Chapter 2

The second half of this little book is composed chiefly of recipes for dishes that can be made in haste, and by the inexperienced cook. But such cook can hardly pay too much attention to details if she does not wish to revert to an early, not to say feral type of cuisine, where the roots were eaten raw while the meat was burnt. Because your dining-room furniture is Early English, there is no reason why the cooking should be early English too. And it certainly will be, unless one takes great trouble with detail.

Let us suppose that at 7:30 P.M. your husband telephones that he is bringing a friend to dine at 8. Let us suppose an even more rash act. He arrives at 7:15, he brings a friend: you perceive the unexpressed corollary that the dinner must be better than usual. In such a moment of poignant surprise, let fly your best smile (the kind that is practiced by bachelors' widows) and say "I am delighted you have come like this; do you mind eight or a quarter past for dinner?" Then melt away to the cook with this very book in your hand.

I take it that you consider her to be the junior partner in the household, you, of course, being the senior, and your husband the sleeping partner in it. Ask what there is in the house for an extra dish, and I wager you the whole solar system to a burnt match that you will find in these pages the very recipe that fits the case. A piece of cold veal, viewed with an eye to futurity, resolves itself into a white creamy delightfulness that melts in your mouth; a new-laid egg, maybe, poached on the top, and all set in a china shell. If you have no meat at all, you must simply hoodwink your friends with the fish and vegetables.

You know the story of the great Frenchwoman:

"Hèlas, Annette, I have some gentlemen coming to dine, and we have no meat in the house. What to do?"

"Ah! Madame, I will cook at my best; and if Madame will talk at her best, they will never notice there is anything wrong."

But for the present day, I would recommend rather that the gentlemen be beguiled into doing the talking themselves, if any shortcoming in the menu is to be concealed from them, for then their attention will be engaged.

It takes away from the made-in-a-hurry look of a dish if it is decorated, and there are plenty of motifs in that way besides parsley. One can use beetroot, radishes, carrots cut in dice, minced pickles, sieved egg; and for sweets, besides the usual preserved cherries and angelica, you can have strips of lemon peel, almonds pointed or chopped, stoned prunes cut in halves, wild strawberries, portions of tangerine orange. There is a saying,

Polish the shoe, Though the sole be through,

and a very simple chocolate shape may be made attractive by being garnished with a cluster of pointed almonds in the center, surrounded by a ring of tangerine pieces, well skinned and laid like many crescents one after the other. There is nothing so small and insignificant but has great possibilities. Did not Darwin raise eighty seedlings from a single clod of earth taken from a bird's foot?

It is to be regretted that Samuel Johnson never wrote the manual that he contemplated. "Sir," he said, "I could write a better book of cookery than has ever yet been written. It should be a book on philosophical principles."

Perhaps the pies of Fleet Street reminded him of the Black Broth of the Spartans which the well-fed Dionysius found excessively nasty; the tyrant was curtly told that it was nothing indeed without the seasoning of fatigue and hunger. We do not wish a meal to owe its relish solely to the influence of extreme hunger--it must have a beautiful nature all its own, it must exhibit the idea of Thing-in-Itself in an easily assimilable form.

I am convinced, anyhow, that this little collection (formed through the kindness of our Belgian friends) will work miracles; for there are plenty of miracles worked nowadays, though not by those romantic souls who think that things come by themselves. Good dinners certainly do not, and I end with this couplet:

A douce woman and a fu' wame Maks King and cottar bide at hame.

Which, being interpreted, means that if you want a man to stay at home, you must agree with him and so must his dinner.

M. LUCK.

HORS D'OEUVRE

(Herring and Mayonnaise)

Take some salt herrings, one for each person, and soak them for a day in water. Skin them, cut them open lengthways, take out the backbone, and put them to soak for a day in vinegar. Then before serving them, let them lie for a few minutes in milk, and, putting them on a dish, pour over them a good mayonnaise sauce.

[_Mme. Delhaye._]

CARROT SOUP

Wash and scrape a pound of carrots, slice them, treat two medium sized potatoes in the same manner, add a bay leaf, a sprig of thyme and a chopped onion. Cook all with water, add salt, pepper, and cook gently till tender, when pass it through a sieve. Put in a pan a lump of butter the size of an egg, with a chopped leek and a sprig of chervil. Let it cook gently for three or four minutes, then pour on the puree of carrots and let it all come to the boil before taking it off to serve.

[_Madame Stoppers._]

SORREL SOUP

Take a quart of bouillon or of meat extract and water. Fry in butter a carrot, a turnip, an onion, a small cabbage, all washed and chopped, and add half a teaspoonful of castor sugar. Put your soup to it and set on the fire. Let it simmer for twenty minutes, add any seasoning you wish and a little more water, and let it simmer for another half hour. Then shred a bit of basil or marjoram with a handful of well washed sorrel, throw them in, cook for five minutes, skim it, pour it into a soup tureen, and serve.

OSTEND SOUP

There are many varieties of this soup to be met with in the different hotels, but it is a white soup, made of fish pieces and trimmings, strained, returned to the pot, and with plenty of cream and oysters added before serving. It should never boil after the cream is put in. A little mace is usual, but no onions or shallot. A simple variety is made with flour and milk instead of cream, the liquor of the oysters as well as the oysters, and a beaten egg added at the last moment.

[_Esperance._]

ANOTHER SORREL SOUP

Take a tablespoonful of breadcrumbs, moisten them in milk in a pan, then add as much water as you require. Throw in three medium potatoes, a handful of well washed sorrel, and a sprig or two of chervil, a lump of butter, pepper, and salt. Bring to the boil, simmer for quarter of an hour, pass through a tammy, heat again for ten minutes and serve burning hot.

