Unexpected company to luncheon with a lady who has to eat that meal alone generally, and (as is the unwise way of such ladies) makes it a yery slender meal, is one of the ordeals of a young housekeeper ; company to lunch and nothing in the house. But there is generally a dainty luncheon in eyery house if you know how to pre- pare it ; there certainly always will be if you keep your store-room supplied with the things I haye named. Let the table be prettily laid at all times, then if you haye potted meat and preserves, have them put on the table. Are there cold potatoes? If so cut them up into potato salad, if they are whole ; if broken, warm them in a wine-glass of milk, a teaspoonful of flour, and a piece as large as an ^gg of maitre d'^Tiotel butter. Have you Luncheon. 45 sncli scraps of cold meat as could not come to table? Toss them up with a hall cup of water^ a slice of glaze (oh, blessed ever-ready glaze!) a teaspoonful of rayigotte, or maitre d^Mtel, and a teaspoonful of roux or blanc, ac- cording as your meat is light or dark, season, and serve. Or you have no meat, then you have eggs, and what bet- ter than an omelet and such an omelet as the following? Take the crumb of a slice of bread, soak it in hot milk (cold will do, but hot is better), beat up whites of four eggs to a high froth; mix the bread with all the milk it will absorb, no more, into a paste, add the yolks of eggs with a little salt, set the pan on the fire with an ounce of butter. Let it get very hot, then mix the whites of eggs with the yolks and bread lightly, pour in the pan, and move about for a minute ; if the oven is hot, when the omelet is brown underneath, set the pan in the oven for five minutes, or until the top is set ; then double half over, and serve. If your guests have a liking for sweets, and your potted meats supply the savory part of your luncheon, then have a brown gravy ready to serve with it. Put into a half cup of boiling water a slice of glaze, a spoonful of roux, and enough Harvey sauce, or mushroom powder, to flavor. If your omelet is to be sweet, before you fold it put in a layer of preserves✪ Omelet. The advantage of the omelet I have here given is that it keeps plump and tender till cold, so that five minutes of waiting does not turn it into leather, the great objection with omelets generally. Potatoes for luncheon, as I have said, should always be prepared in some fancy way, and snow is a very pretty one. Have some fine mealy potatoes boiled, carefully poured off, and set back of the stove with a cloth over them till they are quite dry and fall apart ; then have a 46 Culture and Cooking. colander^ or coarse wire sieve made liot and a Jiot dish in which, to serve them, pass the jloury potatoes through the sieve, taking care not to crush the snow as it falls. You require a large dish heaping full, and be careful it is kept hot. This mode of preparing potatoes, although very pretty and novel, must never be attempted with any but the whitest and mealiest kind.

AI-modernized reading of the original text

Unexpected company to luncheon with a lady who has to eat that meal alone generally, and (as is the unwise way of such ladies) makes it a very slender meal, is one of the ordeals of a young housekeeper ; company to lunch and nothing in the house. But there is generally a dainty luncheon in eyery house if you know how to prepare it ; there certainly always will be if you keep your store-room supplied with the things I have named. Let the table be prettily laid at all times, then if you have potted meat and preserves, have them put on the table. Are there cold potatoes? If so cut them up into potato salad, if they are whole ; if broken, warm them in a wine-glass of milk, a teaspoonful of flour, and a piece as large as an egg of maitre d'hôtel butter. Have you Luncheon. 45 such scraps of cold meat as could not come to table? Toss them up with a half cup of water, a slice of glaze (oh, blessed ever-ready glaze!) a teaspoonful of ravigotte, or maitre d^Mtel, and a teaspoonful of roux or blanc, according as your meat is light or dark, season, and serve. Or you have no meat, then you have eggs, and what better than an omelet and such an omelet as the following? Take the crumb of a slice of bread, soak it in hot milk (cold will do, but hot is better), beat up whites of four eggs to a high froth; mix the bread with all the milk it will absorb, no more, into a paste, add the yolks of eggs with a little salt, set the pan on the fire with an ounce of butter. Let it get very hot, then mix the whites of eggs with the yolks and bread lightly, pour in the pan, and move about for a minute ; if the oven is hot, when the omelet is brown underneath, set the pan in the oven for five minutes, or until the top is set ; then double half over, and serve. If your guests have a liking for sweets, and your potted meats supply the savory part of your luncheon, then have a brown gravy ready to serve with it. Put into a half cup of boiling water a slice of glaze, a spoonful of roux, and enough Harvey sauce, or mushroom powder, to flavor. If your omelet is to be sweet, before you fold it put in a layer of preserves. The advantage of the omelet I have here given is that it keeps plump and tender till cold, so that five minutes of waiting does not turn it into leather, the great objection with omelets generally. Potatoes for luncheon, as I have said, should always be prepared in some fancy way, and snow is a very pretty one. Have some fine mealy potatoes boiled, carefully poured off, and set back of the stove with a cloth over them till they are quite dry and fall apart ; then have a 46 Culture and Cooking. colander, or coarse wire sieve made hot and a hot dish in which to serve them, pass the floury potatoes through the sieve, taking care not to crush the snow as it falls. You require a large dish heaping full, and be careful it is kept hot. This mode of preparing potatoes, although very pretty and novel, must never be attempted with any but the whitest and mealiest kind.

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