Part 7

TERRAPINS.--In buying terrapins select the largest and thickest. Like all other delicacies, the best are the cheapest in the end. Small poor terrapins are not worth the cost of the seasoning. A poor terrapin, poorly dressed, is indeed a poor thing, and is always recognized as such, by those who are expected to eat it. _Get fine terrapins only._ Put them into a pot of water that is boiling very hard at the time, and let them boil for about ten minutes. Immediately on taking them out, proceed to rub, with a coarse clean cloth, all the skin from the head, neck, and claws--also, the thin shell, as it comes loose. Having washed them in warm water, put the terrapins into a clean pot with fresh water, and a table-spoonful of salt, and boil them again till they are thoroughly done, and the paws are perfectly soft. Remove the toe-nails. Some terrapins require three hours. When they are quite soft, open them carefully, remove the spongy part, the sand-bag, the gall, and the entrails--it being now the custom to throw away the whole of the disgusting garbage, always tasteless, tough, and disagreeable to look at. Be careful not to break the gall, as it will give an unpleasant bitter taste to the whole. Cut into small pieces all the meat of the terrapins, put them into a stew-pan, (adding the juice they have yielded in cutting up, _but no water_,) and proceed to season them, beginning with cayenne and black pepper, to your taste; also, a handful of flour for the thickening. Stir all well together, and in a short time add four table-spoonfuls of cream, or fresh butter, and a half pint of Madeira or sherry to every four terrapins. If they have no eggs, make up some artificially; crumbling the yolks of hard-boiled common eggs, mashed to a paste with a little nice butter, and then made into balls with beaten raw egg. Add plenty of these to the stew, and let the whole cook together for a quarter of an hour longer. Serve it up hot, in a well heated covered dish.

Four fine large terrapins generally make one dish; and the above is the usual quantity of seasoning for them.

NEW WAY OF DRESSING TERRAPINS.--In buying terrapins, select those only that are large, fat, and thick-bodied. Put them whole into water that is boiling hard at the time, and (adding a little salt) boil them till thoroughly done throughout. Then, taking off the shell, extract the meat, and remove carefully the sand-bag and gall; also, _all the entrails_,--they are disgusting, unfit to eat, and are no longer served up in cooking terrapin for the best tables. Cut the meat into pieces, and put it into a stew-pan with its eggs, and sufficient fresh butter to stew it well. Let it stew till quite hot throughout, keeping the pan carefully covered that none of the flavor may escape; but shake it over the fire while stewing. In another pan, make a sauce of beaten yolk of egg, highly flavored with Madeira or sherry, and powdered nutmeg and mace, and enriched with a large lump of fresh butter. Stir this sauce well over the fire, and when it has _almost_ come to a boil, take it off. Send the terrapin to table hot in a covered dish, and the sauce _separately_ in a sauce-tureen, to be used by those who like it, and omitted by those who prefer the genuine flavor of the terrapin when simply stewed with butter.

This is now the usual mode of dressing terrapins in Maryland and Virginia, and will be found superior to any other.

No dish of terrapins can be good unless the terrapins themselves are of the best quality. It is mistaken economy to buy poor ones. Besides being insipid and tasteless, it takes more in number to fill a dish. The females are the best.

A TERRAPIN POT-PIE.--Take several fine large terrapins, the fattest and thickest you can get. Put them into a large pot of water that is boiling hard; and boil them half an hour or more. Then take them out of the shell, pulling off the outer skin and the toe-nails. Remove the sand-bag and the gall, taking care not to break it, or it will render the whole too bitter to be eaten. Take out also the entrails, and throw them away; as the custom of cooking them is now, very properly, exploded. Then cut up all the meat of the terrapins, taking care to save all the liquid that exudes in cutting up, and also the eggs. Season the whole with pepper, mace, and nutmeg, adding a little salt; and lay among it pieces of fresh butter slightly rolled in flour.