[_Esperance._]

HASTY SOUP

Into a quart of boiling water throw lightly four tablespoonfuls of semolina, so that the grains are separated. Let it boil for a quarter of an hour, with pepper and salt. Take the tureen and put the yolk of an egg in it with a bit of butter the same size, mix them with a fork and pour in a teacupful of hot water with extract of meat in it, as strong as you wish. Quickly pour in the semolina soup and serve it at once. This is a quickly made and inexpensive dish, besides which it is a nice one.

[_Madame Alphonse F._]

ARTICHOKES A LA VEDETTE

Boil some globe artichokes in salted water till they are tender. Take out the center leaves, leaving an even fringe of leaves on the outside. Remove as much of the choke as you can. Put them back in a steamer. Toss some cooked peas in butter, then mix them in cream and taking up your artichokes again put in your cream and peas in the center of each, as much as you can get in. The cream is not necessary for this dish to be a good one, but the artichokes and peas must both be young. As a rule people cut their fruit too soon and their vegetables too late.

[_Chef reconnaissant._]

SURPRISE POTATOES

Quarter of an hour will suffice to prepare and cook this savory surprise, once the potatoes are baked. Take three large potatoes of symmetrical size, clean and bake them; cut each in two and remove the inside without injuring the skin. Melt half an ounce of butter by the fire, add two ounces of potato passed through a sieve, a teaspoonful of grated parmesan, pepper, salt, and a tablespoonful of milk. Then stir in the yolk of an egg and presently the white, well beaten. Fill the empty potato skins with the mixture which ought to rise and puff out in ten or twelve minutes.

VEGETABLE SALADS

Sometimes one has a few leeks, a half cauliflower, a handful each of peas and beans. Instead of currying these vegetables (which removes all distinctive flavor from them) cook them gently, and toss them when cold in a good salad dressing. If you can give the yolk of an egg to it, so much the better. Any cold meat is improved by a side dish of this sort. The vegetables that one can curry with advantage are large marrows, cut into cubes, turnips, potatoes, parsnips.

[_Marguerite Leblanc_.]

TOMATOES A LA SIR EDWARD GREY HOMMAGE

Take some fine firm tomatoes, not very ripe. Turn them with the stalk side up and cut a slice off the top with a sharp knife. Take out the inside with a teaspoon. Break into each tomato a pullet's egg, sprinkle with pepper and salt. The inside of the tomato you will pass through a fine wire sieve and it will be a thick liquor; mix it with bread-crumbs, salt, pepper, and some grated cheese till quite thick. Put this mixture on the top of each egg and place all in the oven for three or four minutes, so that the eggs are only just set and no more.

[_Amie inconnue._]

STUFFED CARROTS

Take some good sized carrots, and after washing them well and cutting off the green tuft, cut each one across about two and a half inches from the leaves. Scoop out the inside yellow part, leaving a case of the redder part and a piece to form the bottom, at the smaller end. Then stew the cases very gently till a little tender, but not quite soft. Take them out of the water, drain them, and then placing each on its small end, fill up with hot chopped mushrooms, that have been tossed in butter. Arrange in a circle on a dish, and garnish with small sprigs of carrot leaves. The insides that you have scooped out are to be used for soup flavoring.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

TO COOK ASPARAGUS

One should not let the tips of this vegetable touch the water. Take your bundle, dip the stalks in warm water to remove any dust, and the tips also, if it is necessary. Then tie the bundle round with tape, keeping the ends of stalks even so that it will stand upright. Place them in boiling water with the heads just sticking out, and keep them like that. In this way the heads, which are very tender, will be cooked in the steam and will not drop off.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

TOMATOES IN HASTE

Butter a pie-dish, preferably a fireproof china dish. Open a tin of tomatoes and remove as much skin as you can if they are the unpeeled kind. Put a handful of crumbled brown bread in the dish with lumps of butter, then pour on that some tomatoes, dust with pepper and salt, then more bread, and so on, finishing at the last with lumps of butter, and a thick sprinkling of grated cheese. Bake for twenty minutes.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

KIDNEYS AND LETTUCE

Put on some water to boil. Take your lettuce, and choose the round kind, and wash it well. Take out neatly with your fingers the center leaves, and fill up instead with a sheep's kidney which you have lightly dusted with flour, pepper, and salt. Tie the lettuce round very firmly and set it in a pan of boiling water that covers up only three quarters of the vegetable. Boil for eighteen minutes. Take out the lettuce, untie it, drain it, and serve at once. Kidneys are good when they are placed inside large Spanish onions and gently stewed, in which case a dab of made mustard is given them.

TOMATO RICE

Put on your rice to boil. Make a tomato sauce by stewing them gently, and then rubbing them through a sieve; this makes a purée, which you must put back to heat with pepper and salt and a small quantity of made mustard. Then grate some parmesan, or failing that, some Gruyère cheese. Take off the rice, drain it, keeping it hot, put it on a dish and pour over it your purée. Then sprinkle the grated cheese thickly on top of all.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

RICE WITH EGGS

Boil some rice till it will press closely together. Fill some teacups with it, pressing the rice well down; then leave a hole in the middle and pour into each hole a small raw egg, yolk, and white. Set the tea-cups to cook in the oven, and when the eggs are just set and no more, press on them some more rice. Turn them out of the teacups, and if you have rubbed the inside of the cups with a little butter this will be easy, and sprinkle over the top of each mold plenty of chopped parsley. Do not forget salt and pepper to season the ingredients.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

BROAD BEANS IN SAUCE

Take your shelled beans, very young and tender. Throw them into boiling water for a minute, then pour the water away. Heat for a pound of beans one and one-half pints of milk, stir in four ounces of salt butter, a very little chopped parsley, salt and pepper. Do not let the milk boil, but when it simmers put in the beans. When they have been heated for ten minutes, thicken your sauce with the yolks of two eggs and a tablespoonful of cream. Take out a bean and eat it to see if it is cooked, and if so, pour all on a hot dish. Garnish with fried sippets of bread. Old broad beans can be treated in the same way, but they must first be skinned.

