The encyclopædia of practical cookery

(3) Put 2oz. of butter into a small lined saucepan ; melt it, then put in 1 table-spoonful of flour, and stir it over the fire until lightly browned. Pour in f pint of clear gravy, continue stirring it over the fire until boiling and thickened, season to taste with salt, then pour in very quickly while stirring £ pint of Champagne ; boil it up once, then strain it through a fine hair-sieve, and serve immediately. Champagne Syrup. — Pour 2 pints of Champagne into a vessel with 2 fluid ounces of brandy and 1 fluid ounce Champagne — continued. of sherry, and add 31b. of sugar ; dissolve this without using heat, and bottle for future use. Iced Champagne and Fruit Jelly. — Get a variety of preserved fruits, wash them in warm water, sponge them carefully, cut into dice, put them in a basin, pour in i tumblerful of cognac, and let them steep for an hour. Put in another basin six or seven leaves of clarified gelatine, and pour over them 1 tumblerful of orange-syrup with half a bottle of Champagne, 1 teacupful of pine-apple syrup, and 1 teacupful of lemon-juice. Pour this preparation into .a freezer, turn the can, and stir the preparation with a large spatula. As soon as it begins to set, work it without leaving off until frothy and elastic. Drain the fruits, and mix with the preparation, which then take up with a large spoon, and with it fill a jelly-mould embedded a-quarter-of-anhour before in salted ice ; cover it with a round of paper, and place on it a pan filled with salt and ice. A-quarter-of-an-hour after take the mould out of the ice, wash it, quickly dip it into tepid water, wipe it well, and turn the jelly out on a very cold dish. Pour over a puree of fruit, or sweetened raspberries, cooled on the ice, and serve it immediately, or keep it cold in an ice-chest. Iced Champagne Granito with Strawberries. — Put a freezing-pot in some mixed pounded ice and bay-salt, and pour in two bottles of Champagne and lqt. of syrup. When it is frozen to icicles, add lib. of crystallised strawberries, and serve in glasses. CHAMPAGNE BRANDY.— A very fine liqueur brandy, distilled from rich champagne wine. CHAMPAGNE CIDER. — See Cider. CHAMPIGNONS.— Amon gst the numerous edible fungi with which France abounds, those commonly known as the Fairy-ring mushrooms or Champignons (Marasmius oreades) are not the least valuable to the cook, possessing powerful flavouring qualities : they are found growing in rings, in dry upland pastures, and a very pretty fancy attributes to them an association with the moonlight dances of fairies. As they are so closely allied in appearance to a poisonous Champignon ( Marasmius wrens ) cooks are not much given to using them, although the two may be readily distinguished. The harmless Champignon (see Fig. 401) has cream-coloured laminae, or “ gills ” as they are commonly called, and the gills of the poisonous Champignon are dark. But the better feature of distinction is that the latter have stems that are hairy, especially towards the root. Again, the edible Champignon is always found in the open country, whereas the poisonous kind mostly frequents woods, but are sometimes found consorting with the edible Champignon as a member of the Fairy-ring. A little caution only is necessary to detect l their presence. For details respecting Culinary Processes , Utensils , Sauces, dc., referred to, see under their special heads.