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

"He doth learn to make strange sauces, to eat anchovies, macaroni, bovoli, fagioli, and caviare." —Ben Jonson ("Cynthia's Revels"). BOIL a quarter of a pound of macaroni until tender; season it with salt and paprika and pour over it a tomato sauce made as follows : Fry in a tablespoonful of butter a few leaves of parsley, a dozen fresh mushrooms, peeled and cut in small pieces, and an onion, sliced, or a clove of garlic (the latter gives the true Italian flavor). Add half a pint of hot water, in which three bouillon capsules have been dissolved, making a very strong stock, and a pint of canned tomatoes. Cook very gently for three hours. Strain, then stir in a lump of butter. SEPTEMBER 28th "She went to the garden for parsley to stuff a rabbit." — ^Shakespeare ("Taming of the Shrew"). TO make a rabbit taste like a hare, skin it and season it with black pepper and allspice. Pour over it a glass of port wine and the same amount of vinegar. Baste it with this occasionally, and after it has lain over night, stuff it with breadcrumbs, seasoned with salt, pepper, and chopped parsley, and roast in a moderate oven. Serve with a sauce of melted butter to which currant jelly has been added. SEPTEMBER 29TH "And my Barbary hen has laid two eggs; Heaven knows the trouble we had to bring her to it" — Charles Reade ("Peg Woffington"). IF there is a little cold ham, boiled, fried or broiled, to be disposed of, chop it very fine and mix with the yolks of hard boiled eggs which have been removed from the whites and rubbed smooth. Put the mixture back in the whites, place them in a baking dish close together, pour over them a thick cream sauce, sprinkle dry bread crumbs on top, season with bits of butter, salt, and paprika, and bake long enough to brown nicely. Instead of chopped ham, the small cans of devilled ham may be used. SEPTEMBER 30TH "Though they could not all talk, they could all eat; and the beautiful pyramids of grapes, nectarines and peaches soon collected them around the table." — ^JANE Austen ("Pride and Prejudice"). FRUIT used as a centrepiece is very handsome when dipped first into white of egg lightly beaten, then in granulated sugar. Dry on a sieve and serve very cold on a bed of grape-leaves. Grapes, plums, and berries are the most adapted to this form of serving. Apples and peaches are best left with their blushing cheeks unadorned. OCTOBER 1ST "For the stock of clear soup you will get a leg of beef, a leg of veal and a ham." — ^Thackeray ("A Little Dinner at Timmins's"). FOR good strong stock take three pounds of lean veal, three pounds of lean beef, one slice of ham or a ham-bone, two onions, two stalks of celery. Mince the ham or crack the ham-bone, put the meats and the seasoning over the fire in six quarts of cold water. Let this come slowly to the boiling point and then simmer for six or seven hours. Strain through a double cloth and set in a cold place. When the fat has hardened on top of the stock remove it carefully. Put the stock back on the fire with the unbeaten white and the shell of an egg. Let it heat quickly and boil fast for five minutes. Strain again. Add salt and pepper to taste just before serving. Many people like the addition of one glass of sherry. OCTOBER 2D ^ There were barrels of oysters, hecatombs of lobsters, a few tremendous-looking crabs and a tub full of pickled salmon." — ^Anthony Trollope ("The Warden"). SOFT-SHELL crabs are good only when freshly caught, as the shells harden after twenty-four hours. Remove the sand-bags and the shaggy bits from the side ; then wash and wipe j sprinkle with salt and pepper; roll in bread-crumbs, then in egg, then in crumbs; fry in smoking hot lard or, much better, in good olive oil. OCTOBER 3D