Part 11

ANCHOVY SAUCE.--Soak eight anchovies for three or four hours, changing the water every hour. Then put them into a sauce-pan with a quart of cold water. Set them on hot coals and simmer them till they are entirely dissolved, and till the liquid is diminished two-thirds. Then strain it, stir two glasses of red wine, and add to it about half a pint of melted butter.

Heat it over again, and send it to table with salmon or fresh cod.

CELERY SAUCE.--Take a large bunch of young celery. Wash and pare it very clean. Cut it into pieces, and boil it gently in a small quantity of water, till it is quite tender. Then add a little powdered mace and nutmeg, and a very little pepper and salt. Take a tolerably large piece of butter, roll it well in flour, and stir it into the sauce. Boil it up again, and it is ready to send to table.

You may make it with cream, thus:--Prepare and boil your celery as above, adding some mace, nutmeg, a piece of butter the size of a walnut, rolled in flour; and half a pint of cream. Boil all together.

Celery sauce is eaten with boiled poultry.

When celery is out of season, you may use celery seed, boiled in the water which you afterwards use for the melted butter, but strained out after boiling.

NASTURTIAN SAUCE.--This is by many considered superior to caper sauce and is eaten with boiled mutton. It is made with the green seeds of nasturtians, pickled simply in cold vinegar.

Cut about six ounces of butter into small bits, and put them into a small sauce-pan. Mix with a wine-glass of water, sufficient flour to make a thick batter, pour it on the butter, and hold the sauce-pan over hot coals, shaking it quickly round, till the butter is melted. Let it just boil up, and then take it from the fire. Thicken it with the pickled nasturtians and send it to table in a boat.

Never pour melted butter over any thing, but always send it to table in a sauce-tureen or boat.

WHITE ONION SAUCE.--Peel a dozen onions, and throw them into salt and water to keep them white. Then boil them tender. When done, squeeze the water from them, and chop them. Have ready some butter that has been melted rich and smooth with milk or cream instead of water. Put the onions into the melted butter, and boil them up at once. If you wish to have them very mild, put in a turnip with them at the first boiling.

Young white onions, if very small, need not be chopped, but may be put whole into the butter.

Use this sauce for rabbits, tripe, boiled poultry, or any boiled fresh meat.

BROWN ONION SAUCE.--Slice some large mild Spanish onions. Cover them with butter, and set them over a slow fire to brown. Then add salt and cayenne pepper to your taste, and some good brown gravy of roast meat, poultry or game, thickened with a bit of butter rolled in flour that has first been browned by holding it in a hot pan or shovel over the fire. Give it a boil, skim it well, and just before you take it off, stir in a half glass of port or claret, and the same quantity of mushroom catchup.

Use this sauce for roasted poultry, game, or meat.

MUSHROOM SAUCE.--Wash a pint of small button mushrooms,--remove the stems and the outside skin. Stew them slowly in veal gravy or in milk or cream, seasoning them with pepper and salt, and adding a piece of butter rolled in a large proportion of flour. Stew them till quite tender, now and then shaking the pan round.

The flavour will be heightened by having salted a few the night before in a covered dish, to extract the juice, and then stirring it into the sauce while stewing.

This sauce may be served up with poultry, game, or beef-steaks.

In gathering mushrooms take only those that are of a dull pearl colour on the outside, and that have the under part tinged with pale pink.

Boil an onion with them. If there is a poisonous one among them the onion will turn black. Then throw away the whole.

EGG SAUCE.--Boil four eggs ten minutes. Dip them into cold water to prevent their looking blue. Peel off the shell. Chop the yolks of all, and the whites of two, and stir them into melted butter. Serve this sauce with boiled poultry or fish.

BREAD SAUCE.--Put some grated crumbs of stale bread into a sauce-pan, and pour over them some of the liquor in which poultry or fresh meat has been boiled. Add some plums or dried currants that have been picked and washed. Having simmered them till the bread is quite soft, and the currants well plumped, add melted butter or cream.

This sauce is for a roast pig.

MINT SAUCE.--Take a large bunch of young green mint; if old the taste will be unpleasant. Wash it very clean. Pick all the leaves from the stalks. Chop the leaves very fine, and mix them with cold vinegar, and a large proportion of powdered sugar. There must be merely sufficient vinegar to moisten the mint well, but by no means enough to make the sauce liquid. It should be very sweet.