[_Aimee._]

OMELETTE OF PEAS

Beat up three eggs, to which add one tablespoonful of grated cheese, pepper, and salt, and mix thoroughly. Butter an omelette pan, and pour in the mixture, keep moving it gently with a fork while you sprinkle in with the other hand some cooked green peas. The omelette will be cooked by the time you have sprinkled in two handfuls. Slip it off on to a very hot dish, fold over, and serve at once.

[_Jean O._]

BRUSSELS ARTICHOKES

Wash well some globe artichokes, and boil them in salted water. Meanwhile make a good mushroom filling, highly seasoned, of cooked mushroom, dipped into butter, pepper, salt, a few breadcrumbs, and shreds of ham. Remove the center leaves from the vegetable and as much of the choke as you can. Fill up with the mushroom force and stew gently in brown sauce flavored with a bunch of herbs.

[_F. R._]

BELGIAN SALAD

is merely endive, washed and torn apart with red peppers added here and there as well as the ordinary salad dressing.

_Belgian asparagus_ is done by adding to the cooked vegetable a bechamel sauce, poured over the dish, and then slices of hard boiled eggs placed on the top. The giant asparagus is used, and it is eaten with a fork.

[_A Grocer's Wife._]

BRUSSELS CARROTS

Cut young carrots in small pieces, blanch them in salted water; melt some butter in a stew pan, add enough water and meat extract to make sufficient to cover the carrots, season with pepper, salt and a pinch of sugar and toss the carrots in this till they are tender. Then add the yolk of an egg and a tablespoonful of cream, holding the pan just off the fire with the left hand, while you stir with the right. When it is well mixed pour all out on a vegetable dish and sprinkle over with chopped parsley.

[_Amie reconnaissante._]

CARROTS AND EGGS

Make the same preparation as above, for the sauce, with the same seasonings, but add a dust of nutmeg. Then add half a pint of white stock which will be enough for a small bunch of carrots; simmer them for fifteen minutes and then break in three whole eggs, taking care that they fall apart from each other. Let them cook till nearly set (for they will go on cooking in the hot sauce after you remove them from the fire) and serve at once. This is nearly as good if you use old carrots sliced, instead of the young ones.

[_M. Zoeben_.]

CUCUMBERS AND TOMATOES

Take two earthenware pots and put some tomatoes to stew in one, in water, pepper, and salt. Peel a cucumber, open it, remove the seeds and stuff it with any forcemeat that you have; but a white one is best. Let it cook gently in some brown stock, well covered over. When tender put the cucumber along the dish and tomatoes on each side. A puree of potatoes can surround them.

[_A. Fanderverde_.]

RED HARICOTS

Soak some white haricot-beans over night, or stew them till tender in some weak stock. Make a tomato sauce in a saucepan, and flavor it rather strongly with made mustard, stirring well, so that it is well incorporated. When the beans are tender, drain them from the liquor (keeping them hot) and reduce that to half its quantity. Put back the beans and add the tomato sauce, heat for a couple of minutes, and serve with three-cornered pieces of toast.

[_Elise et Jean_.]

POTATOES A LA BRABANCONNE

Boil some potatoes, rub them through a sieve, add pepper, salt, and a tablespoonful of cream to a pound of potatoes, rub through a tammy again. Chop a shallot, a spring or two of parsley and mix them in, sprinkling in at the same time a dust of nutmeg and a dessertspoonful of grated cheese. Place the puree in a dish to be baked, and before setting it in the oven sprinkle on the top some bread-crumbs, and cheese grated and mixed and one or two pats of salt butter. Bake till it is a golden brown.

[_Elise et Jean_.]

FLEMISH PEAS

Cook some young peas and some carrots (scraped and shaped into cones) in separate pans. Then put them together in an earthenware close covered pan to simmer together in butter and gravy, the first water having been well drained from them. Season with pepper and salt and let them cook gently for ten or twelve minutes; do not uncover the pot to stir it, but shake it every now and then to prevent the contents from burning.

[_Amie inconnue_.]

CHOU-CROUTE

Take as many white September cabbages as you wish, trim them, cut in halves, remove the stalks, wash them very thoroughly and shred them pretty finely. Procure an earthenware crock and put in a layer of cabbage, sprinkle it with coarse salt, whole pepper, and juniper berries. Fill up the crock in this way, put on the lid, and keep it down closely with weights. It will be ready in about six weeks' time, when the fermentation has taken place. It is good with pork or bacon.

SPINACH FRITTERS

Take any cold boiled spinach--though people generally eat all that there is--and mix it thickly with the yolk of egg and a little rice flour; you may add a little powdered sugar. Have ready some boiling fat, and drop spoonfuls of the spinach into it. If the fat is hot enough the fritters will puff out. Drain them quickly and serve very hot.

HARLEQUIN CABBAGES

Shred some red cabbage, to half a pound of it add two medium sized apples, minced finely without core or skin, a bit of fat bacon, season with pepper, salt, vinegar, which should be tarragon vinegar, and put it to simmer in some gravy or milk and water. It should cook for an hour over a gentle fire. Cook separately some green cabbage, cleaned, boiled till tender in salted water, chopped, then put back on a gentle fire with salt, pepper, a dust of nutmeg, and some fat or butter. Let it heat and mix well, and then serve the two colors side by side in the same dish; the red cabbage has a sour and the green has a nutty flavor which is very agreeable.

LITTLE TOWERS OF SALAD

Put a couple of eggs on to boil hard, while you make a thick mayonnaise sauce. Cut some beetroot, some cucumber, some cold potato, some tomato into slices. Peel your eggs, and slice them, and build up little piles of the different things, till about two inches high. Between each slice you will sprinkle grated breadcrumbs, pepper, salt, a tiny scrap of chopped raw shallot, parsley, all mixed in a cup. Finish with the rounded ends of white of egg on the top, put lettuce round and pour the dressing over it.