Have ready an ample quantity of paste, made in the proportion of a pound of butter to two large quarts (or pounds) of flour, or a pound and a half of butter to three quarts of flour, and rolled out thick. Butter the inside of an iron pot, and line the sides with paste, till it reaches within one-third of the top. Then put in the pieces of terrapin, with the eggs, butter, &c., and with all the liquid. Lay among the terrapin, square pieces of paste. Then pour in sufficient water to stew the whole properly. Next, cover all with a circular lid, or top-crust of paste, but do not fit it so closely that the gravy cannot bubble up over the edges while cooking. Cut a small cross slit in the top crust. Place the pot, with the pie, over a good fire, and boil it till the whole is thoroughly done, which will be in from three quarters to an hour after it comes to a boil. Take care not to let it get too dry, but keep at hand a kettle of boiling water to replenish the pot when necessary. To ascertain if the pie is done, lift up with a fork a little of the paste, at one side, and try it low down in the pot.

It may be much improved, by mixing among the pieces of terrapins, (before putting them into the pie,) some yolks of hard-boiled eggs, grated or minced. They will enrich the gravy.

A pot-pie may be made, (a very fine one too,) of some of the best pieces of a green turtle.

A SEA-COAST PIE.--Having boiled a sufficient number of crabs and lobsters, extract all the meat from the shells, and cut it into mouthfuls. Have ready some fine large oysters drained from the liquor. Cover the bottom and sides of a deep dish with puff-paste; and put in a thick layer of crab or lobster, seasoned with a little cayenne pepper, and a grated lemon-peel. Mix it with some hard-boiled yolk of egg, crumbled fine, and moistened with fresh butter. Next, put a close layer of oysters, seasoned with pounded mace and grated nutmeg. Put some bits of butter rolled in flour on the top of the layer. Proceed in this manner with alternate layers of crab or lobster, and of oysters, till the dish is nearly full. Then pour in, at the last, a tea-cupful or more of the oyster liquor, with an equal quantity of rich cream. Have ready a thick lid of puff-paste. Put it on the pie, pressing the edges closely, so as to unite them all round; and notch them handsomely. Make a wreath of leaves cut out of paste, and a flower or knot for the centre; place them on the top-crust; and bake the pie well. While it is baking, prepare some balls made of chopped oysters; grated bread-crumbs; powdered nutmeg, or mace; and grated lemon-peel; also, some hard-boiled yolks of eggs, grated. Having fried these balls in butter, drain them, and when the pie is baked, lay a circle of them round the top, between the border of paste-leaves and the centre-knot.

This pie will be found so fine that it ought to be baked in a dish which will contain a large quantity.

