THE BELGIAN COOK-BOOK
EDITED BY
MRS. BRIAN LUCK
1915
"Lucullus, whom frugality could charm,
Ate roasted turnips at the Sabine Farm."
PREFACE
The recipes in this little book have been sent by Belgian refugees from all parts of
the United Kingdom, and it is through the kindness of these correspondents that I
have been able to compile it. It is thought, also, that British cooking may benefit
by the study of Belgian dishes.
The perfect cook, like Mrs. 'Arris or the fourth dimension, is often
heard of, but never actually found, so this small manual is offered for
the use of the work-a-day and inexperienced mistress and maid. It is not
written in the interests of millionaires. The recipes are simple, and
most inexpensive, rather for persons of moderate means than for those who
can follow the famous directions for a certain savory: "Take a leg of
mutton," etc. A shelf of provisions should be valued, like love-making,
not only for itself but for what it may become.
SAVORIES: If you serve these, let them be, like an ankle, small and neat
and alluring. This dish is not obligatory; recollect that it is but a
culinary work of supererogation.
SOUP: Let your soup be extremely hot; do not let it be like the
Laodiceans. You know what St. John said about them, and you would be
sorry to think of your soup sharing the fate which he describes with such
saintly verve. Be sure that your soup has a good foundation, and avoid
the Italian method of making _consommé_, which is to put a pot of
water on to warm and to drive a cow past the door.
FISH: It is a truism to say that fish should be absolutely fresh, yet
only too many cooks think, during the week-end, that fish is like the
manna of the Hebrews, which was imbued with Sabbatarian principles that
kept it fresh from Saturday to Monday. I implore of you to think
differently about fish. It is a most nourishing and strengthening food
--other qualities it has, too, if one must believe the anecdote of the
Sultan Saladin and the two anchorites.
MEAT: If your meat must be cooked in water, let it not boil but merely
simmer; let the pot just whisper agreeably of a good dish to come. Do you
know what an English tourist said, looking into a Moorish cooking-pot?
"What have you got there? Mutton and rice?" "For the moment, Sidi, it is
mutton and rice," said the Moorish cook; "but in two hours, inshallah,
when the garlic has kissed the pot, it will be the most delicious
comforter from Mecca to Casa Blanca." Simmer and season, then, your
meats, and let the onion (if not garlic) just kiss the pot, even if you
allow no further intimacy between them. Use bay-leaves, spices, herbs of
all sorts, vinegar, cloves; and never forget pepper and salt.
Game is like Love, the best appreciated when it begins to go. Only
experience will teach you, on blowing up the breast feathers of a
pheasant, whether it ought to be cooked to-day or to-morrow. Men, as a
rule, are very particular about the dressing of game, though they may not
all be able to tell, like the Frenchman, upon which of her legs a
partridge was in the habit of sitting. Game should be underdone rather
than well done; it should never be without well-buttered toast underneath
it to collect the gravy, and the knife to carve it with should be very,
very sharp.
VEGETABLES: Nearly all these are at their best (like brunettes) just
before they are fully matured. So says a great authority, and no doubt he
is thinking of young peas and beans, lettuces and asparagus. Try to dress
such things as potatoes, parsnips, cabbages, carrots, in other ways than
simply boiled in water, for the water often removes the flavor and leaves
the fiber. Do not let your vegetable-dishes remind your guests of
Froissart's account of Scotchmen's food, which was "rubbed in a little
water."
SWEETS: It is difficult to give any general directions for sweets. They
should be made to look attractive, and they should be constantly varied.
The same remarks apply to savories, which last ought always to be highly
seasoned, whether hot or cold.
MADE DISHES are a great feature in this little book. I have tried to help
those small households who cook, let us say, a leg of mutton on Sunday,
and then see it meander through the week in various guises till it ends
its days honorable as soup on the following Friday. Endeavor to hide from
your husband that you are making that leg of mutton almost achieve
eternal life. It is noticeable that men are attracted to a house where
there is good cooking, and the most unapproachable beings are rendered
accessible by the pleasantness of a _soufflé_, or the aroma of a
roast duck. You must have observed that a certain number of single men
have their hearts very "wishful" towards their cook. Not infrequently
they marry that cook; but it is less that she is a good and charming
woman than that she is a good and charming cook. Ponder this, therefore;
for I have known men otherwise happy, who long for a good beef-steak
pudding as vainly as the Golden Ass longed for a meal of roses. Try
these recipes, for really good rissoles and hashes. Twice-cooked meat can
always be alleviated by mushrooms or tomatoes. Remember that the
discovery of a new dish is of more use than the discovery of a new star,
--besides which, you will get much more praise for it. And if on Wednesday
you find that you have to eat the same part of the very same animal that
you had on Monday, do not, pray, become exasperated; treat it
affectionately, as I treat my black hat, which becomes more ravishing
every time that I alter it. Only, do not buy extravagant make-weight for
a scrap of cold meat that would be best used in a mince patty, or you
will be like a man keeping a horse in order to grow mushrooms.
And, lastly, the good cook must learn about food what every sensible
woman learns about love--how best to utilize the cold remains.
M. LUCK.
PART I
CAULIFLOWER SOUP
After you have boiled a cauliflower, it is a great extravagance to throw
away the liquor; it is delicately flavored and forms the basis of a good
soup. Wash well your cauliflower, taking great care to remove all grit
and insects. Place it to simmer with its head downwards, in salted water;
and, when it is tender, remove it. Now for the soup. Let all the outer
leaves and odd bits simmer well, then pass them through a sieve. Fry some
chopped onions, add the liquor of the cauliflower and the pieces that
have been rubbed through the sieve, add a little white pepper and a slice
of brown bread. Let all cook gently for half-an-hour, then, just before
serving it, take out the slice of bread and sprinkle in two teaspoonfuls
of grated Gruyere cheese.
FISH SOUP
When you buy fish and have it filleted, ask for the bones and trimmings
to be sent also. Put a quart of milk to heat and add to it a bunch of
mixed herbs, a few minced shallots, parsley, pepper and salt. Throw in
your fish and cook for an hour. If you have any celery put in a piece, or
two or three white artichokes. Strain the soup, taste it, and add more
salt or more milk as you think necessary. Return to the pan. Take the
yolk of an egg and just before taking the soup from the fire, stir it
quickly in. This soup must never boil. It should be made out of the very
white fish, excluding herring and mackerel.
STARVATION SOUP
If you have a pork-bone from the fresh meat, let it boil in water for an
hour. Put the pan to cool and take off the fat, and remove the bone.
Replace the pan on the fire and throw into it two pounds of Brussels
sprouts. Do not add onions to this soup but leeks, and the hearts of
cabbage. Pepper and spice to taste. Rub it through a sieve and let it be
thick enough to form a thin purée.
IMMEDIATE SOUP, OR TEN MINUTES SOUP
Into a quart of boiling water throw two tablespoonfuls of either semolina
or tapioca: let it boil for eight minutes with a dust of salt and pepper.
Meanwhile, take your tureen, put quickly into it two yolks of very fresh
eggs, add two pats of butter and two small spoonfuls of water to mix it.
Stir quickly with the spoon, and when the soup has done its eight
minutes' boiling, pour it on the egg and butter in the tureen. This is an
extremely good soup. It is rendered still better by a small quantity of
Bovril.
CHERVIL SOUP
Put a bone of veal on to cook in water, with four or five potatoes,
according to the quantity desired. When these are tender, pass them
through the tammy and return them to the soup. Chop up the chervil,
adding to it half a dessert-spoonful of cornflour. Quarter of an hour
before serving, put in the chervil, but take the cover off the pot, so
that it remains a good green color. Pepper and salt to be added also.
[_V. Verachtert, Café Appelmans, Anvers._]
A GOOD PEA SOUP
Soak your dried peas over-night. The following day boil some fresh water,
and throw in the peas, adding a few chopped onions and leeks, with pepper
and salt. Let the soup simmer for three hours on the top of the stove,
giving it a stir now and then. If you have a ham-bone, that is a great
improvement, or the water in which some bacon has been boiled is a good
foundation for the soup, instead of the fresh water.