PUFFS FOR FRIDAY

Make a batter of a beaten egg, a dust of rice flour, pepper, salt and as much cream as you can give. Roll out this batter so thinly that you can almost see through it. Cut it into rounds and put on it any cooked vegetables that you have, but they must be highly seasoned. Cold potatoes will do if they are done with mustard, vinegar, or a strong boiled sauce. Fold over the paste, press it together at the edges, and fry in hot fat.

HADDOCK A LA CARDINAL

Take some fillets of haddock, or cod or hake, and poach them gently in milk and water. Meanwhile, prepare a good white sauce, and in another pan a thick tomato sauce, highly seasoned, colored with cochineal if need be, and as thick as a good cream. Lay the fillets when cooked one each on a plate, put some of the white sauce round it, and along the top put the tomato sauce which must not run down. A sprig of chervil is to be placed at each end of the fillet.

[_Seulette._]

SKATE STEW

Put the fins, skin, trimmings of skate into water enough to cook them, with pepper and salt and simmer for half an hour. Strain it through a fine sieve. Make a brown sauce of butter and flour, pepper, salt, adding a little milk, about a teacupful for a pound of skate, then squeeze in the juice of half a lemon, and if you have it, a glass of white wine. Take the skate, cut it in pieces, simmer it in salted water; when cooked, strain away the water, dish the fish, pouring over it the above sauce. Decorate with strips of lemon peel laid in a lattice-work down the center.

[_Une epiciere_.]

TO DRESS COARSE FISH

Any fish is good if dressed in this way. Make a brown sauce, well flouring it with salt, pepper, and dried herbs. Mince and fry a shallot and add it, then a large glass of red wine, a few drops of lemon juice. Cook some fish roe, sieve it, and stir it into the sauce. Take your fish and simmer it in milk and water till cooked, then heat it up quickly in the sauce to serve.

[_F. R._]

FLEMISH SALAD

This is fillets of herring, laid in a bowl with slices of apple, beetroot, cold potatoes, and cold cooked sprouts, covered with the ordinary salad dressing. If the fish is salted, let it soak first of all in milk to take away the greater part of the salt. This is a winter dish, but the same sort of thing is prepared in summer, substituting cold cooked peas, cauliflower, artichokes, beans, with the fish.

[_Amie reconnaissante._]

FLEMISH SAUCE

This popular sauce is composed of melted butter thickened with yolk of egg and flavored with mustard; it is used greatly for fish.

BEEF SQUARES

If you have a small piece of very good beef, such as rump steak or fillet of beef, it is more economical to cut it into squares, and grill it lightly at a clear fire. Have ready some squares of toast, buttered and hot, lay these on a hot dish with a bit of steak on the top, and on the top of that a slice of tomato much peppered and salted and a small pile of horse-radish. This makes a pretty dish and can be varied by using capers or chopped gherkins instead of horse-radish. It is a great saving to cut meat, bread, etc., in squares instead of rounds.

[_Une amie au convent._]

IMITATION CUTLETS

A dish that I have done for those who like curry flavoring is the following. Take any cold cooked vegetables, and cutting them in small pieces, roll them in a thick white sauce which you have strongly flavored with curry. Put it aside to get firm. If you are in a hurry you can bind with the yolk of an egg in the flour and make a thick batter in that way. Form into cutlets and fry as you would a real cutlet. The same thing can be done with macaroni or spaghetti that is already cooked, with cold fish or anything that is insipid to the taste.

[_Une amie au convent_.]

KIDNEYS WITH MADEIRA

Use either sheep or pigs' kidneys. Cut them longways, so as to be able to take out the threads from the inside of them. Put some butter on to fry over a brisk fire and when it is browned, but not burnt, put in the kidneys for three or four minutes. Take them out and keep them hot for a minute while you add to the butter they were cooked in a soupspoonful of Madeira wine, a good dust of chopped parsley, a little cayenne pepper and salt. Mix it well, and if too thick add a little gravy. Pour the sauce over the kidneys and finish with a powdering of chopped parsley. Fried potatoes are eaten with this dish.

[_Mme. Vanderbelle Genotte._]

PIGS' TROTTERS IN BLANQUETTE

Any part of pork or veal is good done in this way. Take your pieces of meat and fry them in butter till they are a good golden brown color. Put them in a pan, covering them with water, and adding a sliced onion, a bay leaf, a whole carrot, a leek, pepper, salt,--let it all simmer gently over a slow fire till the meat is cooked but not boiled. Take the pieces from the liquor and pass it through a sieve. Mix a little rice flour in a cup of cold water, stirring well. Drop in the juice of half a lemon and the beaten yolk of an egg, which stir round quickly. Put in the meat again for a moment and serve it with boiled potatoes.

LOIN OF MUTTON IN THE POT

Put in an earthenware pot three shallots, finely minced; take a bit of garlic, cut it close and rub it round the side of the pot; put in as well a lump of butter, pepper and salt, and some rather fat gravy. Divide the loin and put six chops in to simmer for three quarters of an hour on a moderate fire, covering the pot with the lid. Before you serve it, stir in a little lemon juice and stir up the sauce. To be served with Cauliflower à la Aerschot as follows: Cut your cauliflower into medium pieces, seeing that it is very clean, while you have some salted water boiling up. Put in the pieces, boil till tender, then drain them on a sieve. Put leaves and trimming of the vegetable into the pot to simmer and serve as basis for a vegetable soup. Make a good white sauce, adding the yolk of an egg, and flavoring it with nutmeg. Put the vegetable on a dish and pour over the sauce, letting it stand for a few moments by the fire before it is eaten.

