Twentieth century home cook book

— Madame Laura, FRENCH GUMBO. Fry one nice chicken. While this is frying slice three quarts of okra with a little green pepper (or red, if no green is to be had). Salt and flour as you would the chicken. When chicken is brown, take out and throw okra into the same lard; fry until brown. Have ready one gallon of boiling water ; pour over okra. Let it boil one-half hour, then put in chicken, and set back to simmer until it is cooked down enough for use. Serve with boiled rice in the center of each plate (one spoonful). — Mrs. John Durst. GUMBO SOUP. Cut up in small pieces four squirrels and one chicken, cook until the flesh falls from the bones. To each gallon of soup add a handful of green or dried sassafras buds, put in a bag. One quart of okra, one large onion cut fine, half dozen medium-sized Irish potatoes cut in cubes, one carrot grated, and a small quantity of cabbage. Season with pepper and salt. When the soup is done take out the bag, and, after removing the buds, squeeze the bag into the soup. Add red pepper and thicken with browned flour. GUMBO SOUP. Prepare two good-sized chickens as for a fricassee ; flour the chickens and fry in butter until a light brown. Put the chickens in a soup pot, and pour over them three quarts of hot water, allowing the whole to simmer slowly for two hours. Braid a little flour and butter together for thickening • and salt to suit the taste. After straining three pints of oysters, add the iuice to the soup ; also a few slices of cold ham. Let the contents boil gently for ten or twelve minutes. Just before removing the soup from the fire stir into it two spoonfuls of powdered sassafras leaves. Leave it on the fire to simmer a few minutes, then add the oysters. Season with pepper, serve in deep dish and garnish with rice. CHAPTER VII. SELECTING, PREPARING, AND COOKING. All fish lose their flavor in a short time after being taken from the water ; hence it is necessary to purchase those recently caught. Fish, when fresh caught, are hard when pressed by the finger, the eyes full and the gills red. If the flesh is flabby and the eyes sunken, the fish are stale. They should be carefully cleaned, washed, and salted. In preparing they are often spoiled by improper judgment. Fish should remain only a short time in water, as it causes them to become soft and flabby. If the fish be frozen, the frost should always be taken out in cold water, or it will be soft and fall to pieces. The earthy taste often found in fresh water fish may be extracted by soaking in salt and water. All fish are better if allowed to take salt an hour or so before cooking. Most kinds of salt fish should be soaked in cold water for twenty-four hours. The fleshy side turned down in the water. Fish should be well cleaned preparatory to cooking ; they may be readily scaled by plunging them for an instant in hot water, then washing and scraping away all coagulated blood. It injures fish to wash them too much, as it destroys their flavor. Nearly all kinds of fish are better in cold weather. Mackerel in July, August, September, and October. Shad are good from April to June. For invalids, white fish are considered the best. Fish, unless good, are very inferior eating. Cooks should consider what fish they have and cook accordingly. Some varieties when boiled or baked are fine, but tasteless if fried or broiled: Large fish are generally baked or boiled. Small ones, fried or broiled. Trout should always be boiled or baked. Red Snapper always boiled. White fish, best when broiled. Fresh mackerel should always be broiled. [78] Fish should always be boiled very gently. Sew them in a cloth and drop in cold water with a sufficient quantity of salt. Boil about thirty minutes.