The "Queen" cookery books: Breakfast and Lunch Dishes

dish, with a garnish of tiny rolls of fried bacon or ham, and the buttered eggs poured over all. In short, this dish may be varied almost indefinitely. If served on hot buttered toast the latter may be spread with any kind of savoury butter, such as anchovy, bourguignotte (a rich, thick brown sauce, flavoured with onion, herbs, mushroom, spice, and red wine, and thickened with butter), cayenne or curry ,*ham, lobster, muitre d’hotel, truffle, shrimp, or ravigotte butter. A pretty dish of this kind, which may serve as an example, is the Spanish tomate y huevos (buttered eggs and tomatoes) : For this parboil three or more ripe tomatoes, rub them through a sieve, put the pulp into a pan with an ounce or so of butter or good dripping, and a seasoning of pepper and salt; break two or three eggs, according to the size you wish your dish to be (one egg and two tomatoes a head is the usual reckoning), into the mixture, stir it over the fire till the eggs are thoroughly “ scrambled,” and serve very hot. Pieces of cold cooked potato cut into cubes, dice of cold bacon, sliced sausage, minced parsley, chives, finely-sliced shallot, &c., are all added to this dish, which is a special blessing for thrifty housewives, as it produces a dainty dish out of the merest scraps. It is manifestly impossible in a book of this size to attempt anything exhaustive in the matter of egg cookery, so that only a few recipes will be given as specimens, and the intelligent cook must use them as stepping stones to further variety. Baked Eggs. — Butter some patty pans and sprinkle them with minced parsley and chives, then break a fresh egg carefully into each, put a morsel of butter and a seasoning of salt and pepper on each, and bake till the egg is lightly set. Have ready as many squares of hot buttered toast as you have eggs, strew these thickly with grated ham or tongue, caviar, &c., turn an egg carefully on to each, and serve either plain or surrounded with any nice sauce or gravy to taste. This dish can manifestly be varied almost indefinitely by changing the spreading of the toast, the sprinkling of the pans, and the surrounding sauce as you please. Egg Balls. — These may be either fried or boiled, the process is the same, only using water or fat according to the kind you wish for. Have ready a deep pan three parts full of boiling water, or any frying fat to taste, and stir it with a long wooden spoon or skewer till it acquires a circular, whirling motion, then break an egg into the very centre of this miniature whirlpool, keeping up the steady circular action all the time till the egg is cooked, when, if the whirling has been steadily kept up, it will be a round ball. Now lift it out with a slice, drain for a minute, then place it in a warm dish by the fire till the rest of the eggs are cooked singly in the same way. A very little practice will enable the cook to prepare her eggs thus both rapidly and easily. They are very nice as a garnish for many dishes, and also served on a puree of mushrooms, spinach, endive, or tomatoes, &c., as you please. Devilled Eggs. — Put a round of fried ham dusted with cayenne pepper into as many little china