[_Madame Herman Noppen._]

OX TONGUE WITH SPINACH AND WHITE SAUCE

Boil the tongue in salted water till the outer skin will peel off. Take this off, then put the tongue back in the liquor to simmer while you prepare the same. Take a piece of butter the size of an egg, melt it and mix it with two dessertspoonfuls of ground rice, add some of the liquor, pepper, and salt, stir well, so that it makes a good cream; drop in the yolks of two eggs, always stirring, and a little lemon juice. Serve the tongue whole with this sauce poured over it and spinach done in the following way: Wash the spinach in running water till every bit of grit has gone. Put some water on to boil, salt it well, and throw in the spinach which you have freed from mid-rib and stalk. The water must be boiling and the fire brisk. When tender, pass the spinach through the sieve, then put a bit of butter into an enameled saucepan, then the spinach, which heat for six minutes, add a little pepper. Serve it with the tongue, and you can garnish as well with little croutons of bread fried in butter.

[_Madame Herman Noppen_.]

VEAL FRITTERS

If you have only a little piece of veal or other cold meat, you can make a very presentable dish in the following way: Cut a thin slice of meat and spread on each side of it a layer of mashed potatoes to which you have added some tomato sauce. Beat up an egg and dip the slices and potato into it, lay them in fine breadcrumbs and fry them till a good golden color in plenty of fat. Send them to table under a hot cover.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

STEWED BEEF

If you are obliged to make a hot dish in a hurry and have only a piece of inferior meat, there is no better way of using it than by dressing it in the Brabant way, which is rather expensive. Clean and cook some mushrooms, and when fried lightly, add them and their liquor to your beef, cut up in small pieces, but not minced. Add pepper, salt, a dust of spices, or an onion with three or four cloves in it, and a half bottle of good red wine. Stew all together for at least twenty minutes, take out the onion and cloves, and serve in the dish it was cooked in which should be an earthenware pot.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

A MUTTON SALAD

Cut some slices of cold mutton or lamb, removing every bit of fat and skin that you can, unless that destroys the firmness of the slice. Prepare a salad of lettuce, and if you cannot give a mayonnaise sauce, add to the lettuce plenty of sliced cucumber, for that keeps the mutton moist. Put the salad on each slice and roll the meat over as tightly as you can. Lay the rolls closely together in a dish and sprinkle a very little salad dressing over them. This way of doing meat is very useful for taking to picnics, or for taking on a long journey.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

SAUSAGE PATTIES

Half a pound of sausage meat of any kind that you like. Make some rounds of paste, lay the meat on half of each round and fold over. Steam for quarter of an hour, or stew in plenty of gravy.

[_Pour la Patrie_.]

SAUSAGE AND POTATOES

Roll some cooked sausage meat in mashed potatoes, making a roll for each person. Brush the potatoes over with milk and put them to bake till nicely browned. Decorate with gherkins on each roll of butter.

[_Pour la Patrie_.]

RAGOUT OF COLD MEAT

Take any cold meat that you have, free it from fat and skin and cut it in rounds like a five-franc piece. If you have some lean bacon or ham, a little of that should be added. I should tell you first of all to put some rice on to boil in boiling water. Make a sauce of flour and butter in a pan, adding gravy if you happen to have it, but failing that, use water and vinegar in equal parts to thin it; season with pepper and salt and a small spoonful of anchovy sauce. When the sauce is heating, put in the meat and cover the pan, let it all heat for twelve minutes and then place meat and sauce in the middle of a dish. By this time the rice may be tender. Drain it well and put it as a border to the stew.

[_Aimee._]

A QUICKLY MADE STEW

Put a piece of butter in a stewpan, with an onion cut in pieces, a few cloves, salt and pepper, a tablespoonful of shredded parsley, and if you have it some good gravy or meat juice and water. Throw into the sauce some cold meat, preferably underdone, and after it has simmered for fifteen minutes take a cut onion and rub with it the bottom of the dish that you are going to use. Take a good glass of red wine, such as Burgundy and mix it with the yolk of an egg, stir this into the stew and serve up in a couple of minutes.

[_Madame Groubet._]

GRENADINES OF VEAL

Take a fireproof dish, and after sprinkling it with breadcrumbs put in it a layer of roast veal in slices, a layer of mashed potatoes, a layer of veal kidney, partly cooked, and cut into pieces and lastly a layer of potato. Cover the whole with a bechamel sauce into which you have stirred some grated cheese; put it to bake in the oven. Then make a brown sauce with any veal or kidney gravy that you have, and cook some mushrooms in it with pepper and salt; the sauce is to be served with the grenadine.

HOCHE POT

Slice an onion and fry it in butter till it is brown; add pieces of pork and of mutton freed from fat and skin; cover them with water and throw into it any kinds of vegetables that you may have; but particularly sliced carrots and turnips and green cabbages; put it in the oven to cook. In another saucepan boil some white haricot beans, salt, and pepper, until they are tender, when they must be added to the stew with a small quantity of the liquor that they have been boiled in.

PIGEON AND CABBAGE ROLLS

Take two pigeons, two cabbages, four slices of fried bacon, an ounce of butter, a large wineglassful of sherry, and some gravy. Truss your pigeons and cook them in butter for ten minutes in a fireproof dish. Then take them out, cut them into neat pieces. Meanwhile have the cabbages boiled in salted water. Drain them. Cut them in small pieces and roll some up in each slice of bacon; lay the pigeons on top, pouring over them the liquor they were cooked in and half the wine. Put all in the oven for ten minutes--pour in the rest of the wine and leave for another ten minutes before serving. If you have stock to add to this it is an improvement, or put half a teaspoonful of meat extract to half a pint of water.

[_Une refugiee_.]

REMAINS OF SAUSAGE

If you have a few inches of a big sausage cut it into as thick slices as you can--fry them and lay them in a circle on a dish with a poached egg on each. Little dinner breads are good when soaked in milk, stuffed with sausage meat, and fried. It can be used to stuff cucumber, or eggplants, but you should then crumble up the meat and bind it with the yolk of a raw egg.