TO DRESS A TURTLE.--The turtle should be taken out of water, and killed over night in winter, and early in the morning in summer. Hang it up by the hind fins, and before it has had time to draw in its neck, cut off its head with a very sharp knife, and leave the turtle suspended. It should bleed two or three hours or more, before you begin to cut it up. Then lay it on its back upon a table: have at hand several vessels of cold water, in which to throw the most important parts as you separate them; also a large boiler of hot water. Take off the fins at the joint, and lay them by themselves in cold water; next divide the back-shell from the under-shell. The upper part of the turtle is called the calipash--the under part the calipee. In cutting open the turtle, be very careful not to break the gall, which should be taken out and thrown away; if broken, its bitterness will spoil all around it. Take out the entrails and throw them away. The practice of cooking them is now obsolete. So it is with the entrails of terrapins. Using a sharp knife, cut off the fins carefully, also the liver, lungs, heart, kidneys, &c. Wash them well, and lay them in a pan of cold water, the liver in a pan by itself. If there are eggs, put them also into cold water. Having extracted the intestines, stand up the turtle on end, to let the blood run out. Afterwards cut out all the flesh from the upper and under shells, and remove the bones. Cut the calipee (or meat belonging to the under-shell) into pieces about as large as the palm of your hand, and break the shell. The calipash, or meat next the back-shell, may be cut smaller--the green fat into pieces about two inches square. Put all the meat into a large pan, sprinkle it slightly with salt, and cover it up. Lay the shells and fins in a tub of boiling water, and scald them till the scales can be scraped off with a knife, and all the meat that still adheres to the shells easily removed, as it is worth saving. Clean the fins nicely, (taking off the dark skin,) and lay them in cold water. Wipe the back-shell dry, and set it aside. Then proceed to make the soup. For this purpose, take the coarser pieces of flesh with the bone likewise. Put them into a pot with a pound of cold ham cut into pieces, and eight large calves'-feet (two sets) that have been singed and scraped, but not skinned. If you cannot conveniently obtain calves'-feet, substitute a large fore-leg or knuckle of veal. Add four onions, sliced thin; two tablespoonfuls of sweet-marjoram leaves; a large bunch of basil; a dozen blades of mace; and a salt-spoon of cayenne. The ham will make any other salt unnecessary. Pour on as much water as will completely cover the whole, and let it simmer slowly over a steady fire during five hours, skimming it well. If after a while the soup seems to be boiling away too much, replenish it with a little hot water from a kettle, kept boiling hard for the purpose. When it has simmered five hours, take up the whole, and strain the soup through a sieve into a deep pan. Wash out the soup-pot with hot water, and return the strained soup to it, with the liver, &c., cut in small pieces, and some of the best of the meat, and a portion of the green fat. Have ready two or three dozen force-meat balls, the size of a hickory nut, and made of the usual proportions of minced veal, bread-crumbs, butter, grated lemon-peel, mace, nutmeg, and beaten yolk of egg. Put them into the soup, and let it boil an hour longer; also the eggs of the turtle, or some hard-boiled yolks of eggs. After it has thus boiled another hour, add the juice and grated yellow rinds of two lemons, and a pint of Madeira. Boil the soup a quarter of an hour longer, and it will then be ready for the tureen. It must never boil hard.

In the mean time, stew in another pot the finest of the turtle-meat, seasoned with a little salt and cayenne, and a liberal allowance of sweet-marjoram leaves rubbed fine, and mixed with powdered mace and nutmeg. Add a pound of fresh butter, cut into pieces and rolled in flour. When the turtle-meat has stewed an hour, put in the green fat, and add the juice and grated yellow rinds of two lemons, and a pint or more of Madeira, and let the whole stew slowly an hour longer. While the meat is stewing, take the shell of the back; wash it clean, and wipe it dry; lay a band of puff-paste all round the inside of the shell, two inches below the edge, and two inches above it. Notch the paste handsomely, and fill the shell with the stewed turtle. Have ready the oven, heated as if for bread. Lay a large iron baking-sheet or a square pan upon four bricks (one at each corner) to elevate the turtle-shell from the floor of the oven. Place on it the shell with its contents, and let it bake till well browned on the surface. Send it to table with the shell placed on a large dish. At the other end set the tureen of soup. Have ready (on two side dishes) the fins stewed tender in a little of the soup, and the liver fried in butter.

This receipt is for a turtle of moderate size. A large one will, of course, require an increased proportion of all the articles used in seasoning it--more wine, &c. In serving up turtle at a dinner-party, let it constitute the first course, and have nothing else on the table while the turtle is there.

We have seen elegant silver turtle-dishes, representing the back-shell of the animal, superbly chased and engraved, the feet for it to stand on being paws of silver; and the fins having hollow places to hold the sauce. This was for the stew; making a dish separate from the soup, which is always sent to table in a tureen.

TURTLE PASTY.--When the meat has been all extracted, scrape and wash the large back shell of the turtle till it is perfectly clean. Make a rich puff-paste. Roll it out thin, and line with it the bottom and sides, in fact the whole of the back-shell. Having prepared and seasoned the best pieces of the turtle-meat, as in the preceding receipt, stew them till thoroughly done, and very tender, and when cool, fill the shell with them. Have ready an upper lid of the same puff-paste, rolled out rather _thick_. Cover the pie with it. Unite the edges of the upper and under crusts, very neatly, wetting your fingers with water. Then notch them handsomely all round, and cut a cross slit in the centre of the top or cover. Set it directly into a rather quick oven. Bake the crust of a light brown, and send it to table hot.

