Miss Beecher's Housekeeper and Healthkeeper. Catharine Esther Beecher
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Soup stock is broth of any kind of meat prepared in large quantity, to keep on hand for gravies and soups. Beef and veal make the best stock. One hind shin of beef makes five quarts of stock, and one hind shin of veal makes three quarts. Wash and put into twice as much water as you wish to, to have soup, and simmer five or six hours.
All kinds of bones should be mashed and boiled five or six hours, to take out all the nutriment, the liquor then strained, and kept in earthenware or stone, not in tin. Take off the fat when cool.
Cool broth quickly, and it keeps longer.
Use a flat-bottom kettle, as less likely to scorch.
Soft water is best for soups; a little soda improves hard water.
Stock will keep three or four days in cool weather; not so long in warm. Keep it in a cool place. When used, heat to boiling point, and then take up and flavor.
Put in the salt and pepper when the meat is thoroughly done.
Meat soups are best the second day, if warmed slowly and taken up as soon as heated. If heated too long, they become insipid.
Thin soups must be strained. If to be made very clear, stir in one or two well beaten eggs, with the shells, and let it boil half an hour.
Use the meat of the soup for a hash, warmed together with a little fat, and well seasoned.
Be very careful, in using bones and cold meats for soups, that none is tainted, for the soup may be ruined by a single bit of tainted meat or bone.
Potato Soup.—Take six large mealy potatoes, sliced and soaked an hour. Add one onion, sliced and tied in a rag, a quart of milk, and a quarter of a pound of salt pork cut in slices. Boil three quarters of an hour, and then add a table-spoonful of melted butter and a well-beaten egg, mixed in a cup of milk. This is a favorite soup with many, and easily made. Some omit the pork, and use salt and pepper to flavor it, and add one well beaten egg.
Green Corn Soup.—This is very nice made with sweet corn put into seasoned soup stock.
Plain Beef Soup.—Put three pounds of beef and one chopped onion, tied in a rag, to three quarts of cold water. Simmer till the meat is very soft—say four hours; then add three tea-spoonfuls of salt, as much sugar, and half a tea-spoonful of pepper. Any other flavors may be added to suit the taste. Strain the soup, and save the meat for mince-meat or hash. Half a dozen sliced tomatoes will much improve this. Some would thicken with three or four tea-spoonfuls of potato-starch or flour.
Rich Beef Soup.—The following is a specimen of soups that are most stylish, rich, and demand most care in preparation:
Simmer six pounds of beef for six hours in six quarts of water, using the bones, broken in small pieces. Cool it, and take off the fat. Next day, an hour before dinner, take out the meat to use for hash or mince-meat, heat the liquor, throw in some salt to raise the scum, and skim it well. Then slice small, and boil in very little water, these vegetables: two turnips, two carrots, one head of celery, one quart of tomatoes, half a head of small white cabbage, one pint of green corn or Shaker corn, soaked over night. Cook the cabbage in two waters, throwing away the first. Boil the soup half an hour after these are put in. Season with salt, pepper, mace, and wine to suit the taste.
Green Pea Soup.—Boil the pods an hour in a gallon of water. Strain the liquor, and put into it four pounds of beef or mutton, and simmer one hour. Then add half the peas contained in half a peck of pods, and boil half an hour; then thicken with two great spoonfuls of flour, and season with salt and pepper. Three tomatoes, sliced, improve this.
Dried Bean Soup or Pea Soup.—Soak the beans, if dry, over night, and then boil till soft. Then strain them through a colander; and to each quart of liquor add a tea-spoonful of sugar, a tea-spoonful of salt, and a salt-spoonful of pepper. Add a beaten egg, a tea-cup of milk, and two spoonfuls of butter. A sliced onion improves it for some, and not for others; also, half the juice of a lemon when taken up. Canned sweet-corn, or common corn with sugar added, makes good succotash for winter.
Clam Soup.—Wash and boil the clams till they come out of their shells easily; then chop them, and put them back into the liquor, which should first be strained. Add a tea-cup of milk for each quart of soup; thicken with a little flour, into which has been worked as much butter as it will hold, and season with salt and pepper to suit the taste.
A Vegetable and Meat Soup for Summer.—Take three quarts of stock that is duly seasoned with sugar, salt, and pepper. Add two small onions, chopped fine, three small carrots, three small turnips, one stalk of celery, and a pint of green peas—all chopped fine. Let it simmer two hours, and then serve it.
Dried Pea Soup with Salt Pork.—Soak a quart of split peas over night in soft water. Next morning wash them and put them in four quarts of water, with a tea-spoonful of sugar, two carrots, two small onions, and one stalk of celery—all cut in small pieces. Let them boil three hours. Boil a pound of salt pork in another pot for one hour; take off the skin, and put the pork in the soup, and then boil one hour longer.
Dried Bean or Pea Soup with Meat Stock.—Soak a pint of beans or split peas over night in soft water. Then boil them in three quarts of soup-stock, duly seasoned with salt and pepper, with one small onion, one turnip, one stalk of celery, and six cloves—all cut in small pieces. Let it boil four or five hours. Strain through a colander.
Mutton Soup.—Boil four pounds of mutton in four quarts of water, with four heaping tea-spoonfuls of salt, one even tea-spoonful of pepper, two tea-spoonfuls of sugar, one small onion, two carrots, and two turnips—all cut fine—and one tea-cup of rice or broken macaroni. Boil the meat alone two hours; then add the rest, and boil one hour and a half longer.
French Vegetable Soup.—Take a leg of lamb, of moderate size, and four quarts of water. Of potatoes, carrots, cabbage, tomatoes, and turnips, take a tea-cupful of each, chopped fine. Salt and black pepper at the rate of one heaping tea-spoonful of salt to each quart of water, and one sixth as much black pepper.
Wash the lamb, and put it into the four quarts of cold water. When the scum rises, take it off carefully with a skimmer. After having pared and chopped the vegetables, put them into the soup. Carrots require the most boiling, and should be put in first. This soup requires about three hours to boil.
Plain Calf’s Head Soup.—Boil the head and feet in just water enough to cover them; when tender, take out the bones, cut in small pieces, and season with marjoram, thyme, cloves, salt, and pepper.
Put all into a pot, with the liquor, and four spoonfuls of butter; stew gently an hour; then, just as you take it up, add two or three glasses of port-wine, and the yelks of three eggs boiled hard.
An Excellent Simple Mutton Soup.—Put a piece of the fore-quarter of mutton into salted water, enough to more than cover it, and simmer it slowly two hours. Then peel a dozen turnips, and six tomatoes, and quarter them, and boil them with the mutton till just tender enough to eat. Thicken the soup with pearl barley. Some use, instead of tomatoes, the juice and rind of a lemon. Use half a tea-cup of rice, if you have no pearl barley.
CHAPTER V.
HASHES.
These are the common ways of spoiling hashes: 1. by frying, instead of merely heating them. Melted butter and oils are good and healthful when only heated, but are unhealthful when fried. 2. Dredging in flour, which, not being well cooked, imparts a raw taste of dough. 3. Using too much water, making them vapid; or too much fat or gravy, making them gross. 4. Using too much or too little salt and other seasoning. The following recipes will save from these mistakes, if exactly followed. When water is recommended