[_Mdlle. M. Schmidt._]
WATERZOEI
This is an essentially Flemish soup. One uses carp, eels, tench, roach,
perches, barbel, for the real waterzoei is always made of different kinds
of fish. Take two pounds of fish, cut off the heads and tails, which you
will fry lightly in butter, adding to make the sauce a mixed carrot and
onion, three cloves, a pinch of white pepper, a sprig of parsley, one of
thyme, a bay-leaf; pour in two-thirds of water and one-third of white
wine till it more than covers the ingredients and let it simmer for half-
an-hour. Then the pieces of fish must be cut an equal size, and they are
placed to cook quickly in this liquor for twenty minutes. Five minutes
before serving add a lemon peeled and cut into slices and the pips
removed. Some people bind the sauce with breadcrumbs grated and browned.
You serve, with this dish, very thin slices of bread and butter. For
English tastes, the heads and tails should be removed when dressing the
dish.
A GOOD BELGIAN SOUP
is called _crême de sauté_. Itself one of the most wholesome of
vegetables, watercress combines admirably with potatoes in making soup.
Wash, dry, and chop finely four ounces of the leaves picked from the
stalks, fry slowly for five minutes with or without a thinly-sliced
onion, add one pound of potatoes cut in small dice, and fry, still very
slowly, without browning; pour in one quart of water or thin stock,
simmer gently, closely-covered, for from thirty-five to fifty minutes,
rub through a hair sieve, and having returned the puree to the saucepan
with a half-teaspoonful of castor sugar, and salt and cayenne to taste,
thicken with one table-spoonful of flour stirred smoothly into one
breakfast-cupful of cold milk; boil up sharply, and serve sprinkled with
watercress.
[_E. Haig._]
BELGIAN PURÉE
Cook two pounds of Brussels sprouts in boiling water. Take them out,
drain them and toss them in butter for five minutes, sprinkle them with a
teaspoonful of flour, and then cook them in gravy (or meat extract and
water), fast boiling, over a good fire, and keep the lid of the saucepan
off so that they may remain green. Pass them through the sieve, leave
them in ten minutes, bind the mixture with the yolks of three eggs, a
pint of milk; then at the last minute one dessert-spoonful of butter for
each pint and a half of soup.
AMBASSADOR SOUP
A pint and a half of either fresh peas, or of dried peas that have been
soaked for six hours in cold water; a leek, and three onions chopped
finely. Simmer till the peas are tender, then pass all through the sieve.
Well wash some sorrel and chop it, and add as much as will be to your
taste. In another pan cook five tablespoonfuls of rice, and add that
to your soup. Simmer up again, stirring it all very well. This soup
should be of a green color.
[_Mme. Georges Goffaux._]
CRECY SOUP (BELGIAN RECIPE)
Take ten carrots, two onions, one leek, five potatoes, and cook all
gently in water, with salt and pepper; when they are tender, rub them
through the sieve and serve it very hot.
[_G. Goffaux._]
FLEMISH SOUP
To two pounds of washed and picked Brussels sprouts add ten potatoes, two
onions, two leeks, salt, pepper. Cook all gently and pass through a
sieve. Add at the last moment a sprinkle of chopped chervil.
[_G. Goffaux._]
TOMATO PURÉE
Begin by cleaning four potatoes, two leeks, a celery, four carrots, three
pounds of big tomatoes; well wash all these vegetables and cut them in
dice, the tomatoes a little larger. Cook them all gently for an hour in
nearly two pints of gravy, to which you have already added two thick
slices of bread and a pinch of salt. Take care that your vegetables do
not stick to the bottom of the pan. When all is well cooked, pass it
through a fine tammy. Add more gravy, or water and meat juice; make it of
the consistency that you wish. Bring it to the boil again over the fire,
adding pepper and salt, and just before serving a bit of fresh butter
also. It is a great improvement to add at the last minute the yolk of an
egg, mixed in a little cold water, quickly stirred in when the soup is
off the fire.
The three recipes for seven or eight persons.
[_G. Kerckaert._]
ONION SOUP
Mince some thick onions, five or six, and let them color over the fire in
butter. Add a dessert-spoonful of flour, sprinkling it in, and the same
amount in gravy; thicken it with potatoes and when these are cooked,
peas, all through a sieve. Bring the purée to the right consistency with
milk, and let it simmer for a few minutes before serving, adding pepper
and salt.
[_Gabrielle Janssens._]
POTAGE LEMAN
Make a good gravy with one and one-half pounds of skirt of beef. With one
half of the gravy make a very good purée of peas--if possible the green
peas--with the other half make a good purée of tomatoes. Combine the two
purées, adding pepper and salt and a dust of cayenne. For each guest add
to the soup a teaspoonful of Madeira wine, beat it all well and serve
quickly. Or add, instead of Madeira, one dessert-spoonful of sherry wine.
This celebrated soup is honored by the name of the glorious defender of
Namur.
[_Gabrielle Janssens._]
TOMATO SOUP
Boil together six medium potatoes, a celery, two leeks, two carrots, and
a pound of fresh tomatoes, with pepper, salt and a leaf of bay. Pass all
through the sieve. Fry two or three chopped onions in some butter and add
the soup to them. Boil up again for twenty minutes before serving. If you
have no fresh tomatoes, the tinned ones can be used, removing the skin,
at the same time that you add the fried onions.
[_Mme. van Praet._]
SOUP, CREAM OF ASPARAGUS
Boil some potatoes and pass them through the sieve, add the asparagus-
tops, with a pat of butter for each four tops; thin the soup with extract
of meat and water, and at the last moment stir in the raw yolks of two
eggs, and a little chopped parsley.
[_Mme. van Praet._]
GREEN PEA SOUP
Put half a pound of dry green peas to soak overnight in water, with a
teaspoonful of bicarbonate of soda in it. In the morning take out the
peas and put them on the fire in about three-and-a-half pints of water.
When the peas are nearly cooked, add five big potatoes. When all is
cooked enough for the skins to come off easily, rub all through a sieve.
Fry in some butter four or five onions and five or six leeks till they
are brown, or, failing butter, use some fat of beef; add these to the
peas and boil together a good half-hour. If possible, add a pig's trotter
cut into four, which makes the soup most excellent. When ready to serve,
remove the four pieces of trotter. Little dice of fried bread should be
handed with the soup.
[_V. Verachtert._]
VEGETABLE SOUP
Fry four onions till they are brown. Add them to three pints of water,
with four carrots, a slice of white crumb of bread, five potatoes, a
celery and a bunch of parsley, which you must take out before passing the
soup through the sieve. A few tomatoes make the soup better; if they are
tinned, do not add them till after the soup has been passed through the
tammy; if they are fresh, put them in with the other vegetables. Simmer
for an hour, add pepper and salt before serving.
[_V. Verachtert._]
MUSHROOM CREAM SOUP
On a good white stock foundation, for which you have used milk and a bone
of veal, sprinkle in some ground rice till it thickens, stirring it well
for twenty minutes. Wash and chop your mushrooms, and fry them in butter.
Add the yolk of an egg and bind it. This is a delicious soup.
[_Mme. van Marcke de Lunessen._]
THE SOLDIER'S VEGETABLE SOUP
(Eight to ten persons)
Peel three pounds of vegetables. Put them in a large pot with all the
vegetables that you can find, according to the season. In the winter you
will take four celeries, four leeks, two turnips, a cabbage, two onions,
pepper and salt, two-penny-worth of bones, and about five and one-half
quarts of water. Let it all boil for three hours, taking care to add
water so as to keep the quantity at five quarts. Rub all the vegetables
through a tammy, crushing them well, and then let them boil up again for
at least another hour. The time allotted for the first and second cooking
is of the greatest importance.
LEEK SOUP
Cut up two onions and fry them till they are brown; you need not use
butter, clarified fat will do very well. Clean your leeks, washing them
well; cut them in pieces and fry them also; add any other vegetables that
you have, two medium-sized potatoes, pepper, salt, and a little water.
Let all simmer for three hours, and pass it through a fine sieve. Let
there be more leeks than other vegetables, so that their flavor
predominates.
[_Mme. Jules Segers_.]
