The "Queen" cookery books: Pickles and Preserves

loz. bay salt, loz. saltpetre, and |lb. coarse sugar, pounded and well mixed. (A few grains of powdered cochineal added to this pickle improves the colour.) Rub this piclde well into the beef for a week, turning and basting it daily, then leave it in the pickle three or four days longer, only turning, but not rubbing it. It is excellent for cooking in eight days or so, but if to be smoked, leave it sixteen days in the pickle, then drain it, and smoke for a few days. This makes delicious sandwiches. Beef, Salted in a Hurry. — Rub some 51b. 01 61b. of beef well with salt, then flour well a coarse clean cloth, and fold the meat up in this, lay it in a pan of boiling water and cook as long as you would any other salt beef of the same size, and it will eat as salt as if salted for four or five days. Hound, to Salt. — For 251b. of round take 2oz. of saltpetre, 4oz. of pepper, 6oz. of sugar, and ^lb. each of bay and common salt ; rub the meat well all over with this mixture, rubbing, basting, and turning it daily for a month. It can then be hung up and dried, or boiled straight as it comes out of the pickle. As in most of these old-fashioned recipes, it must be observed that the boiling here spoken of is in reality gentle simmering. Whole, to Salt. — Take as much cold spring water as will well cover the meat you wish to salt, and with this water and bay salt make a brine strong enough to float a potato ; boil this well together till the salt is dissolved and all the scum has ceased to rise, let it stand till cold, then pour it over the meat in the pickling tub or barrel. This is an old Scotch recipe used when a “ mart ” or bullock was killed and the whole salted down for the winter use of the family. Mutton Hams: — These can be cured by almost any recipe given for pork ham, and if smoked make excellent rashers. Sprats, to Pichle. — Pound together 21b. common salt, 4oz. each of bay salt and saltpetre, 2oz. sal prunella, and a little cochineal. Now have ready a peck of sprats, and pack these in a stone jar, a row of sprats, then a layer of the above mixture, and repeat these two layers, pressing them down well till the jar is full ; cover down closely, and keep in a cool, dry place for six months, when they will be ready. The sprats must be as fresh as it is possible to get them, and must be neither wiped nor washed. Salmon, to Kipper. — Cut up, clean and scale the fish, and remove the bone neatly, then rub it well all over with equal parts of salt and brown sugar, to which you add a tiny pinch of saltpetre ; let the fish Lie in this for two days, covering it with a board rather heavily weighted, then hang it up to dry, if to be used as what is called “ green kipper” ; or if to be kept, smoke it. To prevent the folds spoiling, it is a good plan to spread open the fish, stretching it out with wooden skewers. Some housewives add freshly ground black pepper to the salt and sugar. It hardens very quickly, and if kept long in the smoking cupboard the slices should be soaked for twenty to thirty minutes before cooking. Herring and mackerel are delicious kippered in this way.