The "Queen" cookery books: Vegetables

must in the first instance have been trimmed so as to match as neatly as may be. Put each case when ready into a basin of cold, salted, and slightly acidulated water, till you have prepared the required number, then lift them out, dry each well on a clean cloth, and fry them in clean, hot fat for three or four minutes till they feel tender ; they are then lifted out, and drained for a minute ; now let the fat reboil, and just as you want to serve the cases, drop them into this, and let them crisp and colour nicely; then drain well, dust them lightly with minced parsley and coralline pepper, and serve filled with any nice mince or ragout to taste. Potatoes, curried. — Slice finely a Spanish onion and a good-sized apple, and fry them in 2oz. of butter or clarified dripping till of a delicate brown ; now dredge in a tablespoonful each of curry powder and fine rice flour, and fry these also, then moisten with the juice of a lemon and one and a half pints of any light stock (meat or vegetable), and let it all cook gently together till the onion is tender, when you sieve it all into a clean pan, add to it cooked potatoes, cut into slices the size and thickness of a florin, and let it get hot together ; serve with a border of rice seasoned with coralline pepper. Duchesse. — Boil or bake half a dozen good potatoes, then rub them through a fine wire sieve, and mix this puree with an ounce of butter, the yolks of two eggs, a little salt and white pepper, and some finely-minced parsley. Shape this paste into little balls in your well-floured hands, flatten these with a floured rolling pin till an inch thick and slightly oval in shape, and fry them in plenty of hot fat, turning them over and over, and serve directly both sides are well coloured. These duchesses are variously flavoured by different cooks, some adding grated Parmesan, others grated ham or tongue, to the mixture, and most consider a dash of nutmeg or mace a great improvement, but these of course are matters of taste. Other cooks keep them ballshaped, making them originally about the size of a chestnut, and then egg and breadcrumb them, and fry them in plenty of hot fat ; but these are strictly either potato halls or potato croquettes. Another way is to divide up the paste into strips, powdering these well with grated Parmesan and coralline pepper, then with your well-floured hands roll each strip into sticks three or four inches long, and rather thicker than a pencil, egg and breadcrumb these, fry, drain, and serve dusted with freshly-grated Parmesan and coralline pepper ; these are sometimes called Batons au Parmesan. Potatoes, fried. — Peel and cut the potatoes into wedge shapes, like the divisions of an orange both in shape and size ; have ready some very hot fat, and try this by dropping in a piece of the potato, if this becomes firm and colours lightly in a few seconds, the fat is ready. Now put your potatoes into the frying basket, and plunge this gently into the friture, being careful to keep them well covered with the fat; in three to four minutes they will be ready, when you lift the frying basket from tlie fat, allowing the potatoes to drain back for a minute into the pan, then place them on kitchen paper,