CELERIS AU LARD
Take one pound of celery, cut off the green tops, cut the stems into
pieces two-thirds of an inch long; put into boiling salted water, and
cook till tender. Take one-half pound potatoes, peel and slice, and add
to the celery, so that both will be cooked at the same moment. Strain and
place on a flat fire-proof dish. Prepare some fat slices of bacon, toast
them till crisp in the oven; pour the melted bacon-fat over the celery
and potato, adding a dash of vinegar, and place the rashers on top. Serve
hot.
Leeks may be prepared in the same way.
CABBAGE WITH SAUSAGES
Cut a large cabbage in two, slice and wash, put it into boiling water
with salt, and when partly cooked, add some potatoes cut into smallish
pieces. Cook all together for about an hour; then drain. Put some fat in
a saucepan, slice an onion, brown it in the fat, add the cabbage and
potato, and stew all together for ten minutes; then dish. Bake some
sausages in the oven and dish them round the cabbage; serve hot.
_Another way (easier)_
Stew the cabbages, potato and sausages all together and dish up neatly.
LEEKS À LIEGOISE Take enough of leeks to make the size of dish required;
if they are very thick, cut in two lengthwise; cut off the green tops;
leaving only the blanched piece of stalk; put them into boiling salted
water and cook thoroughly about one hour: strain and dish neatly on a
fish-drainer. Have ready some hard-boiled eggs; shell them, cut in two,
and place round the leeks; serve hot with melted butter, or cold with
mayonnaise sauce.
N. B. The water in which the leeks have been boiled makes a wholesome
drink when cold, or a nourishing basis for a vegetable soup.
[_From Belgians at Dollarfield, N.B._]
A SALAD OF TOMATOES
To make a tomato salad you must not slice the fruit in a dish and then
pour on it a little vinegar and then a little oil; that is not salad
--that is ignorance.
Take some red tomatoes, and, if you can procure them, some golden ones
also. Plunge each for a moment in boiling water, peel off the skin, but
carefully, so as not to cut through the flesh with the juice. Take some
raw onion cut in slices; if you do not like the strong taste, use
shallot; and lay four or five flat slices on the bottom of the salad
dish. Put the tomato slices over them, sprinkle with salt and just a dust
of castor sugar. In four hours lift the tomatoes and remove the onions
altogether. Make in a cup the following sauce: Dissolve a salt-spoonful
of salt in a teaspoonful of tarragon vinegar. Stir in a dessert-spoonful
of oil, dropping it slowly in, add a very little mustard, some pepper and
a sprinkle of chopped chervil. Some people like chopped chives. Pour this
over the tomato salad and leave it for an hour at least before serving
it.
POTATOES AND CHEESE
Every one likes this nourishing dish, and it is a cheap one. Peel some
potatoes and cut them in rounds. In a fireproof dish put a layer of
these, sprinkle them with flour, grated cheese, pepper, salt, a few pats
of butter. Then some more potatoes, and so on till the dish is full. Beat
the yolks of two eggs in a pint of milk, add pepper and salt and pour it
over the dish. Leave it on the top of the stove for five minutes, then
cook it for half-an-hour in a moderate oven. Less time may be required if
the dish is small, but the potatoes must be thoroughly cooked. The
original recipe directs Gruyère cheese, but red or pale Canadian Cheddar
could be used.
FRIDAY'S FEAST
Cook a medium cabbage till it is tender, and all the better if you can
cook it in some soup. When tender, mince it and rub it through a sieve.
Boil at the same time three pounds of chestnuts, skin them, keep ten
whole, and rub the others through the sieve, adding a little milk to make
a purée. Mix the purée with the cabbage, adding salt, pepper, and a lump
of butter the size of a chestnut. Press it into a mold and cook it in a
double saucepan for quarter of an hour. Take it out and decorate with the
whole chestnuts.
RED CABBAGE
Take half a red cabbage of medium size, chop it very finely and put it in
a pan; add a little water, salt, and pepper, three or four potatoes cut
in fine slices and five lumps of sugar. Let it all simmer for two hours
with the lid on. Then take off the cover and let it reduce. Before
serving it, add either a bit of fat pork or some gravy, with a dessert-
spoonful of vinegar. Stir it well before sending it to table.
[_Mrs. Emelie Jones_.]
ASPARAGUS À L'ANVERS
Clean a bunch of asparagus and cook it in salt water for fifteen minutes.
To do this successfully, tie the bunch round with some tape and place it
upright in a pan of boiling water. Let the heads be above the water so
that they will get cooked by the steam and will not be broken. Simmer in
this way to prevent them moving much. Meanwhile, hard-boil three eggs and
chop some parsley. Lay the asparagus on a dish and sprinkle parsley over
it, place round the sides the eggs cut in halves long-ways, and serve as
well a sauce-boat of melted butter.
[_Mrs. Emelie Jones_.]
COOKED LETTUCE
Very often you will find that you cannot use all your lettuces, that they
have begun to bolt and are no good for salad. This is the moment to cook
them. Discard any bad leaves and wash the others carefully. Boil them for
twelve minutes, take them off the fire, drain them and dry them in a
clean cloth so as to get rid of all the water. Mince them finely, then
put them into a saucepan with a lump of butter, pepper and salt. Stir
till they begin to turn color, then put in a thimbleful of flour melted
in milk. Stir constantly, and if the vegetable becomes dry, moisten with
more flour and milk. Let it simmer for quarter of an hour, and turn it
out as a vegetable with meat.
STUFFED CAULIFLOWER
Pick over a fine cauliflower, and plunge it for a moment in boiling
water. Look over it well again and remove any grit or insects. Put it
head downwards in a pan when you have already placed a good slice of fat
bacon at the bottom and sides. In the holes between the pan and the
vegetable put a stuffing of minced meat, with breadcrumbs, yolks of eggs,
mushrooms, seasoning of the usual kinds, in fact, a good forcemeat. Press
this well in, and pour over it a thin gravy. Let it cook gently, and when
the gravy on the top has disappeared put a dish on the top of the
saucepan, turn it upside down and slip the cauliflower out. Serve very
hot.
GOURMANDS' MUSHROOMS
There was a man in Ghent who loved mushrooms, but he could only eat them
done in this fashion. If you said, "Monsieur, will you have them tossed
in butter?" he would roar out, "No--do you take me for a Prussian? Let me
have them properly cooked."
Melt in a pan a lump of butter the size of a tangerine orange and squeeze
on it the juice of half a lemon. The way to get a great deal of juice
from a lemon is to plunge it first of all for a few minutes, say five
minutes, in boiling water. When the butter simmers, throw in a pound of
picked small mushrooms, stir them constantly, do not let them get black.
Then in three or four minutes they are well impregnated with butter, and
the chief difficulty of the dish is over. Put the saucepan further on the
fire, let it boil for a few minutes. Take out the mushrooms, drain them,
sprinkle them with flour, moisten them with gravy, season with salt and
pepper, put them back in the butter and stir in the yolk of an egg. Add
also a little of the lemon juice that remains. While you are doing this
you must get another person to cut and toast some bread and to butter it.
Pour on to the bread the mushrooms (which are fit for the greatest saints
to eat on Fridays), and serve them very hot.
POMMES CHÂTEAU
Take twenty potatoes, turn them with a knife into olive shape, boil them
in salted water for five minutes; drain them and put them on a baking-tin
with salt and butter or dripping. Cook them in a very hot oven for thirty
minutes, moving them about from time to time. Sprinkle on a little
chopped parsley before serving.
CHIPPED POTATOES
Take some long-shaped potatoes, peel them and smooth them with the knife.
Cut them into very thin rounds.
Heat the grease pretty hot, dry the slices of potato with a cloth, put
them into the frying basket and plunge them into the fat. When they are
colored, take the basket out, let the fat heat up again to a slightly
higher temperature, and re-plunge the basket, so that the slices become
quite crisp. Serve with coarse salt sprinkled over.
CHICORY À LA FERDINAND
Boil and chop in medium-sized pieces the chicory, mince up a few chives
according to your taste and heat both the vegetables in some cream,
adding salt and pepper. Pour on a dish and decorate with chopped hard-
boiled eggs.
