The housekeeper's guide to preserved meats, fruits, vegetables, &c

In France sliced pickled gherkins are always served with mayonnaise salads, and render them, to my mind, far more appetising. When it is possible to obtain a few small claws of lobster — not the pincers — they can be placed round the dish to show what it is made of. A still nicer garnish for lobster salad is to place four or five small red crayfish, one in each corner, and another crayfish on the top of the salad. Tinned lobster can also be used for making lobster pates, but lobster butter made from the coral of fresh lobster is almost essential, as the inside of the pates should look red. In making lobster pates from tinned lobster, of course the first point is the pate cases. When it is possible, these are always best bought of a French pastrycook — if possible, ready made. The cases should be so constructed that they will hold a considerable quantity of forcemeat. The old-fashioned pates made many years ago by pastrycooks consisted of three layers, each one smaller than the other, which generally resulted in the pates being all pastry. There used to be a small sort of red wafer in the middle. The only flavour discernible in these wafers was that of anchovy, and these a few years back were sold as lobster pates. We will suppose, then, the cases are ready-made, and that each pat4 case will hold a large tablespoonful and a half or two tablespoonfuls of lobster forcemeat. This should be made as follows : — Get a small quantity of good white sauce and colour it a bright red with lobster butter; then add some of the meat from the tinned lobster, sufficient to make the whole a sort of lobster mince. Add, say, to every half-pound a brimming teaspoonful of anchovy sauce, and just a suspicion of the flavour of nutmeg, some black pepper, and the juice of a quarter of a lemon. No cayenne pepper need be added in consequence of there being a considerable quantity of cayenne already in the lobster butter, otherwise cayenne pepper is essential. Tinned lobster can also be made into “bashawed lobster ” as follows : — Get a little white sauce or a little butter, and colour it a deep red with some lobster butter. Next chop up a piece of onion, about the size of one’s thumb down to the first joint, and enough parsley to fill a teaspoon brimming full when chopped. Cut up some of the meat of a tinned lobster and mix all this together. Add a teaspoonful of anchovy sauce and half a teaspoonful of black pepper. Bashawed lobster, properly, should be served in the shell of the lobster itself ; but as we have prepared it from tinned lobster there would probably be no shell obtainable, therefore the cook must serve it in scallop-shells ; or should some deep oyster-shells be obtainable, they may be used to form a very pretty dish in which to serve bashawed lobster. Fill each shell with the lobster forcemeat, shake some bread -crumbs over the top, and cover it completely with them. Then bake them in the oven till the bread-crumbs are a nice brown colour. The bread-crumbs, before they are shaken on, must be very dry, or else they will take some time to brown over. A few bread-raspings, a bright golden brown in colour, give a tone to the dish. LOZENGES, GELATINE.— See Gelatine. LOZENGES, MEAT.— See Meat Lozenges. LUCCA OIL.— See Oil. LUCKNOW CHUTNEY.— See Chutney.