LOBSTERS.--If you buy a lobster ready boiled, see that his tail is stiff and elastic, so that when you bend it under, it springs back immediately; otherwise he is not fresh. If alive or unboiled, he will be lively and brisk in his motion when newly caught. The same with prawns, and crabs.

The heaviest lobsters are the best.

To boil a lobster, have ready a pot of fast-boiling water, very strongly salted. Put in the lobster head downward; and if the water is really hot (it is cruel to have it otherwise,) he will be dead in a moment. Crabs, of course, the same. A moderate sized lobster (and they are the best,) will be done in half an hour. A large one requires from three-quarters to an hour. Before it is sent to table, the large claws should be taken off, and laid beside it. The head also should be separated from the body, but laid so near it that the division is nearly imperceptible. The head is never eaten. Split the body, and lay it open all the way down, including the tail. If there is a good dresser of salads in the house, the lobster may be served up ready dressed, in a deep dish, seasoned with the proper condiments, after being cut small or minced, heaped up towards the centre of the dish, and decorated with the small claws laid across on the top, with the addition of green celery leaves, or parsley sprigs.

LOBSTER SALAD--(_plain_.)--Take a well boiled lobster. Extract all the meat from the body and claws, cut it up small, and mash the coral with the back of a spoon or a broad knife. Wash the best part of a fresh lettuce, and cut that up also, omitting all the stalk. Mix together the chopped lobster and the lettuce, and put them into a salad bowl. Make the dressing in a deep plate, allowing for one lobster a salt-spoon of salt, half as much of cayenne, a tea-spoonful of made mustard, (tarragon mustard is best,) four table-spoonfuls (or more) of sweet oil, and three table-spoonfuls of the best cider vinegar. Mix all these together, with the yolks of three hard-boiled eggs, mashed to a soft moist paste with the other ingredients, adding the coral of the lobster. When they are all mixed smoothly, add them to the lobster and lettuce. If the mixture seems too dry, add more sweet oil. Toss and stir the salad with a box-wood fork. Also, the things should be mashed with a box-wood spoon. Cover, and set it in a cool place till wanted. It should be eaten as soon as possible after mixing, as it becomes flat by standing.

Plenty of sweet oil renders a lobster wholesome. Still, persons who are not in good health, had best abstain from lobster.

You may add to the dressing, one or two raw yolks of eggs, beaten well.

FINE LOBSTER SALAD--(_This is for company._)--Boil eight eggs for ten minutes, or till quite hard. Lay them in cold water, or cool them by laying bits of ice among them. When quite cold, cut each egg lengthways into four or six pieces, taking a bit off one end of each piece or slice. Cut up into long pieces the best part of a fresh lettuce, that has just been washed in a pan of cold water. Lay the lettuce in a dish, and surround it closely with the pieces of egg standing up on their blunted ends, with the yolk side outward, and forming a handsome wall all round the bed of lettuce. Upon this, pile neatly the bits of chopped lobster, finishing with the small claws stuck into the top. Have ready the dressing in a sauce-tureen. Make it of the beaten yolks of two raw eggs, and four table-spoonfuls of sweet oil, thickened with the mashed coral of the lobster, and the crumbled yolks of two hard-boiled eggs, and season slightly with a little salt, cayenne, and a spoonful of tarragon mustard. Finish with two table-spoonfuls of vinegar, and stir the whole hard with a box-wood spoon or fork. Send it to table with the sauce-tureen, along with the dish of lobster, &c. Pour on each plate of lobster a portion of this dressing. Or, if you can obtain no lettuce, mix this dressing at once with the chopped meat of the lobster. Smooth it in a pile on the dish, (keeping it towards the centre) and stand up the slips of hard egg handsomely surrounding it--the small claws decorating the top.

