The "Queen" cookery books: Vegetables

overdone it is utterly spoilt. (Never use a tinned pan to cook cauliflowers in.) When cooked drain well, and serve in a hot vegetable dish, either plain or with any sauce to taste (such as bechamel, brown butter, cream, curry, estragon, hollandaise, Morny, tomato, white sauce, &c.), round, but not over it ! {Estragon sauce is plain melted butter or white sauce, to which have been added a spoonful of finely minced fresh tarragon, a drop or two of tarragon vinegar, and a small piece of butter quite at the last.) In France, the sauce, which is usually kept somewhat thick for this purpose, is poured first into the dish, the cauliflower being carefully stood up in the middle of it. When cauliflowers are small or ill-grown, cook them as above, then arrange them head down in a pudding basin of suitable size (previously scalded out with boiling water), arranging the florets neatly, press them gently into shape, tlien lay the dish on top of the basin, reverse the latter quickly, and remove it ; the cauliflower should turn out in a compact tidy head. When served thus the sauce sent up with it may be poured over as well as round it, for cauliflowers needing such treatment are seldom of a good colour. One of the nicest sauces for these cauliflowers is Allemande, made thus : Take l^oz. of white roux, or stir together over the fire till quite smooth l-|oz. fresh butter and a spoonful of fine flour, then moisten this with half a pint of milk or white stock (or half and half), add a drop or two of essence of mushroom, and stir it over the fire till it thickens and is perfectly smooth ; now lift it off the fire, add a tiny pat of butter broken up small, and, when it is pretty well dissolved, stir in the yolk of an egg previously beaten up with the strained juice of a lemon, and use. It must be remembered that broccoli can be served by any recipe given for cauliflower. Cauliflowers lend themselves particularly well! to reheating, though of course a freshly cooked' vegetable may be used. The following are some ways of treating cooked cauliflower : — Cauliflower au four. — Break up the cold cauliflower into little sprays, and arrange them neatly in a wellbuttered dish ; beat up together half a gill of dissolved, butter, three-quarters of a gill of new milk or cream, and a teacupful of freshly grated and sieved whitebreadcrumbs, season with pepper and salt, add in a well-beaten whole egg, pour this all over the cauliflower, being careful to have it well covered, and bake till nicely browned. A more savoury version of this is — au gratin. — For this arrange the vegetable (either freshly cooked or left from a previous meal) on a buttered fireproof china dish, pour over it sufficient liquefied butter to moisten it nicely, dust it lightly with freshly ground black pepper and some grated Parmesan cheese ; have ready equal parts of freshly grated and sieved white breadcrumbs and grated Parmesan, and strew this liberally over the dish, moistening it well with liquefied butter, repeating this strewing, if necessary, to cover the cauliflower well, and bake till browned. fritters {choufleur d la Villeroi). — Break a not too cooked cauliflower up into tiny sprays, dip these into any rich and very thick white sauce.