[_Mme. Georgette._]

SHOULDER OF LAMB A LA BEIGE

Braise your shoulder of lamb; that is, put it in a closely covered stewpan, in a good brown sauce or gravy with the vegetables, to be served with it. It is the lid being closed that makes the meat take some flavor from the vegetables. To do it in the Belgian way, take some good white turnips, wash them and scrape them, put small ones in whole, large ones cut in half. Take some small cabbages, trim off without leaves, cut them in half, remove the stalk, make a hollow in the center and fill it with forcemeat of any kind; but sausage meat is good. Place the stuffed cabbages round the meat to cook gently at the same time.

[_Madame Vershagen._]

FILLET OF BEEF À LA BRABANCONNE

Take a whole fillet of beef, trim it neatly and set it in a braising pan to cook very slowly in some good brown sauce to which you have added a pint of stock. Put in neatly shaped carrots and turnips and some balls made of mashed potato already fried. Keep hot in two sauceboats a puree of Brussels sprouts and a puree of onions. These are prepared by cooking the vegetables in water, then chopping fine, and rubbing through a sieve with cream, or with a little good milk, pepper, and salt. To serve the fillet, lay it on a dish with the carrots and turnip, potato cakes round; pour over it the rest of the brown sauce from the pan; then add in heaps the onion puree and the sprouts puree.

[_Madame Vershagen._]

STEWED BEEF

An inferior part of beef may be made to taste excellent if it is braised; that is, simmered with the cover on slowly, in company with onions (already fried) and well washed pieces of carrots and whole turnips. Put on also some small cabbages cut in halves, and if you can give it, a glass of good red wine.

[_Une refugiee._]

BEEF AND APRICOTS

Stew your beef, say three pounds of steak, in some gravy, adding to a pint of liquor a level teaspoonful of white sugar. Throw in a handful of the dried apricots, but be sure you wash them well first. This dish is generally accompanied by leeks, first blanched for a few moments, and then put in the stew. Flavor with salt, pepper, and the rind of half a lemon which remove before you serve the stew. For English taste the sugar could be omitted.

[_Seulette._]

FOR AN INVALID

This must be begun at least three hours before it will be required. Take two ounces of pearl barley, wash it well, and put it in cold water enough to cover it, for an hour. Take a pound of good steak, shred it in small pieces, and put it in an enameled saucepan with a quart of cold water and a sprinkle of salt. Strain the water from the barley and add this last to the meat, and let it simmer for two hours. Then strain off the liquor and pound the meat and barley in a mortar, rub it through a sieve; when it is a smooth puree put it back into the pan with its liquor and a gill of cream. Let it simmer again for a moment and serve it in a cup with a lid to it.

[_Madame A. F._]

INVALIDS' EGGS

Cut out some rounds of bread a good deal larger than a poached egg would be. While these are frying, make a puree of Brussels sprouts. Boil them till tender, squeeze in a cloth. Rub them through a sieve and make into a very thick puree with cream, pepper and salt. Poach a fresh egg for each crouton, and slip it on, very quickly, put some of the green puree round, and serve under a hot cover.

A SWEET FOR THE CHILDREN

If you have some little breads over, cut each one in four, soak the pieces in milk sweetened and flavored with vanilla, for three hours. When they are well soaked roll them for a moment in grated and dried breadcrumbs, and dip them for a moment in boiling fat, just as you would do croquettes. Sift some white sugar over them and serve very hot.

[_Madame M._]

QUINCE CUSTARD

When you have quince preserves by you this is a quickly prepared dish. Make a good custard with a pint of rich milk, four eggs and a little essence of almonds and two ounces of powdered sugar. Put your quince preserve at the bottom of a fireproof circular dish and fill up with custard. Put it to bake for half or hour or till set. When set add some more quince (heated) on the top with some chopped almonds and serve hot. The same dish can be done with apples, which should be stewed, flavored with the rind of a half lemon, and passed through a sieve. Apple puree is put on the top in the same way, and it is decorated with some thin lemon peel cut into stars.

[_Chef reconnaissant._]

YELLOW PLUMS AND RICE

Put half a pound of rice in hot milk till it has absorbed all it can and is tender. Beat lightly the yolks of three eggs, beating in a lump of fresh butter the size of a pullet's egg; add powdered sugar and the whites of the eggs well beaten. Put the rice into this mixture and place all in a mold. Cook it gently for twenty-five minutes. Meanwhile take some very perfect yellow plums, skin and stone them and heat them in half a bottle of light white wine that you have seasoned with a little spice. Turn out the rice, put the yellow plums on the top and pour round the sauce, strained through muslin. Very good cold.

BRABANT PANCAKE

Butter first of all your pancakes, and you should have proper pancake saucers fit to go to table. Heat half a pint of sweetened milk and melt a quarter of a pound of salt butter with it. When well melted pour it into a basin and sprinkle in nearly three ounces of flour. Beat up the yolks of three large or four small eggs and incorporate them, then add the whites well beaten. Put a spoonful or two on each saucer and set to bake in the oven for ten minutes and when done place each saucer on a plate with a good lump of apricot jam on each. If you have no pancake saucers, put the apricot preserve on one half of each pancake and fold it up.

[_Jean O._]

DELICIOUS SAUCE FOR PUDDINGS

To a large wineglassful (say a glass for champagne wine) of new Madeira add the yolks only of two eggs. Put in a very clean enamel saucepan over the fire and stir in powdered sugar to your taste. Whisk it over the fire till it froths, but do not allow it even to simmer. Use for Genoese cakes and puddings.

