À la mode cookery

Braising is a process in which the meat and ingredients should be placed in a closed stewpan called a brasiere, which is a pan with a cover made to hold live embers in, so that there is heat above as well as below. A few slices of fat bacon should be put at the bottom of the pan, and trimmings of veal or other meat, rinds of bacon, some vegetables, such as onions and carrots, cut into slices, a bouquet garni, &c., over which place what is to be braised, and then the lid closed hermetically so as to allow no steam to escape. Stuffings, Forcemeats, &c. These preparations, whether in the form of stuffing, forcemeats, or balls, make a considerable part of good cooking by the flavour they impart to whatever dish they are added to if properly compounded. Exact rules for the quantities of which they are composed cannot easily be given, but the following remarks may be useful and practice will soon give the knowledge in mixing them to the taste. According to what is required, the following list should be selected from, taking care that the most pungent articles must not be used in such quantity as the others. No one flavour should predominate, and if several dishes are served at the same time, there should be a marked variety in the taste of the forcemeat as well as in the gravies. It should be consistent enough to eat with a knife but not dry nor heavy. Forcemeat ingredients are : — Essential Accessory Cold fowl or veal. i Oysters. Scraped ham or tongue. Anchovy. Fat bacon. Tarragon. Beef suet. Savoury. Crumbs of bread. Pennyroyal. Parsley. Knotted marjoram. White pepper. Thyme. Salt. