How to cook vegetables

lettuce (frisee), and the coss or romaine lettuce. Eaten raw as salad it is considered a cooling, antiscorbutic, and slightly laxative article of diet. Taken at supper time, it is said to promote sleep, and a medicinal extract is made from its leaves, which is sometimes given to produce sleep in patients whose constitution will not bear the administration of Cabbage Lettuce opium. The lettuce is not known to grow wild anywhere, but it is now cultivated in all countries where the climate will admit ; in our country it has been cultivated from a very remote age. There are several excellent ways of cooking lettuce as vegetable, as the following recipes will show. Lettuce Soup. Trim 6 to 8 cabbage lettuces, cut each in two, wash, drain, and place in a saucepan with two peeled onions stuck with 2 cloves and a bouquet-garni. Add a quart of stock and i oz. of butter, also a teacupful of rice, and seasoning. When the lettuces are cooked, drain, and I 12 pound with the rice ; then rub through a sieve, adding a little stock at the same time. Boil the soup and skim, adding at the last a gill of cream and a pinch of castor sugar. Serve fried bread croutons with this soup. Braised Lettuce. Wash, trim, and blanch about 6 lettuces, drain them on a cloth, and tie each with a small piece of twine, range them in a pan, add about a pint of stock, and braise them with 2 oz. of butter in the oven. When done take them up carefully, drain, and trim into shape. Reduce the stock to a half glaze, put in the lettuces, and place in the oven for 10 minutes (cover the pan with buttered paper). Glaze each head with the reduced stock, or else a little dissolved meat glaze. Dish up in a circle upon croutons of fried bread about the size of the lettuces. Have ready some thinly-cut slices of fried bacon, garnish the dish with these, and serve hot. Garbure of Lettuce. Braise the lettuces and drain them. Prepare some thin slices of grilled bread and place in the bottom of a deep dish. Arrange the lettuces on the bread, then again with lettuce after, alternately, until the dish is full, making sure that the lettuce forms the last layer. Pour over some rich stock or gravy, and brown in the oven. Lettuce a la Creme. After having braised 6 lettuces, drain, press, and chop them finely. Melt 2 oz. of butter in a stewpan, stir in 1 oz. of flour, and stir till a light brown ; then moisten with a gill of cream. Add the chopped lettuces to this, and cook slowly for about 10 minutes. Season and serve in a vegetable dish. Surround the lettuce with croutons of fried bread. LETTUCE. Stuffed Lettuces.