FoodNet

The spirit of cookery

1895

Page 413 · 3 recipe records on this page

Presented as published in 1895. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
Boasting on the sjnt, even an extemporized one made of wood, and turned on two forks fixed in the ground before the camp fire, can be very successfully employed for the cooking of beef, mutton, and veal. Pieces of veal or mutton of from four to six pounds in weight should have been killed at least forty-eight hours before. Larger pieces of beef should have been kept from three to four days, according to the temperature of the air and the season ; if they be used too soon after slaughtering, they will be neither tender nor tasty. Pork, however, can be roasted on the spit immediately after having been killed. Roasts are particular conveniences to troops who remain stationary for longer periods — e.g., during sieges, PREPARATION OF MEAT BY SOLDIERS 655 Soldiers should, before all things, learn the processes of (irilling, frying, and braising meat. The most convenient and quickest mode of preparing meat for grilling consists in cutting it into thin slices of the size of half a crown or a five-shilling piece, or into pieces of a cubical shape, and filing them on a long clean-shaved skewer j some fat may be packed between every two slices, or placed at intervals. These slices, dusted over with a little pepper and salt, are now turned over, and before a bright fire, and are done in less than a quarter of an hour. This arrangement is very commonly used in the Levant and in India, where these slices (most frequently of mutton) so filed, skewered, or spitted, are called kebabs or khubabs. In case the soldier have no skewer ready, and be pressed for time, he may file the khubabs on his sword or bayonet, protect the point of the arm and all bare steel with a potato, or some membranous offal, or a wet cloth, or a piece of oiled or greased paper, grill them for less than a quarter of an hour, and then take his cooked meat with him wherever his duty may call him. Such khubabs, made in the morning before the bivouac fire, may be carried as a provision for the day. Care is to be taken to obtain taste- less wood for skewers if no iron ones are at hand. Dry/ wood tastes less than green; hazel-sticks have little taste beech-wood less ; fir-wood tastes resinous, but not very disagreeable. Such khubabs, or even larger pieces, may be fried with fat in the cover of the cooking kettle, particularly on live embers ; this has the advantage of yielding some sauce and fused fat, which can be eaten with the bread. Thus pansteak is obtained ; by turning the slices of meatKhubabs (Grilled Meat Skewers) in flour, and then frying them, they become cutlets or chips, germanice Schnitzel. The meat may also be braised or stewed; for this purpose it should be cut in slices, like khubabs, tui’ued in flour, fried half-way in fat, and then some water, broth, or milk being added, it should be 656 THE SPIRIT OF COOKERY covered in the pan, and allowed to stew slowly on the embers.