It is only eaten in the spring with roast lamb. Send it to table in a sauce-tureen.

CAPER SAUCE.--Take two large table-spoonfuls of capers and a little vinegar. Stir them for some time into half a pint of thick melted butter.

This sauce is for boiled mutton.

If you happen to have no capers, pickled cucumber chopped fine, or the pickled pods of radish seeds, may be stirred into the butter as a tolerable substitute, or nasturtians.

PARSLEY SAUCE.--Wash a bunch of parsley in cold water. Then boil it about six or seven minutes in salt and water. Drain it, cut the leaves from the stalks, and chop them fine. Have ready some melted butter, and stir in the parsley. Allow two small table-spoonfuls of leaves to half a pint of butter.

Serve it up with boiled fowls, rock-fish, sea-bass, and other boiled fresh fish. Also with knuckle of veal, and with calf's head boiled plain.

APPLE SAUCE.--Pare, core, and slice some fine apples. Put them into a sauce-pan with just sufficient water to keep them from burning, and some grated lemon-peel. Stew them till quite soft and tender. Then mash them to a paste, and make them very sweet with brown sugar, adding a small piece of butter and some nutmeg.

Apple sauce is eaten with roast pork, roast goose and roast ducks.

Be careful not to have it thin and watery.

CRANBERRY SAUCE.--Wash a quart of ripe cranberries, and put them into a pan with about a wine-glass of water. Stew them slowly, and stir them frequently, particularly after they begin to burst. They require a great deal of stewing, and should be like a marmalade when done.

After you take them from the fire, stir in a pound of brown sugar.

When they are thoroughly done, put them into a deep dish, and set them away to get cold.

You may strain the pulp through a cullender or sieve into a mould, and when it is in a firm shape send it to table on a glass dish. Taste it when it is cold, and if not sweet enough, add more sugar. Cranberries require more sugar than any other fruit, except plums.

Cranberry sauce is eaten with roast turkey, roast fowls, and roast ducks.

PEACH SAUCE.--Take a quart of dried peaches, (those are richest and best that are dried with the skins on,) and soak them in cold water till they are tender. Then drain them, and put them into a covered pan with a very little water. Set them on coals, and simmer them till they are entirely dissolved. Then mash them with brown sugar, and send them to table cold to eat with roast meat, game or poultry.

WINE SAUCE.--Have ready some rich thick melted or drawn butter, and the moment you take it from the fire, stir in two large glasses of white wine, two table-spoonfuls of powdered white sugar, and a powdered nutmeg. Serve it up with plum pudding, or any sort of boiled pudding that is made of a batter.

COLD SWEET SAUCE.--Stir together, as for a pound-cake, equal quantities of fresh butter and powdered white sugar. When quite light and creamy, add some powdered cinnamon or nutmeg, and the juice of a lemon. Send it to table in a small deep plate with a tea-spoon in it.

Eat it with batter pudding, bread pudding, Indian pudding, &c. whether baked or boiled. Also with boiled apple pudding or dumplings, and with fritters and pancakes.

CREAM SAUCE.--Boil a pint and a half of rich cream with four table-spoonfuls of powdered sugar, some powdered nutmeg, and a dozen bitter almonds or peach kernels slightly broken up, or a dozen fresh peach leaves. As soon as it has boiled up, take it off the fire and strain it. If it is to be eaten with boiled pudding or with dumplings send it to table hot, but let it get quite cold if you intend it as an accompaniment to fruit pies or tarts.

OYSTER SAUCE.--Take a pint of oysters, and save out a little of their liquor. Put them with their remaining liquor, and some mace and nutmeg, into a covered saucepan, and simmer them on hot coals about ten minutes. Then drain them. Oysters for sauce should be large.

Having prepared in another saucepan some drawn or melted butter, (mixed with oyster liquor instead of water,) pour it into a sauce-boat, add the oysters to it, and serve it up with boiled poultry, or with boiled fresh fish.

Celery, first boiled and then chopped, is an improvement to oyster sauce.

STORE FISH SAUCES.

GENERAL REMARKS.

Store fish sauces if properly made will keep for many months. They may be brought to table in fish castors, but a customary mode is to send them round in the small black bottles in which they have been originally deposited. They are in great variety, and may be purchased of the grocers that sell oil, pickles, anchovies, &c. In making them at home, the few following receipts may be found useful.

