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

These cheesecakes should be baked in the oven, and when the pastry is done the cheese- cake itself can be coloured instantly with the assistance of a salamander. Cooks should never keep these cheese- cakes in the oven longer than is neces- sary for baking the pastry, or the pastry will become hard and dried up. For the benefit of inexperienced cooks, I BLACKWELL'S | will explain that a salamander is simply I a piece of red-hot iron, which is com- monly met with in all French kitchens, but not so often in English. Before using it is placed in the fire sufficiently long to make it red-hot. A very simple salamander can be made by placing the kitchen shovel in the fire until it is red- hot. The cheesecake will colour in- stantly if the salamander be held at the distance of about an eighth of an inch off. A very nice way of making cheese- cakes is to take an ordinary pie-dish, and line the edge with puff-paste in the usual way. Now fill up the dish with the mixture, as before directed, and place it in the oven. The top of the cheesecake can be coloured with a sala- mander, but the mixture itself will re- quire baking longer than an ordinary cheesecake, owing to its depth. RHUBARB, BOTTLED. — Rhubarb can now be obtained preserved in bottles, and is very useful for making rhubarb tart when rhubarb is not in season. Good spring rhubarb should look pink, and housekeepers can easily improve the appearance of pale rhubarb by the addition of a few drops of cochineal or vegetable colouring matter. (See Vege- table Colouring.) Bottled rhubarb can also be used for making open tarts. When used for this purpose it requires the addition of a very considerable quantity of sugar — about three-quarters of a pound of sugar to a bottle of rhu- barb. In making rhubarb tart from bottled rhubarb, housekeepers should bear in mind that the rhubarb is already cooked, and ' as soon as the pastry is cooked the pie is ready. Rhubarb tart is far nicer cold than hot. RIBBON MACARONI. — See Maca- roni. ROGNONS DE COQ.— Rognons de coq are sold in bottles and are useful as an addition to financier c ragout, ragout a la Toulouse, and ragout a la tortue. A de- scription of ragout financier c and ragout (l la Toulouse will be found under the heading of “ Financihre Ragout.” In making ragout & la tortue the cook should proceed as follows : — Place a good-sized gravy-spoonful of white coclt’s-combs in a stewpan with some cock’s kernels, small truffles, some button mushrooms, some quinelles of forcemeat, and a few gherkins cut into HOUSEKEEPER'S GUIDE. 135 the shape of olives, and to this should be added a small quantity of sauce known to foreign cooks as turtle sauce. Turtle sauce is served with tUc de veau en tortuc. It is simply good rich brown gravy, to which has been added, say to half a pint of gravy, a wineglass of madeira, a tablespoonful of tomato sauce, and a small quantity of mush- room catsup. Before serving the sauce a little lemon-juice should be added. Many cooks also add to this sauce a small quantity of anchovy butter, which is made by taking, say, two filleted anchovies, and pounding them to a very smooth paste in a mortar with an equal quantity of butter. I do not wish to differ in opinion from so many cele- brated cooks, but, to my own individual taste, I do not think the addition of anchovies to turtle sauce an improve- ment.