APPLES AND SAUSAGES
This dish comes from the French border of Belgium; it tastes better than
you would think. Take a pound of beef sausages, and preferably use the
small chipolata sausages. (What a delightful thing if the English would
make other kinds of sausages as well as their beef and pork ones!) Fry
then your sausages lightly in butter, look upon them as little beings for
a few moments in purgatory before they are removed to heaven, among the
apples. Keeping your sausages hot after they are fried, take a pound of
brown pippin apples, pare them and core them. Cut them into neat rounds
quarter of an inch thick, put them to cook in their liquor of the
sausages (which you are keeping hot elsewhere), and add butter to moisten
them. Let them simmer gently so as to keep their shape. Put the apple-
rings in the center of the dish, place the sausages round them. This dish
uses a good deal of butter, but you must not use anything else for
frying.
STUFFED CHICORY
Make a mince of any cold white meat, such as veal, pork or chicken, and
add to it some minced ham; sprinkle it with a thick white sauce. In the
meantime the chicories should be cooking; tie each one round with a
thread to keep them firm and boil them for ten minutes. When cooked,
drain them well, open them lengthwise very carefully, and slip in a
spoonful of the mince. Close them, keeping the leaves very neat, and, if
necessary, tie them round again. Put them in a fire-proof dish with a
lump of butter on each, and let them heat through. Serve them in their
juice or with more of the white sauce, taking care to remove the threads.
[_Madame Limpens_.]
TOMATOES STUFFED WITH BEANS
Halve and empty the tomatoes, and put a few drops of vinegar in each.
Cook your beans, whether French beans or haricots or flageolets, and stir
them, when tender, into a good thick bechamel sauce. Let this get cold.
Empty out the vinegar from the tomatoes and fill them with the mixture,
pouring over the top some mayonnaise sauce and parsley.
[_Madame van Praet_.]
CABBAGE AND POTATOES
Boil the cabbages in salted water till tender. Chop them up. Brown an
onion in butter, and add the cabbage, salt, pepper, and a little water.
Slice some potatoes thickly, fry them, and serve the vegetable with
cabbage in the center, and the fried potatoes laid round.
[_Mdlle. M. Schmidt, Antwerp_.]
SPINACH À LA BRACONNIÈRE
Cook two pounds of well-washed spinach; drain it, and pass it through a
sieve; or, failing a sieve, chop it very finely with butter, pepper and
salt. Do not add milk, but let it remain somewhat firm. Make a thick
bechamel sauce, sufficient to take up a quarter of a pound of grated
Gruyère, and, if you wish, stir in the yolk of a raw egg. Lay in a
circular dish half a pound of minced ham, pour round it the thick white
sauce, and round that again the hot spinach. This makes a pretty dish,
and it is not costly.
[_Mme. Braconnière_.]
A DISH OF HARICOT BEANS
Put the haricots to soak for six hours in cold water. Boil them in water
with one carrot, one onion, salt, two cloves, a good pinch of dried
herbs. Drain off the liquor from the haricots. Chop up a shallot, and fry
it in butter; add your haricots, with pepper and salt and tomato purée.
Stir well, and serve with minced parsley scattered at the top.
[_Mme. Goffaux_.]
POTATOES IN THE BELGIAN MANNER
Take some slices of streaky bacon, about five inches long, and heat them
in a pan. When the bacon is half-cooked, take it out of the pan and in
the fat that remains behind fry some very finely-sliced onions till they
are brown. When the onions are well browned, put them in a large pot,
large enough for all the potatoes you wish to cook, adding pepper, salt,
and a coffee-spoonful of sweet herbs dried and mixed, which in England
replace the thyme and bay-leaves used in Belgium. Add sufficient water to
cook the potatoes and your slices of bacon. Cook till tender.
[_E. Wainard_.]
TOMATOES AND SHRIMPS
Lay on a dish some sliced tomatoes, taking out the seeds, and sprinkle
them over with picked shrimps. Then pour over all a good mayonnaise
sauce. For the sauce: Take the yolk of an egg and mix it with two soup-
spoonfuls of salad oil that you must pass in very gently and very little
at a time. Melt a good pinch of salt in a teaspoonful of vinegar
(tarragon vinegar, if you have it); add pepper and a small quantity of
made mustard. In making this sauce be sure to stir it always the same
way. It will take about half-an-hour to make it properly.
[_Paquerette_.]
FLEMISH ENDIVE
Choose twelve endives that are short and neat; cut off the outside leaves
and pare the bottom; wash them in plenty of water, and cook them in
simmering water for three minutes. Then take them from the water and
place them in a well-buttered frying-pan, dust them with salt and also
with a pinch of sugar. Add the juice of half a lemon, and rather less
than a pint of water. Place the pan on the fire for two or three minutes
to start the cooking, then cover it closely, and finish the cooking by
placing it in the oven for fifty minutes. Take out the endives and put
them in the vegetable-dish and pour over them the liquor in which they
have been cooked. This liquor is improved by being reduced, and when off
the fire, by having a small piece of butter added to it.
The above recipe can be used for chicory as well as for endive.
[_J. Kirckaert_.]
CAULIFLOWER AND SHRIMPS
Take a cauliflower and cut off the green part, and wash it several times
in salted water. Boil it gently till cooked, taking care that it remains
whole. Put it aside to cool, and when it is quite cold make a hole in the
center down to the bottom. Pick some shrimps till you have half a pint of
them, make a good mayonnaise and, taking half of it, mix it with the
shrimps. Fill the hole in the cauliflower with the shrimps and sauce, and
pour the rest of the sauce over the top of the cauliflower.
This dish is to be served very cold.
[_E. Defouck_.]
BELGIAN CARROTS
Clean well the carrots, cut them in dice, and wash them well. Put them on
the fire with enough water to cover them, a bit of butter, an onion well
minced, salt and pepper and a dessert-spoonful of powdered sugar. Place
the dish in the oven for at least an hour, and, when you serve it,
sprinkle over the carrots some minced parsley.
[_Gabrielle Janssens_.]
STUFFED TOMATOES
Take ten good tomatoes and cut off the tops, which are to serve as lids.
Remove the insides, and fill with the following mixture: minced veal and
ham, rather more veal than ham, mushrooms tossed in butter, a little
breadcrumb, milk to render it moist, pepper and salt. Put on the covers
and add on each one a scrap of butter. Bake them gently in a fireproof
dish. The following excellent sauce is poured over them five minutes
before taking them out of the oven: Use any stock that you have,
preferably veal, adding the insides of the tomatoes, pepper and salt;
pass this through the wire sieve. Make a _roux_--that is, melt some
butter in a pan, adding flour little by little and stirring until it goes
a brown color. Add to it then your tomatoes that have been through the
sieve, and some more fried mushrooms. Pour this sauce over the whole and
serve very hot.
[_Mme. van Praet_.]
RED CABBAGE
Mince the cabbage and put it in a pan with plenty of refined fat
(clarified fat) and two or three large potatoes, pepper and salt. Add
sufficient water to cover it, with a dash of vinegar and six dessert-
spoonfuls of brown or moist sugar. Let it simmer for four hours, drain it
and serve cold.
[_Mme. Segers_.]
VEGETABLE SALAD
The special point of this dish is that peas, beans, carrots in dice, are
all cooked separately and when they are cold they are placed in a large
dish without being mixed. Decorate with the hearts of lettuce round the
edge and with slices of tomato, and pour over it, or hand with it, a good
mayonnaise.
[_Mme. van Praet_.]
CHICORY
This excellent vegetable can be dressed either in a bechamel sauce, or
with butter and lemon-juice. It is gently stewed, first of all, and it
requires pepper and salt. The sauces can be varied with tomato, or with
some of the good English bottled sauces stirred with the bechamel.
[_Mme. van Praet_.]
CAULIFLOWER À LA REINE ELIZABETH
Simmer the cauliflowers till tender. Prepare a mince of veal and pork,
and season it well with a little spice. Butter a mold and fill it with
alternate layers of mince and of cauliflower broken in small pieces. Fill
a large saucepan three-quarters full of boiling water and place the mold
in this; let it cook for one hour in this way over the fire; turn it out
and pour a spinach sauce over it.
[_Mme. van Praet_.]
MUSHROOMS À LA SPINETTE
Make some puff pastry cases, wash and chop the mushrooms and toss them in
butter to which you have added a slice of lemon. Make a bechamel sauce
with cream, or, failing that, with thick tinned cream, and mix with the
mushrooms. Heat the cases for a few minutes in the oven and fill them
with the hot mixture.