The usual way of eating these sauces is to pour a little on your plate, and mix it with the melted butter. They give flavour to fish that would otherwise be insipid, and are in general use at genteel tables.

Two table-spoonfuls of any of these sauces may be added to the melted butter a minute before you take it from the fire. But if brought to table in bottles, the company can use it or omit it as they please.

SCOTCH SAUCE.--Take fifteen anchovies, chop them fine, and steep them in vinegar for a week, keeping the vessel closely covered. Then put them into a pint of claret or port wine. Scrape fine a large stick of horseradish, and chop two onions, a handful of parsley, a tea-spoonful of the leaves of lemon-thyme, and two large peach leaves. Add a nutmeg, six or eight blades of mace, nine cloves, and a tea-spoonful of black pepper, all slightly pounded in a mortar. Put all these ingredients into a silver or block tin sauce-pan, or into an earthen pipkin, and add a few grains of cochineal to colour it. Pour in a large half pint of the best vinegar, and simmer it slowly till the bones of the anchovies are entirely dissolved.

Strain the liquor through a sieve, and when quite cold put it away for use in small bottles; the corks dipped in melted rosin, and well secured by pieces of leather tied closely over them. Fill each bottle quite full, as it will keep the better for leaving no vacancy.

This sauce will give a fine flavour to melted butter.

QUIN'S SAUCE.--Pound in a mortar six large anchovies, moistening them with their own pickle. Then chop and pound six small onions. Mix them with a little black pepper and a little cayenne, half a glass of soy, four glasses of mushroom catchup, two glasses of claret, and two of black walnut pickle. Put the mixture into a small sauce-pan or earthen pipkin, and let it simmer slowly till all the bones of the anchovies are dissolved. Strain it, and when cold, bottle it for use; dipping the cork in melted rosin, and tying leather over it. Fill the bottles quite full.

KITCHINER'S FISH SAUCE.--Mix together a pint of claret, a pint of mushroom catchup, and half a pint of walnut pickle, four ounces of pounded anchovy, an ounce of fresh lemon-peel pared thin, and the same quantity of shalot or small onion. Also an ounce of scraped horseradish, half an ounce of black pepper, and half an ounce of allspice mixed, and the same quantity of cayenne and celery-seed. Infuse these ingredients in a wide-mouthed bottle (closely stopped) for a fortnight, shaking the mixture every day. Then strain and bottle it for use. Put it up in small bottles, filling them quite full.

HARVEY'S SAUCE.--Dissolve six anchovies in a pint of strong vinegar and then add to them three table-spoonfuls of India soy, and three table-spoonfuls of mushroom catchup, two heads of garlic bruised small, and a quarter of an ounce of cayenne. Add sufficient cochineal powder to colour the mixture red. Let all these ingredients infuse in the vinegar for a fortnight, shaking it every day, and then strain and bottle it for use. Let the bottles be small, and cover the corks with leather.

GENERAL SAUCE.--Chop six shalots or small onions, a clove of garlic, two peach leaves, a few sprigs of lemon-thyme and of sweet basil, and a few bits of fresh orange-peel. Bruise in a mortar a quarter of an ounce of cloves, a quarter of an ounce of mace, and half an ounce of long pepper. Mix two ounces of salt, a jill of claret, the juice of two lemons, and a pint of Madeira. Put the whole of these ingredients together in a stone jar, very closely covered. Let it stand all night over embers by the side of the fire. In the morning pour off the liquid quickly and carefully from the lees or settlings, strain it and put it into small bottles, dipping the corks in melted rosin.

This sauce is intended to flavour melted butter or gravy, for every sort of fish and meat.

PINK SAUCE.--Mix together half a pint of port wine, half a pint of strong vinegar, the juice and grated peel of two large lemons, a quarter of an ounce of cayenne, a dozen blades of mace, and a quarter of an ounce of powdered cochineal. Let it infuse a fortnight, stirring it several times a day. Then boil it ten minutes, strain it, and bottle it for use.

Eat it with any sort of fish or game. It will give a fine pink tinge to melted butter.

CATCHUPS.