[_Madame Groubet._]

FRUIT JELLIES

Jellies that are very well flavored can be made with fresh fruit, raspberries, strawberries, apricots, or even rhubarb, using the proportions of one ounce of gelatine (in cold weather) to every pound of fruit puree. In hot weather use a little less gelatine. As the fruit generally gives a bad color, you must use cochineal for the red jellies and a little green coloring for gooseberry jellies. The gelatine is of course melted in the fruit puree and all turned into a mold. You can make your own green coloring in this way. Pick a pound of spinach, throwing away the stalks and midrib. Put it on in a pan with a little salt and keep the cover down. Let it boil for twelve minutes. Then put a fine sieve over a basin and pour the spinach water through it. Strain the spinach water once or twice through muslin; it will be a good color and will keep some time. Orange and lemon jellies are much more wholesome when made at home than those made from bought powders. To the juice of every six oranges you should add the juice of one lemon, and you will procure twice as much juice from the fruit if, just before you squeeze it, you let it soak in hot water for three or four minutes.

[_Pour la Patrie_.]

STRAWBERRY FANCY

Take a slice or two of plain sponge cake and cut out rounds two inches across. Then whip up in a basin the whites only of four eggs, coloring them with the thinner part of strawberry jam. As a rule this jam is not red enough, and you must add a little cochineal. Put the pink mixture in high piles on the cakes.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

PINK RICE

This sweet is liked by children who are tired of rice pudding. Boil your rice and when tender mix in with it the juice of a boiled beetroot to which some sugar has been added. Turn it into a mold and when cold remove it and serve it with a spoonful of raspberry preserve on the top or with some red plums round it.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

MILITARY PRUNES

Take some of the best French preserved prunes, and remove the stones. Soak them in orange curaçoa for as long a time as you have at your disposal. Then replace each stone by a blanched almond, and place the prunes in small crystal dishes.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

MADELINE CHERRIES

Take some Madeleine cakes and scoop them out to form baskets. Fill these with stoned cherries both white and black that you have soaked in a good liqueur--cherry brandy is the best but you may use maraschino. Place two long strips of angelica across the top and where these intersect a very fine stoned cherry.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

STRAWBERRY TARTLETS

It often happens that you have among the strawberries a quantity that are not quite good enough to be sent to table as dessert, and yet not enough to make jam of. Put these strawberries on to heat, with some brown sugar, and use them to fill small pastry tartlets. Pastry cases can be bought for very little at the confectioner's. Cover the top of the tartlet when the strawberry conserve is cold with whipped cream.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

MADEIRA EGGS OR OEUFS À LA GRAND'MÈRE

Break the yolk of an egg in a basin and be sure that it is very fresh; beat it up, adding a little powdered sugar, and then, drop by drop, enough of the best Madeira to give it a strong flavor. This makes a nice sweet served in glass cups and it is besides very good for sore throats.

[_Pour la Patrie._]

BUTTERFLIES

You will get at the confectioner's small round cakes that are smooth on the top; they are plain, and are about two and one-half inches across. Take one and cut it in halves, separating the top from the bottom. Cut the top pieces right across; you have now two half moons. Put some honey along the one straight edge of each half moon and stick it by that on the lower piece of cake, a little to one side. Do the same with the second half moon, so that they both stick up, not unlike wings. Fill the space between with a thick mixture of chopped almonds rolled in honey, and place two strips of angelica poking forward to suggest antennae. A good nougat will answer instead of the honey.

[_Pour la Patrie_.]

CHERRY AND STRAWBERRY COMPOTE

Take half a pint of rich cream and mix with it a small glassful of Madeira wine or of good brandy. Pick over some fine cherries and strawberries, stoning the cherries, and taking out the little center piece of each strawberry that is attached to the stalk. Lay your fruit in a shallow dish and cover it with the liquor and serve with the long sponge biscuits known as "langues de chat" (Savoy fingers).

[_Amitie aux Anglais._]

CHOCOLATE CUSTARD

To make a nice sweet in a few minutes can be easily managed if you follow this recipe. Make a custard of rich milk and yolks of eggs, sweeten it with sugar, flavored with vanilla, and if you have a little cream add that also. Then grate down some of the best chocolate, as finely as you can, rub it through coarse muslin so that it is a fine powder. Stir this with your custard, always stirring one way so that no bubbles of air get in. When you have got a thick consistency like rich cream, pour the mixture into paper or china cases, sprinkle over the tops with chopped almonds. There is no cooking required.

GOOSEBERRY CREAM WITHOUT CREAM

Take your gooseberries and wash them well, cut off the stalk and the black tip of each. Stew them with sugar till they are tender, just covered in water. Do not let them burn. If you have not time to attend to that put them in the oven in a shallow dish sprinkled with brown sugar. When tender rub them through a fine sieve at least twice. Flavor with a few drops of lemon juice, and add sugar if required. Then beat up a fresh egg in milk and add as much arrowroot or cornflour as will lie flat in a salt spoon. Mix the custard with the gooseberries, pass it through the sieve once more and serve it in a crystal bowl.

[_Mdlle. B-M._]

CHOCOLATE PUDDINGS

Make some Genoese cake mixture as you would for a light cake, and pour it into greased molds like cups. You can take the weight of one egg in dried flour, butter, and rather less of sugar. Beat the butter and sugar together to a cream, sprinkle in the flour, stirring all the time, a pinch of salt, and then the beaten egg. When your little cakes are baked, turn them out of the molds and when cool turn them upside down and remove the inside, leaving a deep hole and a thin crust all round. Fill up this hole with the custard and chocolate as above, and let it grow firm. Then turn the cases right way up and pour over the top a sweet cherry sauce. You may require the yolks of two eggs to make the custard firm.