[_Mme. Spinette_.]
DRESSED CAULIFLOWER
Simmer a cauliflower till it is tender. Pour out the liquor, and add to
it a bit of butter, the size of a nut, rolled in flour, a pinch of
nutmeg, a tablespoonful of Gruyère cheese and a little milk.
Bind the sauce with a little feculina flour. At the moment of
serving, pour the sauce over the cauliflower, which you have placed
upright on a dish. The nutmeg and the cheese are indispensable to this
dish.
[_V. Verachtert_.]
BRUSSELS SPROUTS
(The best way to cook them)
Having cleaned and trimmed your sprouts, let them simmer in salted water,
to which you have also added a little soda to preserve the color. Or, if
you do not like to add soda, keep the pan firmly covered by the lid. When
tender, take them out and let them drain, place them in another pan with
a good lump of butter or fat; stir, so as to let the butter melt at once,
and sprinkle in pepper and a tiny pinch of nutmeg.
[_Mdlle. Germaine Verstraete_.]
RAGOUT OF MUTTON
Fry the mutton very well. Then place in another pan sufficient water to
cover your mutton, adding pepper, salt, a little nutmeg, a celery, and a
few white turnips cut in pieces. When they are well cooked, add the meat
and let all simmer for two hours.
[_V. Verachtert_.]
STEWED SHOULDER OF MUTTON
Put in a pan a large lump of butter or clarified fat, and place the
shoulder in it. Add two big onions sliced, and a very large carrot also
sliced, thyme, bay-leaf, two cloves, pepper and salt, and, if you like
it, two garlic knobs. Let the shoulder simmer in this by the side of the
fire for three hours. Strain the sauce through a fine sieve, and then add
to it either a glass of good red wine or a little made mustard with a
teaspoonful of brown sugar.
[_Mme. Segers_.]
SHOULDER OF MUTTON
Put a handful of dried white haricots to soak over-night and simmer them
the following day for two hours with some salt. Rub your shoulder of
mutton with a little bit of garlic before putting it in the oven to cook,
and when it is done, serve with the haricots round it, to which have been
added a pat or two of butter.
[_V. Verachtert_.]
MUTTON COLLOPS
Take some slices of roast or boiled leg of mutton, egg them, and roll in
a mixture of breadcrumbs, salt, pepper, and a little flower. Fry till the
slices are brown on each side; serve with chipped potatoes.
SHOULDER OF MUTTON DRESSED LIKE KID
My readers have probably tasted a shoulder of kid dressed as mutton. Let
them therefore try the converse of the dish, and, if they really take
trouble with it, they will have a dinner of the most delicious. Put into
a deep dish that will hold your shoulder of mutton the following mixture:
A cupful each of oil, vinegar, white wine, red wine, an onion stuffed
with cloves, a bunch of herbs which must be fresh ones--thyme, parsley,
marjoram, sage, a tiny bit of mint, a few bay-leaves--two medium carrots
cut in slices. Put the shoulder of mutton in this mixture and keep it
there for four days, turning it every now and then and pouring the
mixture on it. On the fifth day take it out, and, if you care to take the
trouble, you will improve it by larding the meat here and there. Put it
to roast in front of a good fire, with your liquor, which serves to baste
it with, in a pan beneath. If you cannot arrange to hang the mutton by a
string to turn like a roasting jack, then bake it, and continually baste
it. A small shoulder is most successful. For one of four pounds bake for
fifty minutes.
ROAST RUMP OF BEEF, BORDELAISE SAUCE
Take three pounds of the rump of beef, put it into a pretty deep pan upon
one onion, one sliced carrot, some thyme, and a bay-leaf, three table-
spoonfuls of dripping, salt, and pepper. Put it on the top of the fire,
and when it comes fully to the boil, put it to the side, and allow it to
simmer nicely for an hour and a half. Dress it on a dish and serve the
sauce separately.
ROASTED FILLET OF BEEF
About three pounds of fillet of beef roasted in a good hot oven for forty
minutes; let it be rather underdone. Take three turnips, four good-sized
carrots, cut them into jardinière slices. Cook them separately in salted
water, drain them and add salt, pepper, a tiny pinch of sugar and one
dessert-spoonful of butter. Dress the fillet on a long dish with the
garniture of carrots and turnips, and some artichoke-bottoms cooked in
water and finished with butter, also add some potatoes _château_. Be
sure the dish is very hot. Put a little water, or, for choice, clear
stock, upon the roasting-dish and pour it over the fillet.
BEEF À LA BOURGUIGNONNE
Braise three pounds of beef upon twenty little onions, ten mushrooms, and
two glasses of red wine, salt, pepper, thyme and bay-leaf; cook for one
and one-half hours with not too hot a fire. After that, place the beef on
an oval dish; keep it hot; stir two tablespoonfuls of demi-glaze into the
vegetables and let it boil up. Cut some slices of the beef, and strain
the sauce over all.
OX-TONGUE À LA BOURGEOISE
Braise a tongue with two glasses of Madeira, one carrot, one onion,
thyme, bay-leaf, for two hours. Take seven tomatoes cut in pieces, four
carrots cut in two and three in four, about one-half inch long, ten
smallish onions, and braise them all together; then add two large table-
spoonfuls of demi-glaze, some salt and pepper. Serve all very hot on an
oval dish.
Braised tongue eats very well with spinach, carrots or sorrel.
BEEF À LA MODE
Take the raw beef, either rump-steak or fillet, and brown it in the pan
in some butter. Then add a little boiling water. Add then six or eight
chopped shallots, the hearts of two celeries chopped, a few small and
whole carrots, pepper, salt, two cloves. Before serving, bind the sauce
with a little flour and pour all over the meat.
[_V. Verachtert_.]
BOEUF À LA FLAMANDE
For this national dish that part of the animal called the "spiering" is
used, which is cut from near the neck. What is called fresh silverside in
England answers very well. Cut the beef into slices about half-an-inch
thick and divide the slices into four pieces. This you can do with a
piece of four pounds. For a piece of four pounds, cook first of all four
large fried onions in fat. Put the beef in the hot fat when the onions
are colored, and sauté it; that is, keep moving the meat about gently.
Take the meat out and place it on a dish. Add to the fat two dessert-
spoonsful of flour and let it cook gently for five minutes, adding a good
pint of water. Pass the sauce through a tammy, over the onions, and put
the meat back in it, and it ought to cover them. Then add a dessert-
spoonful of good vinegar and a strong bunch of herbs. Stew for an hour,
take off the fat and remove the bunch of herbs. Heat up again and serve.
CARETAKER'S BEEF
The real name of this dish is _Miroton de la Concierge_, and it is
currently held that only _concierges_ can do it to perfection. Put a
handful of minced onion to fry in butter; when it is nearly cooked, but
not quite, add a dessert-spoonful of flour, and stir it till all is well
colored. Pour on it a little gravy, or meat-juice of some kind, and let
it simmer for ten minutes after it begins to steam again. Then take your
beef, which must be cold, and cut in small slices; throw them in and let
it all cook for a quarter of an hour, only simmering, and constantly
stirring it, so that though it becomes considerably reduced it does not
stick to the pan.
BLANKENBERG BEEF
This is a winter dish; it is most sustaining, and once made, it can be
kept hot for hours without spoiling. Make a purée of lentils or peas, and
season it with pepper and salt. Mince your beef with an equal quantity of
peeled chestnuts, add chopped parsley, a dust of nutmeg or a few cloves.
If you have any cheap red wine pour it over the mince till it is well
moistened. If you have no red wine, use gravy. If you have no gravy, use
milk. Let all heat up in the oven for ten minutes, then sprinkle in some
currants or sultanas. Take the dish you wish to serve it in, put the stew
in the middle, and place the purée round it. If the mince is moist it can
be kept by the fire till required, or the dish can be covered with
another one and placed in a carrying-can, taken out to skating or
shooting parties.
VEAL WITH TOMATOES
Grill some slices of fat veal; cook some sliced tomatoes with butter,
pepper and salt, on a flat dish in a pretty quick oven. Garnish the veal
with the tomatoes laid on top of each slice, and pour _maître-
d'hôtel_ butter over, made with butter, salt, chopped parsley, and
lemon-juice.