LOBSTER CATCHUP.--This catchup, warmed in melted butter, is an excellent substitute for fresh lobster sauce at seasons when the fish cannot be procured, as, if properly made, it will keep a year.

Take a fine lobster that weighs about three pounds. Put it into boiling water, and cook it thoroughly. When it is cold break it up, and extract all the flesh from the shell. Pound the red part or coral in a marble mortar, and when it is well bruised, add the white meat by degrees, and pound that also; seasoning it with a tea-spoonful of cayenne, and moistening it gradually with sherry wine. When it is beaten to a smooth paste, mix it well with the remainder of the bottle of sherry. Put it into wide-mouthed bottles, and on the top of each put a table-spoonful of sweet oil. Dip the corks in melted rosin, and secure them well by tying leather over them.

In using this catchup, allow four table-spoonfuls to a common-sized sauce-boat of melted butter. Put in the catchup at the last, and hold it over the fire just long enough to be thoroughly heated.

ANCHOVY CATCHUP.--Bone two dozen anchovies, and then chop them. Put to them ten shalots, or very small onions, cut fine, and a handful of scraped horseradish, with a quarter of an ounce of mace. Add a lemon, cut into slices, twelve cloves, and twelve pepper-corns. Then mix together a pint of port, a pint of madeira, and a pint of anchovy liquor. Put the other ingredients into the liquid, and boil it slowly till reduced one-half. Then strain it, and when cold put it into small bottles, securing the corks with leather.

OYSTER CATCHUP.--Take large salt oysters that have just been opened. Wash them in their own liquor, and pound them in a mortar, omitting the hard parts. To every pint of the pounded oysters, add a half pint of white wine or vinegar, in which you must give them a boil up, removing the scum as it rises. Then to each quart of the boiled oysters allow a tea-spoonful of beaten white pepper, a tea-spoonful of pounded mace, and cayenne pepper to your taste. Let it boil up for a few minutes, and then pass it through a sieve into an earthen pan. When cold, put it into small bottles, filling them quite full, as it will not keep so well if there is a vacancy at the top. Dip the corks in melted rosin, and tie leather over each.

WALNUT CATCHUP.--Take green walnuts that are young enough to be easily pierced through with a large needle. Having pricked them all in several places, throw them into an earthen pan with a large handful of salt, and barely sufficient water to cover them. Break up and mash them with a potato-beetle, or a rolling-pin. Keep them four days in the salt and water, stirring and mashing them every day. The rinds will now be quite soft. Then scald them with boiling-hot salt and water, and raising the pan on the edge, let the walnut liquor flow away from the shells into another pan. Put the shells into a mortar, and pound them with vinegar, which will extract from them all the remaining juice.

Put all the walnut liquor together, and boil and skim it; then to every quart allow an ounce of bruised ginger, an ounce of black pepper, half an ounce of cloves, and half an ounce of nutmeg, all slightly beaten. Boil the spice and walnut liquor in a closely covered vessel for three quarters of an hour. When cold, bottle it for use, putting equal proportions of the spice into each bottle. Secure the corks with leather.

MUSHROOM CATCHUP.--Take mushrooms that have been freshly gathered, and examine them carefully to ascertain that they are of the right sort. Pick them nicely, and wipe them clean, but do not wash them. Spread a layer of them at the bottom of a deep earthen pan, and then sprinkle them well with salt; then another layer of mushrooms, and another layer of salt, and so on alternately. Throw a folded cloth over the jar, and set it by the fire or in a very cool oven. Let it remain thus for twenty-four hours, and then mash them well with your hands. Next squeeze and strain them through a bag.

To every quart of strained liquor add an ounce and a half of whole black pepper, and boil it slowly in a covered vessel for half an hour. Then add a quarter of an ounce of allspice, half an ounce of sliced ginger, a few cloves, and three or four blades of mace. Boil it with the spice fifteen minutes longer. When it is done, take it off, and let it stand awhile to settle. Pour it carefully off from the sediment, and put it into small bottles, filling them to the top. Secure them well with corks dipped in melted rosin, and leather caps tied over them.

The longer catchup is boiled, the better it will keep.

You may add cayenne and nutmeg to the spices.

The bottles should be quite small, as it soon spoils after being opened.

