the rest of the cake and fruit into the mould in layers. Make a custard of a pint of milk and six eggs, because for this pudding the custard must be firm enough to hold the pudding in shape so that it can be turned out of the mould; also a quarter of a pound of sugar; that is about four heaping tablespoonfuls of sugar.

After the custard is made, pour it into the mould which you have filled with cake and fruit, and let it stand so that all the custard may be absorbed by the cake. When the custard has been entirely absorbed by the cake, set the mould in the steamer or in the sauce pan with water to reach two-thirds up the side of the mould. Put the cover on the steamer, or sauce pan, and steam it until the custard is firm. That will generally take about an hour and a half. It may take a little longer, but be quite sure that the custard is firm. Do not cook the custard first, just mix it up. In order to be sure that the custard is firm before you attempt to turn the pudding out, you want to run a fork or a small knife down through the thickest part in the middle of the pudding; move it backward and forward; look into the pudding to make sure that the custard is done. As long as the custard looks liquid at all, you must keep on cooking. When the pudding is done take the mould out of the steamer, using a towel, because the mould will be hot. Take a dish or platter that fits just over the top of the mould; have the inside of the platter the size of the top of the mould; put the platter over the mould and turn it upside down; then you will find that you can lift the mould from the pudding without any trouble, and the pudding will remain there on the platter. This pudding I shall serve with-powdered sugar. It is exceedingly rich. It is not necessary to have a sauce with it because it is so rich. But you can use, if you wish, any of the nice pudding sauces that I have told you of. This is a pudding which in Europe is served as the greatest luxury. It takes its name "cabinet" pudding from the fact that it is served in the little rooms, or cabinets, that is, the private rooms where special dinners or suppers are given in the European restaurants. What is called cabinet pudding in the restaurants and hotels in this country is usually a nice bread pudding made with fruit, and it is not decorated in this way. Trouble is not taken to decorate the mould. It is simply a nice bread pudding made with custard, with some raisins or currants in it. That is what is called cabinet pudding in this country in the restaurants and hotels. So you can make the memorandum that you can use instead of the cake, bread; and instead of the French fruit, simply raisins, currants and citron. You can spend as much time and ingenuity decorating the pudding as you like, but I have done this very quickly and very simply. The pudding can be served hot, or it can be cooled and then put on the ice and made very cold. You noticed that in filling the mould I pressed the cake down on the inside, because, as it is saturated with the custard, of course it would sink down. You want to press the cake well down in the mould, and have a layer of cake on top, the last layer of cake.

_Question._ If you made it of bread wouldn't you have to use more sugar in it?

MISS CORSON. Yes, if you use bread you would have to use more sugar.

_Question._ Do you have any salt in it?

MISS CORSON. You don't need to put any salt in it. You can if you want to. There is no necessity for it, because there will be salt both in your bread and in your cake.

_Question._ Do you flavor the custard?

MISS CORSON. No, just the plainest custard. You will find that the French fruit will give the custard all the flavor you require. You will find that if you put the custard into a pitcher after it is made you can pour it into the pudding very much more readily than if you try to pour it from the bowl. Either put it into a pitcher or use a cup, because you will have to pour it slowly in order to let it thoroughly absorb.

PEA SOUP WITH CRUSTS.

Next take the recipe for pea soup. Some of the ladies who were at the Monday afternoon lesson will need only to make one or two notes, and the others will take the full recipe. For pea soup, four quarts, use a cupful of dried peas, yellow split peas. Pick them over, wash them in cold water, put them over the fire in two quarts of cold water and let them heat slowly. As the water heats it softens the peas. When it is boiling add half a cupful more of cold water and let that heat; then add more cold water; continue to add cold water, half a cupful at a time, until you have used two quarts more of cold water in addition to the first two quarts. The object of adding cold water slowly is to soften the peas, by reducing the heat of the water and then gradually increasing it again you soften the peas so that you can cook them in from an hour and a half to two hours. Boil them very slowly without the addition of salt until they are soft enough to rub through a sieve with a potato masher. After they are rubbed through the sieve put them again into the soup kettle with a tablespoonful of b.u.t.ter and a tablespoonful of flour rubbed to a smooth paste. Stir the soup over the fire until the b.u.t.ter and flour are entirely dissolved; then season the soup palatably with salt and pepper and let it boil for two or three minutes. While it is boiling cut two slices of stale bread--bakers' bread is the best, or very light home-made bread--in little dice about half an inch square.

Put a couple of tablespoonfuls of b.u.t.ter in a frying pan over the fire and let the b.u.t.ter begin to brown, then throw the dice of stale bread into the b.u.t.ter and stir the bread until it is brown. Take it out of the b.u.t.ter with a skimmer, if it has not absorbed all the b.u.t.ter, and lay it for a moment on brown paper, and then put it on a hot dish to send to the table with the soup. Do not put the bread into the soup unless you are going to serve at once, because it will soften a little; but you will find that fried bread will soften less quickly than toasted bread.

A great many people put small squares of toast in the pea soup, but that softens at once. If you have a frying kettle which you use for doughnuts or fritters, or anything of that sort, partly full of frying fat, you can heat it and fry the bread in that instead of frying it with the b.u.t.ter in a frying pan. Have the fat smoking hot; the bread browns very quickly; take it out on a skimmer and lay it on a brown paper for a moment; then it is ready for the soup. These little fried crusts of bread are called _croutons_ or crusts in the cookery books. I am going to add an onion fried in b.u.t.ter to the soup to-day. Put that in, if you use it, when you first begin to cook the soup. One onion, peeled, sliced, and fried light brown in a tablespoonful of b.u.t.ter. You could also use the bones from ham, cold roast ham, cold boiled ham, or the bones of beef either raw or cooked, in the place of the onion, or in addition to the onion, as you like. Remember all those things give distinct flavors to the pea soup. If you put any kind of bones in, put them in with the peas at the beginning and boil them with the peas.