FRICANDEAU OF VEAL
A fillet of veal, larded with fat bacon, of about three pounds. Braise it
one and one-half hours on a moderate fire. Dish with its own gravy. This
eats well with spinach, endive, sorrel or carrots.
VEAL CUTLETS WITH MADEIRA SAUCE
are garnished with potatoes and mushrooms, and the sauce is made of demi-
glaze and madeira, worked up with butter, pepper, salt and chopped
parsley.
GRENADINS OF VEAL
Cut your veal into fairly thick cutlets, lard them with fat bacon, and
braise them in the oven, with salt, pepper and butter. Dish up, and rinse
the pot with a little stock, and pour it on the meat ready to serve.
CALF'S LIVER À LA BOURGEOISE
Take a calf's liver, lard it with fat bacon, braise it with the
_bourgeoise_ garnish--carrots and turnips. After it is cooked and
dished, stir some demi-glaze into the sauce, pour it on to the meat and
garnish with potatoes _château_.
VEAL WITH MUSHROOMS, OR THE CALF IN PARADISE
Take some slices of loin of veal, fry them in butter, with pepper and
salt, for twenty minutes. Take two spoonfuls of demi-glaze and heat it
with some mushrooms and a little madeira. Put the mushrooms and sauce on
each slice and sprinkle chopped parsley over all.
This can also be done with _fines herbes_, mushrooms, chervil and
parsley, chopped before cooking them in the butter.
BLANQUETTE OF VEAL
Take your veal, which need not be from the fillet or the best cuts. Cut
it into pieces about an inch long and add a little water when putting it
into the pan; salt, pepper and a little nutmeg, and let it simmer for two
hours. When tender, stir in the juice of half a lemon, and then bind the
sauce with the yolk of an egg, or, in default of that, with a little
flour. Serve immediately. You will find that when you wish to bind a
sauce at the last minute, egg powder will serve very well.
[_V. Verachtert_.]
VEAL CAKE, EXCELLENT FOR SUPPER
Take some chopped veal and with it an equal quantity of chopped beef, and
one-quarter the quantity of breadcrumbs from a fresh loaf. Bind all with
a raw egg, adding salt and pepper, and, if wished, some blanched and
chopped almonds. (Put a large piece of butter both above and below.)
Shape the meat into the form of a loaf and put it in a dish, with a large
slice of butter above and below it. Cook it for about half-an-hour.
[_Mme. Gabrielle Janssens_.]
BREAST OF VEAL
(A good and inexpensive dish)
Cook the breast of veal in stock or in a little meat extract and water,
with sliced carrots and onions, thyme, pepper, salt, three bay-leaves and
three cloves. Let it stew for one hour in this, and then take it out.
Take out also the vegetables, and strain the liquor. Make a bechamel
sauce and add it to the liquor, giving it all a sharp taste with the
juice of half a lemon. Put back the breast of veal in this sauce and when
hot again serve them together.
[_Mdlle. Spinette_.]
OX TONGUE
Cook the ox tongue in stock or in meat extract and water. Make the
hunters' sauce, as for a hare, but sprinkle into it some chopped
sultanas. Take the tongue out of the stock and skin it, cut it in neat
pieces if you wish, and let it heat in your sauce.
[_Mdlle. Spinette_.]
VEAL À LA MILANAISE
Egg and breadcrumb some thick slices of veal; fry and garnish with boiled
macaroni cut in small pieces, with ham, mushrooms, truffles, all cut in
Julienne strips, pepper, salt, and a little tomato sauce. Mix all
these well together, and serve very hot.
STUFFED VEAL LIVER, OR LIVER À LA PANIER D'OR
The _Panier d'Or_ is a hotel in Bruges, much frequented before the
war by the English.
Take the yolk of a hard-boiled egg, a bit of bread the same size, and
crumble them together; rub in some chopped parsley and onion and moisten
it with gravy or with milk; season highly with salt, cayenne, and a
little vinegar or mustard. Take your liver, if possible in one rather
large flat slice. Make deep cuts in it, parallel to each other, and lying
closely together. Press your stuffing into these cuts. Put a bit of
butter the size of a walnut into a pan, or fireproof dish. Take your
liver and tie it round with a slice of fat bacon or fat pork. Lay it in
the dish and let it cook for an hour in a moderate oven. When done,
remove the slice of bacon, if there is any left, and serve the liver in
its own juice.
VEAL À LA CRÊME
Take a piece of veal suitable for roasting, and put it in vinegar for
twenty-four hours.
Roast it with butter, pepper and salt, with a few slices of onion. Baste
it well, and when it is finished crush the onions in the gravy and add
some cream. Mix together with flour so as to thicken.
[_Mdlle. Spreakers_.]
_This is the demi-glaze Sauce which is used for all brown Sauces._
Take one pound of flour, dry it in the oven on a tray till it is the
color of cocoa; pass it through a sieve into a saucepan, moisten it with
stock, mixing very carefully. Boil it up two or three times during forty-
eight hours, adding two carrots, two onions, thyme, bay, all cut up,
which you have colored in the frying-pan, also some salt and peppercorns.
When it is all cooked, pass it through a cloth or sieve. When it is
reduced the first time, you should add some stock, but by the time it is
finished it should be fairly thick. It will keep for a fortnight.
[_G. Goffaux_.]
DUTCH SAUCE FOR FISH
Take a tablespoonful of flour and three of water; make it boil and add
the yolks of three eggs; melt one-half pound of butter and beat it gently
into your first mixture, add salt, the juice of half a lemon and a pinch
of grated nutmeg. Keep the sauce very hot in a _bain-marie_ or in a
double saucepan. If you have neither, keep it in a large cup placed in a
saucepan of hot water.
[_Mrs. Emelie Jones_.]
BEARNAISE SAUCE
(Very good with stewed meat)
Put some onions to cook in tarragon vinegar and water; when they are half
done, add more water and throw in a little thyme and a leaf or two of
bay; let it cook for one hour and pass it through a sieve. Melt some
butter in a pan and thicken it with flour; put your vinegar to it and
more water if you think it necessary; stir in salt and pepper and the
yolks of two eggs or more, according to the quantity that you wish to
make. Let it get thick, and just as you take it off the fire add a
sprinkle of chopped parsley and a pat of butter. This is a useful sauce
and it well repays the trouble.
[_Mme. Spinette_.]
MUSLIN SAUCE
Melt a piece of butter the size of an egg, sprinkle and stir in some
flour, adding water if it becomes too thick. Keep stirring over the fire
for five minutes, and, still stirring, add pepper and salt and the yolks
of two eggs. You may add the yolks of three or four eggs if you wish for
a rich sauce. The last item is the juice of a lemon to your taste. This
is a very popular addition to meat.
[_Mme. Spinette_.]
SAUCE BORDELAISE
Two shallots, ten tarragon leaves all chopped, are put into a very small
saucepan. Add a large glass of claret, a dessert-spoonful of butter, and
let it all reduce together. Add salt, pepper, three dessert-spoonfuls of
demi-glaze, let it come to the boil, and stir in two dessert-spoonfuls of
butter. [_Georges Goffaux_.]
POOR MAN'S SAUCE
Even a piece of meat of poor quality is much liked if it has the
following sauce poured over it when served. Put a little milk, say a
cupful, in a saucepan, with salt and pepper; let it heat. Chop up a
handful of shallots and a quarter as much of parsley that is well washed.
Throw them into the milk; let it boil, and when the shallots are tender
the sauce is ready. If you have no milk, use water; but in that case let
it be strongly flavored with vinegar.
THE GOOD WIFE'S SAUCE
This sauce is indispensable to any one who wishes to use up slices of
cold mutton. Trim your slices, take away skin and fat and pour on them
the following cold sauce. Hard-boil three eggs, let them get cold.
Crumble the yolks in a cup, adding slowly a tablespoonful of oil, salt,
pepper, a little mustard, a teaspoonful of vinegar; then chop the whites
of egg, with a scrap of onion, and if you have them, some capers. Mix all
together and pour it over the cold meat.