[_Mdlle. B-M._]

INDEX

Anchovy Biscuits " Patties " Rounds " Sandwiches Anchovies " Mock Apples, a new dish of Apples and Sausages Artichokes a la Vedette Artichokes, Brussels Asparagus a l'Anvers Asparagus, To Cook Aubergine or Egg Plant

Banana Compote Beans, a Dish of Haricot " Broad, in Sauce Beef a la Bourguignonne Beef a la Mode Beef, Blankenberg " Caretaker's " Fillet of, a la Brabanconne " Roast Rump of, Bordelaise Sauce " Roasted Fillet of " Stewed Beef and Apricots Beef Squares Brussels Sprouts Boeuf a la Flamande Bouchees a la Reine Brabant Pancake Burgundy, Hot Butterflies

Cabbage, Red Cabbage and Potatoes Cabbage with Sausages Cabbages, Harlequin Cake, Mocha Calf's Liver a la Bourgeoise Carbonade, Flemish Carbonade of Flanders Carbonades done with Beer Carrots, Belgian " Brussels " Flemish " Stuffed Carrots and Eggs Cauliflower a la Reine Elizabeth Cauliflower and Shrimps Cauliflower, Dressed " Stuffed Celeris au Lard Cheese Fondants Cheese Limpens Cherry and Strawberry Compote Cherries, Madeline Chicken a la Max Chicory Chicory a la Ferdinand Chicory and Ham with Cheese Sauce Chicory, Stuffed Children's Birthday Dish, The Chinese Corks Chou-Croute Cod, Remains of " The Miller's Cordial, Hawthorn Cream, Chocolate " Rum " Vanilla Creme de Poisson à la Roi Albert Croquettes of Boiled Meat Croquettes of Veal Croquettes, Cheese " Potato Cucumber à la Laeken Cucumbers and Tomatoes Custard, Chocolate Cutlets, Imitation

Delicious Sauce for Puddings

Egg Plants as Souffle Eggs à la Ribeaucourt Eggs, a Difficult Dish of " Belgian " Country " French " Madeira or Oeufs à la Grand'mère " Peasants' " Poached, Tomato Sauce " Stuffed Eggs and Mushrooms Endive, Flemish Entrèe (Croque-Monsieur) " Walloon

Fish " a Brown Dish of Fish, Filleted, with White Sauce and Tomatoes " Remains of " To Dress Coarse Fish and Custard Four Quarters Frangipani Fricadelle Friday's Feast Fritters, Apple " Fruit " Semolina " Spinach " Veal Fruit Jellies

Gaufres from Brussels Gingerbread, Belgian Gooseberry Cream without Cream

Haddock a la Cardinal Haddocks, Baked Hake and Potatoes Ham with Madeira Sauce Ham, York, Sweetbreads, Madeira Sauce Hare " Hunter's Haricots, Red Herring and Mayonnaise Herrings, Dutch Hoche Pot Hoche Pot Gantois Hoche Pot of Ghent Hors d'Oeuvre Hot Pot

Invalid, for an Invalid's Eggs

Kid, Roast, with Venison Sauce Kidneys and Lettuce Kidneys with Madeira

Lamb, Shoulder of, à la Belge Lavender Water Leeks à la Liegeoise Lettuce, Cooked

Mackerel, to Keep for a Week Meat, Cold, Ragout of " Scraps of " To Use Up Cold " To Use Up Remains of Mutton, a Use for Cold " Collops " Loin of, in the Pot " Ragout of " Shoulder of " Shoulder of, Dressed Like Kid " Stew " Stewed Shoulder of Mushrooms à la Spinette Mushrooms, Gourmands'

Oeufs Celestes, Hommage à Sir Edward Grey Omelette, Asparagus " Mushroom " of Peas " Rum Ox Tongue Ox Tongue a la Bourgeoise Ox Tongue with Spinach and White Sauce

Pains Perdus Pastry, Excellent Paste for Peas, Flemish Petites Caisses à la Furnes Pigeon and Cabbage Rolls, Pigeons, Fricassee of Pigs' Trotters in Blanquette Pineapple à l'Anvers Pommes Château Potato Dice Potatoes, Chipped " Surprise Potatoes a la Brabanconne Potatoes and Cheese Potatoes in the Belgian Manner Pouding aux Pommes Prunes, Military " Stewed Puddings, Chocolate Puffs for Friday Purée of Chestnuts

Quince Custard

Rabbit " Baked " Flemish " Laeken Rabbit à la Bordelaise Rice, Golden " Pink " Richelieu " Saffron Rice à la Conde Rice with Eggs Rissoles, Good Riz Conde

Salad, Belgian " Flemish " Little Towers of " a Mutton " of Tomatoes " Vegetable Salads, Vegetable Sauce au Diable Sauce, Bearnaise " Bordelaise " Cream " Dutch, for Fish " Flemish " Maître d'Hôtel " Muslin " Poor Man's " The Good Wife's Sausage and Potatoes Sausage Patties Sausage, Remains of Skate, Stew " Very Nice Snowy Mountains Soles, Filleted, au Fromage Soufflé, Apricot " Au Chocolat " Baked " Cheese " Kidney " Semolina Soup, A Good Belgian " A Good Pea " Ambassador " Another Sorrel " Belgian Purée " Carrot " Cauliflower " Chervil " Cream of Asparagus " Crecy (Belgian recipe) " Fish " Flemish " Green Pea " Hasty " Immediate, or Ten Minutes " Leek " Mushroom Cream " Onion " Ostend " Potage Leman " Sorrel " The Soldiers' Vegetable " Starvation " Tomato " Tomato Puree " Vegetable " Waterzoei Sparrows, Headless Speculoos Sprats, To Keep Spinach à la Braconnière Stew, A Quickly Made Strawberry Fancy Strawberry Tartlets Sweet Drinks and Cordials Orgeat Sweet for the Children, A

Tomato Rice Tomatoes, à la Sir Edward Grey Hommage Tomatoes and Eggs " and Eggs, Two Recipes for Tomatoes and Shrimps Tomatoes in Haste Tomatoes, Stuffed " Stuffed with Beans

Veal, Breast of, " Blanquette of " Fricandeau of " Grenadines of " Grenadins of Veal à la Crème Veal à la Milanaise Veal Cake, " Excellent for Supper Veal Cutlets with Madeira Sauce Veal Liver Stuffed, or Liver à le Panier d'Or Veal with Mushrooms, or the Calf in Paradise Veal with Onions Veal with Tomatoes

Yellow Plums and Rice