Books and My Food: With Literary Quotations and Original Recipes for Every ..

AN easy and very good "sugarplum" to make at home requires one can of sweet condensed milk, one and a half cupfuls of brown sugar, a large tablespoonful of butter, a teaspoonful of vanilla and half a pound of English walnuts. Boil twenty minutes, stirring steadily ; pour on buttered plates and when nearly cold cut in squares. MARCH 1ST "At private houses what does one get now? — blanc de poulet — flavourless trash I" — Bulwer ("Parisians"). POT AGE A la Reine, which is one form of the despised "blanc de poulet," is sufficiently delicious for any festival occasion. Remove the fat from a quart of chicken-broth; season with salt, pepper, and a little onion, and put on to boil. Soak in a little milk half a small loaf of bread-crumbs and mix with them the yolks of three hard-boiled eggs, mash smooth, chop the white meat of a boiled chicken to a powder and stir it into the bread-crumbs and eggs. Stir in slowly one pint of hot cream and mix with the hot chicken-broth. Boil five minutes; if too thick add more cream ; if not thick enough, more crumbs. The white meat of cold roast chicken may be used. MARCH 2D "Turbot with capers is the thing. The brisk little capers relieve the dulness of the turbot; the melted butter is rich, bland and calm." — ^Thackeray ("Memorials of Gormandising"). THIS fish is fortunate in being the better for keeping a day or so, when so many kinds of fish need absolute freshness to make them palatable. Soak the turbot in salted water for at least half an hour before cooking, put it into a pan of boiling water in which are the juice of two lemons and two tablespoonfuls of salt. Put the black side of the fish down when the water begins to boil, skim and set back where it will only simmer for half an hour. At the end of that time drain it carefully, place on a platter covered with a napkin, garnish with parsley, lemon and hard-boiled eggs and serve with white sauce to which capers have been added. A six-pound turbot is a good size. MARCH 3D "Here's a pigeon so finely roasted, it cries, Come, eat me!"— Swift ("Polite Conversation"). IT is only a very tender pigeon which can be confident of its roasted charms, but the right bird is delicious so cooked. Draw, wash and wipe; pepper and salt the insides; tie into shape or fasten with skewers ; wrap the birds with slices of fat bacon or salt pork, and put in the pan with half a cup of hot water to which a teaspoonful of butter has been added. Cook for fifteen minutes before removing the bacon, then rub with lemon- juice and butter and brown. Put the pigeons where they will keep hot while you stir into the gravy a tablespoonful of butter rubbed into one of browned flour. Boil up once. MARCH 4TH "Some cheeses are made of skimmed milk and some o' new milk, and it's no matter what you call 'em, you may tell which is which by the look and the smell."— George Eliot ("Adam Bede"). TO make fresh pot-cheese place in rather a shallow pan milk that has turned a little sour, put it over a sauce-pan of boiling water and heat almost to the boiling point. After about six minutes turn the milk over by spoonfuls, to heat it all equally. When heated through, turn into a collander to drain; when free of whey, add salt to taste and butter. A few spoonfuls of cream improves it. MARCH 5TH "Thy child as surely grasps an orange as he fails to grasp the sun." — ^Robert Browning ("Ferishtah's Fancies"). PARE sweet seedless oranges, take off the inner tough white covering and divide into sections. Add to the beaten whites of two eggs two tablespoonfuls of cold water. Dip the sections of orange in it and then roll each one in granulated sugar. Put on a platter the sections, not touching; set in a warm oven for three or four minutes, then set away to cool. A3 MARCH 6th