CREAM SAUCE
Roll a lump of butter in flour, put it in a pan on the fire, and as it
melts add pepper and salt. Stir it, and as it thickens add a little milk;
let it simmer and keep on stirring it. You will never get a good white
sauce unless you season it well and let it simmer for a quarter of an
hour. Strain it, heat it again, and serve it for fish, potatoes, chicken.
SAUCE MAÎTRE D'HÔTEL
Every one likes this sauce for either meat or fish. In a double saucepan
melt a lump of butter, flavor it with salt, pepper, some minced parsley
that you had first rubbed on a raw slice of onion, and some lemon-juice.
Use vinegar instead of the lemon if you wish, but do not forget that it
does not require so much vinegar. Mix it with a fork and serve it warm;
do not let it bubble.
SAUCE AU DIABLE
(For cold meats)
Take a shallot or two, according to quantity of sauce needed, slice very
finely, shred a little parsley, put both into the sauce-boat, with salt,
pepper, and mustard to taste; add oil and vinegar in proportion of one
dessert-spoonful of vinegar to two table-spoonfuls of oil, till
sufficient quantity.
FRICASSEE OF PIGEONS
Put your pieces of pigeon into a stew-pan in butter, and let it cook with
the pigeons. Then add one carrot, two onions, two sprigs of parsley, a
leaf of sage, five juniper berries, and a very little nutmeg. Stir it all
for a few minutes, and then, and only then, add a half-cupful of water
and Liebig, two rusks or dry biscuits in pieces, the juice of a lemon.
Put it all on the side of the fire, cover the saucepan and let it cook
gently for an hour and a half.
[_Mme. Vandervalle_.]
HUNTER'S HARE
Cut the hare in pieces and cook it in the oven in butter, pepper and
salt, turning it now and then so that it does not get dry. Then prepare
Hunter's Sauce. Melt a bit of butter the size of an egg and add flour,
letting it brown, fry in it plenty of chopped onions and shallots, adding
tarragon vinegar, cayenne and pepper-corns; spice it highly with nutmeg,
three cloves, a sprig of thyme and a couple of bay-leaves. Chop up the
hare liver, put it in the sauce and pass all through the sieve. Pour the
sauce over the hare and add a good glass of claret, or, for English
tastes, of port wine. If the sauce is too thin, thicken it with flour,
and serve all together.
[_Mme. Spinette_.]
FLEMISH RABBIT
Cut the rabbit into neat pieces. Put them into a deep frying-pan and toss
them in butter, so that each piece is well browned without burning the
butter. Take them out of the pan and in the same butter cook six shallots
(finely minced) till they are brown. Then return the rabbit to the pan,
seasoning all with salt and pepper, adding as well three bay-leaves, two
cloves, and two white peppers. If you have any gravy, add a pint of it,
but in default of gravy add the same quantity of Bovril and water. Place
on the fire till it boils, then draw it to the side and let it cook there
gently for three-quarters of an hour. Just when it is nearly done, add a
little vinegar, more or less according to your taste. This is served with
boiled and well-drained potatoes. If the sauce is not thick enough, add
to it a little flour which has been first mixed with some cold water.
[_Georges Kerckeert_.]
ROAST KID WITH VENISON SAUCE
This dish is very excellent with mutton instead of kid; the meat tastes
like venison if this recipe is followed:
Put the meat, say a shoulder of mutton, to soak in a bottle of red wine,
with a sliced carrot, thyme, bay-leaves (4), six cloves, fifteen
peppercorns and a teaspoonful of vinegar, for two hours. Then bring the
liquor to the boil and just before it is boiling pour it over and over
the meat. Do this pouring over of hot liquor for two days. Then put the
meat in the oven with butter, pepper, and salt, till it is cooked.
Sauce: Brown some onions in butter and pour in your liquor, but without
the carrot. Let it simmer for three-quarters of an hour, and pour it
through a sieve. Roll a nut of butter in flour and add little by little
the liquor you have from the meat, then a coffee-spoonful of meat extract
and two lumps of sugar. This sauce ought to be quite thick. It is served
with the meat. [_Mme. Vandervalle_.]
BAKED RABBIT
Fry the pieces of rabbit, adding three onions, two medium potatoes, half
a glass of beer, a little water or stock, pepper and salt. Let it all
bake gently in an earthenware pot for two hours, and then thicken the
same with flour. It is an improvement to add when it is being cooked two
cloves, two bay-leaves, a pinch of nutmeg, and any fresh herbs, such as
thyme, parsley, mint.
[_Mme. E. Maes_.]
CHICKEN À LA MAX
Chop up some cold chicken into small squares, mix with a thick white
sauce, and let it heat. Put it on a hot dish and cover with fried onions.
Put chipped potatoes at the ends of the dish and a boiled chicory at
either side. This excellent dish has received distinction also from its
name, that of the heroic and ingenious burgomaster of Brussels.
[_M. Stuart_.]
RABBIT À LA BORDELAISE
Cut a rabbit into joints, cover with vinegar, chop finely two small
onions, thyme, pepper, and salt, and a little grated nutmeg; let all soak
for twenty-four hours.
Take out the joints and brown gently in a little dripping; when all are
nicely browned take one cupful of the marmalade and stew till tender one
and a half to two hours. When ready, strain off the sauce, thicken nicely
with flour, dish the rabbit, and pour over the sauce.
LAEKEN RABBIT
Take a medium-sized rabbit, and have it prepared and cut into joints. Put
the pieces to soak for forty-eight hours in vinegar, enough to cover
them, with a sprinkle of fresh thyme in it and a small onion sliced
finely. After forty-eight hours, put one-quarter pound of fat bacon,
sliced, in a pan to melt, and when it has melted, take out any bits that
remain, and add to the melted bacon a bit of butter as big as an egg,
which let melt till it froths; secondly, sprinkle in a dessert-spoonful
of flour. Stir it over the fire, mixing well till the sauce becomes
brown, and then put in your marinaded pieces of rabbit. Add pepper and
salt and cook till each piece is well colored on each side. When they are
well colored, add then the bunch of thyme, the sliced onion and half the
vinegar that you used for soaking; three bay-leaves, one dozen dried and
dry prunes, five lumps of sugar, half a pint of water. Cover closely and
let it simmer for two hours and a half.
[_A Belgian at Droitwich_.]
RABBIT
Put the back and the hind legs of one or two rabbits in an oven, covering
the same first with a layer of butter (half inch thick) and then with a
layer of French mustard, pepper and salt. Roast by a good fire for one
hour, baste often with the juice from the meat and the gravy.
HARE
To be put in a pan in the oven: sauce, butter, and a quarter of a pint of
cream, pepper, salt and some flour to thicken the sauce. Before the hare
is put in the oven, cover it with a thin piece of bacon, which must be
taken away before the hare is brought to table.
[_Mdlle. Breakers_.]
RUM OMELETTE
This simple dish is much liked by gentlemen. Break five eggs in a basin,
sweeten them with castor sugar, pour in a sherry glassful of rum. Beat
them very hard till they froth. Put a bit of fresh butter in a shallow
pan and pour in your eggs. Let it stay on the fire just three minutes and
then slip it off on to a hot dish. Powder it with sugar, as you take it
to the dining-room. At the dining-room door, set a light to a big
spoonful of rum and pour it over the omelette just as you go in. It is
almost impossible to light a glass of rum in a hurry, for your omelette,
so use a kitchen spoon.
THE CHILDREN'S BIRTHDAY DISH
Boil up a quart of milk, sweeten it with nearly half a pound of sugar,
and flavor with vanilla. Let it get cold. Beat up six eggs, both yolks
and whites, mix them with the milk, put it all in a fireproof dish and
cook very gently. Cover the top before you serve it with ratafia
biscuits.
A FRANGIPANI
Put your saucepan on the table and break in it two eggs. Mix these with
two dessertspoonfuls of flour. Add a pint of milk, and put it on the
fire, stirring always one way. Let it cook for a quarter of an hour,
stirring with one hand, while with the other sprinkle in powdered sugar
and ground almonds. Turn out to get cold, and cut in squares.
