Harper's cook book encyclopædia

Bacon or Ham Omelet. — Beat six eggs, and add a small teaspoonful of flour mixed with a table-spoonful of milk or water, and pepper and salt to taste. Mince Yz lb. of cold, boiled bacon or ham, and stir it in with the egg. Dissolve a good piece of butter or fat in the omelet-pan and pour in the omelet. Shake the pan while cooking. In three or four minutes the sides may be folded over and the omelet turned out on a hot dish, or taken up with a flat spoon. Some cooks prefer to put the bacon or ham in the middle and fold the sides over it. This kind of omelet may be made with a variety of ingredients : cold meat, kidney, green pease, asparagus tops, small mushrooms, oysters, and lobster. Time, from three to four minutes. Bacon and Lima Beans. — Put 2 lbs. of good, tender bacon into a pan with cold water, nearly full. When it has boiled over one hour add a quart of lima beans, and boil till tender. Take off the skin from the bacon, sprinkle bread-crumbs over the top of it, and serve with the beans under, and fried parsley as a garnish round the dish. Smoked bacon should be dressed separately and placed on the beans when ready. Bacon Salad Dressing. — Cut 3 or 4 ozs. of streaked bacon into very small dice, and fry them to a pale color, but crisp. Beat the yolks of three eggs with a table-spoonful of flour, four table-spoonfuls of vinegar, and half as much again of water ; add a spoonful of made mustard, some salt and pepper. Put this to the bacon in the stewpan and stir it over the fire until thick and smooth. The bacon fat supplies the place of oil. It must be stirred while cooling. Should it be thicker than cream, thin it with a little vinegar and water well stirred in. It is very good for potato salad. Ham with Aspic Jelly. — The best garnish for a cold ham that is intended to be used at once is aspic jelly, as it may be eaten with it. It should be cut into dice, and the dish ornamented with it in any appropriate way. A few carrots and pickles, stamped into shapes, may be added. When a ham is expected to be kept for some days, however, this garnish should not be used, as it soon spoils. Ham, To Boil a. — This is ordinarily esteemed so simple a process that most housekeepers will regard a recipe superfluous ; but ham is often served underdone, and therefore salty, tough, and unpalatable. It is always best to wash a ham the evening before the day you wish to have it cooked, and let it soak in water all night. In the morning, cover it well with water and keep it slowly boiling until you are ready to dish up your dinner. You Ham, Broiled Hams, Easter may ascertain if it is sufficiently done by the readiness with which the bone on the under side may be removed. If it comes out easily, the ham is done. You may remove the outside skin, or not, as you choose. Some epicures think a ham ruined if either skinned or cut until perfectly cold, esteeming it desirable to retain all the juices. The prettiest way of serving up ham is to take off the skin after being thoroughly boiled, to grate bread-crumbs thickly over the top, and brush the whole over with the yolks of eggs. Then put into the oven and brown nicely. If, during the process of boiling, it is found necessary to add more water, be sure that this is boiling, for cold water will inevitably render the meat tough.