Mrs. Roundell's Practical cookery book

American Ladies’ Cabbage. — Boil a firm white Cabbage for 15 minutes, then change the water, adding boiling water from a kettle. When the Cabbage is tender drain it thoroughly and let it get cold. Chop it up finely, add two well-beaten eggs, an ounce of butter, three tablespoonfuls of good milk or thin cream, and a little pepper and salt. Stir all well together, and bake in a buttered pudding-dish till brown. Serve very hot. Cabbage cooked in this way is nearly equal to Cauliflower. Brussels Sprouts. — Choose the Sprouts as nearly as possible of the same size, or the small ones will be overdone. Put them into a basin of cold water with salt and a tablespoonful of vinegar for half an hour, so as to dislodge insects. Then throw them into plenty of boiling water, with a good quantity of salt (say half an ounce), and let them boil hard, with the lid of the pan off. Push the Sprouts down occasionally. They ought to be done in twelve minutes. Brussels Sprouts are spoiled if they are overdone ; it is better that they should even be a little underdone. Drain them well. Brussels Sprouts, if properly cooked, should be quite green, and very tender. The smaller they are the better, and the large coarse Brussels Sprouts so often sold should be avoided, as they have none of the delicate flavour of the small varieties. Brussels Sprouts make an excellent puree. Or, after being boiled, they can be pulled to pieces, laid on squares of toast, and covered with buttered eggs. Or they can, after careful boiling, draining, and gentle drying in a cloth, be lightly saute in a little butter, sprinkled with a little salt and two or three drops of vinegar of any flavour preferred. Or the Brussels Sprouts may, after boiling slightly in water, be gently stewed till tender in some good gravy, to which a little pepper and salt have been added. Or they may, for a second-course vegetable in winter, be lightly BRUSSELS SPROUTS 33 1 fried in butter after boiling, and sent up on slices of hot buttered toast. They will lose colour and brown if they are not very lightly fried. Broccoli. — Broccoli, like all forms of Cabbage, needs careful cooking. As many of the outer leaves as possible should be removed, taking care that enough remain to hold the flowers together in a green sheath. Put the Broccoli, heads downwards, in strong salt and water for half an hour, by which time all insects ought to be dislodged. Drain the Broccoli and plunge them into abundance of boiling water, adding salt, and boil for fifteen minutes. Small Broccoli will be done in that time ; larger heads will need from twenty to thirty minutes. Slow cooking spoils them. When the Broccoli sink in the water try the stumps with a skewer. When fairly tender lift the Broccoli out with a slice, drain well in a colander, and serve in a hot dish. If pieces of the flower are floating on the water the Broccoli are done, and must be taken out at once, whether the stumps are hard or not. The flower should be perfect, and good in colour, eatable down to the stump, and the stump tender. But the stump may be neglected so long as the flower is unbroken. It is well to cut a X on the stumps of Broccoli as on the stalk of Cauliflower.