TOMATA CATCHUP.--Take a peck of large ripe tomatas. Having cut a slit in each, put them into a large preserving-kettle, and boil them half an hour. Then take them out, and press and strain the pulp through a hair sieve. Put it back into the kettle, and add an ounce of salt, an ounce of powdered mace, half an ounce of powdered cloves, a small tea-spoonful of ground black pepper, the same of cayenne pepper, and eight table-spoonfuls of ground mustard. Mix the seasoning with the tomata pulp; let it boil slowly during four hours. Then take it out of the kettle, and let it stand till next day, in an uncovered tureen. When cold, stir into it one pint of the best cider vinegar. Put it into clean bottles, and seal the corks. It will be found excellent for flavouring stews, hashes, fish-sauce, &c.

LEMON CATCHUP.--Grate the peel of a dozen large fresh lemons. Prepare, by pounding them in a mortar, two ounces of mustard seed, half an ounce of black pepper, half an ounce of nutmeg, a quarter of an ounce of mace, and a quarter of an ounce of cloves. Slice thin two ounces of horseradish. Put all these ingredients together. Strew over them one ounce of fine salt. Add the juice of the lemons.

Boil the whole twenty minutes. Then put it warm into a jar, and let it stand three weeks closely covered. Stir it up daily.

Then strain it through a sieve, and put it up in small bottles to flavour fish and other sauces.

This is sometimes called lemon pickle.

SEA CATCHUP.--Take a gallon of stale strong beer, a pound of anchovies washed from the pickle, a pound of peeled shalots or small onions, half an ounce of mace, half an ounce of cloves, a quarter of an ounce of whole pepper, three or four large pieces of ginger, and two quarts of large mushroom-flaps rubbed to pieces. Put the whole into a kettle closely covered, and let it simmer slowly till reduced to one half. Then strain it through a flannel bag, and let it stand till quite cold before you bottle it. Have small bottles and fill them quite full of the catchup. Dip the corks in melted rosin.

This catchup keeps well at sea, and may be carried into any part of the world. A spoonful of it mixed in melted butter will make a fine fish sauce. It may also be used to flavour gravy.

FLAVOURED VINEGARS.

These vinegars will be found very useful, at times when the articles with which they are flavoured cannot be conveniently procured. Care should be taken to have the bottles that contain them accurately labelled, very tightly corked, and kept in a dry place. The vinegar used for these purposes should be of the very best sort.

TARRAGON VINEGAR.--Tarragon should be gathered on a dry day, just before the plant flowers. Pick the green leaves from the stalks, and dry them a little before the fire. Then put them into a wide-mouthed stone jar, and cover them with the best vinegar, filling up the jar. Let it steep fourteen days, and then strain it into wide-mouthed bottles, in each of which put a large quantity of fresh tarragon leaves, and let them remain in the vinegar.

SWEET BASIL VINEGAR.--Is made precisely in the same manner; also those of green mint, and sweet marjoram.

CELERY VINEGAR.--Pound two ounces of celery seed in a mortar, and steep it for a fortnight in a quart of vinegar. Then strain and bottle it.

BURNET VINEGAR.--Nearly fill a wide-mouthed bottle with the fresh green leaves of burnet, cover them with vinegar, and let them steep two weeks. Then strain off the vinegar, wash the bottle, put in a fresh supply of burnet leaves, pour the same vinegar over them, and let it infuse a fortnight longer. Then strain it again and it will be fit for use. The flavour will exactly resemble that of cucumbers.

HORSERADISH VINEGAR.--Make a quart of the best vinegar boiling hot, and pour it on four ounces of scraped horseradish. Let it stand a week, then strain it off, renew the horseradish, adding the same vinegar cold, and let it infuse a week longer, straining it again at the last.

SHALOT VINEGAR.--Peel and chop fine four ounces of shalots, or small button onions. Pour on them a quart of the best vinegar, and let them steep a fortnight; then strain and bottle it.

Make garlic vinegar in the same manner; using but one ounce of garlic to a quart of vinegar. Two or three drops will be sufficient to impart a garlic taste to a pint of gravy or sauce. More will be offensive. The cook should be cautioned to use it very sparingly, as to many persons it is extremely disagreeable.

CHILLI VINEGAR.--Take a hundred red chillies or capsicums, fresh gathered; cut them into small pieces and infuse them for a fortnight in a quart of the best vinegar shaking the bottle every day. Then strain it.