APRICOT SOUFFLÉ
This is good enough even for an English "dinner-party." Beat the whites
of six eggs stiffly. Take four dessert-spoonfuls of apricot jam, or an
equal quantity of those dried apricots that have been soaked and stewed
to a purée. If you use jam, you need not add sugar. If you use the dried
apricots, add sugar to sweeten. Butter a dish at the bottom, and when you
have well mixed with a fork the beaten whites and the apricot, put it in
a pyramid on the dish and bake for fifteen minutes in a moderate oven.
Powder with sugar.
STEWED PRUNES
Prunes are very good done this way. Take a pound of prunes, soak them
twenty-four hours in water. Put them on the fire in a cupful of water and
half a bottle of light red wine, quarter of a pound of sugar and, if you
like it, a pinch of cinnamon or mixed spice. Let it all stew till the
liquor is much reduced and the prunes are well flavored. Let them get
cold, and serve them in a glass dish with whipped cream.
CHOCOLATE CREAM
Take the whites of six eggs and beat them stiff, doing first one and then
another, adding to them three soup-spoonfuls of powdered sugar and three
sticks of chocolate that you have grated. If you have powdered chocolate
by you, use that, and taste the mixture to judge when it is well
flavored. Mix it all well in a cool place. To do this dish successfully,
make it just before you wish to serve it.
[_Mdlle. Lust, of Brussels_.]
SEMOLINA SOUFFLÉ
Boil up two pints of milk and fifteen lumps of sugar with a bit of
vanilla. Add three soup-spoonfuls of semolina, and let it boil for
fifteen minutes, while you stir it. Take it from the fire, and add to it
the yolks of two eggs and their whites that you have beaten stiffly. Put
it in the oven for a quarter of an hour, and serve it hot.
[_Mdlle. Lust, of Brussels_.]
SNOWY MOUNTAINS
Butter six circular rusks, and put on them a layer of jam. Beat the
whites of three eggs and place them on the rusks in the shape of a
pyramide. Put them in the oven and color a little. They must be served
hot.
[_Mdlle. Lust, of Brussels_.]
RICHELIEU RICE
Put three soup-spoonfuls of Carolina rice to swell in a little water,
with a pat of butter. When the rice has absorbed all the water, add a
pint of milk, sugar to sweeten, a few raisins, some chopped orange-peel,
and some crystallized cherries, or any other preserved fruit. Put all on
the fire, and when the mixture is cooked the rice ought to be creamy. Add
the yolk of an egg, stir it well, and pour all into a mold. Put it to
cool. Turn it out, and serve it with the following sauce, which must be
poured on the shape.
A pint of milk, sugar, and vanilla; let it boil. Stir a soup-spoonful of
cornflour in water till it is smooth, mix it with the boiling milk, let
it boil while stirring it for a few minutes, take it from the fire, add
the yolk of an egg, and pour it on the rice shape. Serve when cold.
[_Mdlle. Lust, of Brussels_.]
EXCELLENT PASTE FOR PASTRY
Equal quantities of butter and flour, well mixed in a little beer; add
also a pinch of salt. Make this paste the day before you require it; it
is good for little patties and tarts.
[_Mdlle. Le Kent_.]
CHOCOLATE CREAM
(No. 2)
Melt four penny tablets of chocolate in hot milk until it is liquid and
without lumps. Boil up a pint of milk with a stick of vanilla, a big lump
of butter (size of a walnut) and ten lumps of sugar. When this boils, add
the chocolate and keep stirring continually. Then take the yolks of three
eggs and well beat them; it is better to have these beaten before, so as
not to interfere with the stirring of your mixture. Add your three yolks
and keep on stirring, always in the same way. Then pour the mixture into
a mold that has been rinsed out in very cold water, and let it stand in a
cool place till set.
[_Mrs. Emelie Jones_.]
BELGIAN GINGERBREAD
1/2 pound cornflour
1/4 pound butter
1/4 pound white sugar
1 or 2 eggs
1/2 ounce ginger powder.
Work all the ingredients together on a marble slab, to get the paste all
of the same consistency. Make it into balls as big as walnuts, flattening
them slightly before putting them into the oven. This sort of gingerbread
keeps very well.
[_L. L. B. d'Anvers_.]
APPLE FRITTERS
Put half pound of flour in a deep dish and work it with beer, beating it
well till there are no lumps left. Make it into a paste that is not very
liquid. Peel and core some good apples, cut them into rounds, put them in
the paste so that each one is well covered with it. Have a pan of boiling
fat and throw in the apple slices for two minutes. They ought to be
golden by then, if that fat has been hot enough. Serve them dusted with
powdered sugar and the juice of half a lemon squeezed on them.
[_Mme. Delahaye_.]
FOUR QUARTERS
Weigh four very fresh eggs and put them in an earthenware dish. Add
successively, sieved flour, fine sugar, and fresh butter, each one of
these items being of the same weight of the eggs--hence the name: Four
Quarters. With a wooden spoon, work these four ingredients, then let them
rest for five minutes. Turn it all into a buttered mold and let it cook
for five quarters of an hour in a gentle oven or in a double saucepan.
Turn it out, and eat it either cold or hot and with fruit.
[_Georges Kerckaert_.]
SAFFRON RICE
Wash the rice in cold water, heat it in a little water and add a dust of
salt. Flavor some milk (enough to cover the rice) with vanilla, and pour
it on the rice. Let it cook in the oven for an hour and a quarter. Take
it from the fire, and stir in the yolks only of two eggs, or of one only,
if wished. Sweeten the whole with sugar, and color it with a little
saffron. Turn it out, and let it get very cold.
[_Paquerette_.]
SEMOLINA FRITTERS
Quarter pound semolina, one and a half pints of milk, three eggs. Put on
the milk, and, as soon as it is boiling, drop the semolina in, in a
shower. Let it boil for a few minutes, stirring continually. Then add the
yolks of three eggs, and then the whites, which you have already beaten
stiff. Pour all on a dish, and cool. Have some boiling lard (it is
boiling when it ceases to bubble), and throw into it spoonsful of the
mixture. When they are fried golden, take them out, drain them a moment,
and sprinkle on some white sugar.
[_Mme. Segers_.]
SPECULOOS
(A Brussels recipe)
Pound down half pound flour, four ounces brown sugar, three and a half
ounces butter, a pinch of nutmeg, and the same of mace and cinnamon in
powder. Add, as well, a pinch of bicarbonate of soda. Make the paste into
a ball, and cover it with a fine linen or muslin cloth, and leave it till
the following day. If you have no molds to press it in, cut it into
diamonds or different shapes, and cook them in the oven on buttered
trays. I believe waffle irons can be bought in London.
GAUFRES FROM BRUSSELS
Mix in an earthern bowl half a pint of flour, five yolks of eggs, a
coffee-spoonful of castor sugar, half pint of milk (fresh), adding a
pinch of salt and of vanilla; then two ounces butter melted over hot
water. Then beat up the whites of four eggs very stiffly, and add them.
Butter a baking-tin or sheet (since English households have not got a
gaufre-iron, which is double and closes up), and pour in your mixture,
spreading it over the sheet. When the gaufre is nicely yellowed, take it
out and powder it with sugar. But to render this recipe absolutely
successful, the correct implement is necessary.
RICE À LA CONDE
Simmer the rice in milk till it is tender, sweeten it, and add, for a
medium-sized mold, the yolks of two eggs. Let it thicken a little, and
stir in pieces of pineapple. Pour it into a mold, and let it cool. Turn
it out when it has well set, and decorate with crystallized fruits. Pour
round it a thin apricot syrup.
[_Mme. Spinette_.]
PAINS PERDUS
(Lost bread)
Make a mixture of milk and raw eggs, enough to soak up in six rusks.
Flavor it with a little mace or cinnamon. Put some butter in a pan and
put the rusks in it to fry. Let them color a good brown, and serve them
hot with sugar dusted over them.
[_Mme. Spinette_.]
FRUIT FRITTERS
Peel some apples, take out the core and cut them in slices, powder them
on each side with sugar. You can use also pears, melons, or bananas. Make
a batter with flour, milk and eggs, beating well the whites; a glass of
rum and sugar to sweeten it. Put your lard on to heat, and when the blue
steam rises roll your fruit slices in the batter and throw them into the
lard. When they are golden, serve them with powdered sugar.
[_Mme. Spinette_.]
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