LOBSTER RISSOLES.--Extract all the meat from the shells of one or two boiled lobsters. Mince it very fine; the coral also. Season it with a little salt and cayenne, and some powdered mace and nutmeg. Add about a fourth part of finely grated bread-crumbs; and with a sufficiency of fresh butter or a little finely-minced veal suet, or some sweet oil, make it up into balls or cones. Brush them over with yolk of egg, dredge them lightly with flour, and fry them in lard. Introduce them as a side dish at a dinner party, or as an accompaniment to salmon.

This mixture may be baked in puff-paste as little patties, or you may bake in a soup-plate an empty shell of paste, and when done, (having stewed the rissole mixture made moist) fill the cold paste with it, and serve it up as a lobster pie.

In buying lobsters, choose those that are the heaviest and liveliest, or quickest in their motions when touched. They are then fresh. The hen has the broadest tail and the softest fins.

LOBSTER PUDDING.--Take the empty back shell of one large boiled lobster, and all the best meat of two. Clean out the shell very nicely; washing it, and wiping it dry. Mince the meat, and mash the coral with it; adding half a dozen yolks of hard-boiled eggs crumbled among it, and season it well with powdered mace and nutmeg, and a little cayenne. Moisten it all through with plenty of sweet oil, and the raw yolks of one or two eggs, well beaten. Fill the shell with this pudding, and cover the surface of the mixture with a coating of finely-grated bread-crumbs. Brown it by holding over it a salamander, or a red hot fire-shovel. Send it to table in the shell, laid on a china dish.

Small puddings may be made as above, of crab-meat put into several large crab-shells, and placed side by side on a dish.

They may be eaten either warm or cold; and they look well with green lettuce or pepper-grass, disposed fancifully among them.

CRABS.--Crabs are seldom eaten except at the sea-shore, where there is a certainty of their being fresh from the water. They are very abundant, but so little is in them, that when better things are to be had, they are scarcely worth the trouble of boiling and picking out the shell. They are cooked like lobsters, in boiling salt and water, and brought to table piled on large dishes, and are eaten with salt, pepper, sweet oil, and vinegar. The meat of two dozen crabs, when all is extracted, will make but a small dish. Season it with cayenne, mustard, oil, vinegar, and eat it cold; or stew it with fresh butter, powdered mace, and nutmeg, and serve it up hot.

_Prawns._--The same.

SHRIMPS.--Of all fish belonging to the lobster species, shrimps are the smallest. In England, where they abound, they are sold by the quart, ready boiled. The way to eat them is to pull off the head, and squeeze the body out of the shell by pressing it between your fore-finger and thumb. At good tables they are only used as sauce for large fish, squeezed out of the shell, and stirred into melted butter.

LOBSTER SAUCE.--Take a small hen lobster that has been well boiled. Extract all the meat, and chop it large. Take out the coral, and pound it smooth in a marble mortar, adding, as you proceed, sufficient sweet oil. Make some nice drawn butter, allowing half a pound of nice fresh butter to two heaped table-spoonfuls of flour, and a pint of hot water. Mix the butter and flour thoroughly, and then gradually add to them the coral, so as to give a fine color. Then mix this with a small pint of boiling water. Hold the saucepan over the fire, (shaking it about till it simmers) but do not let it quite boil. Put in the chopped lobster, and let that simmer in the sauce, till well heated. To allow it to boil will spoil the color, (which should be pale pink,) and may be improved by a little prepared cochineal. Or, you may tie, in a small bit of thin muslin, a few chips of alkanet, and put it into the sauce, (taking it out, of course, before it goes to table.) Alkanet communicates a beautiful pink color, and has no taste in itself.

This quantity of sauce is for a large fish--salmon, cod, turbot, or sheep's head. There should always be an ample supply of sauce. It is very awkward for the sauce to give out, before it has gone round the company.

BEEF.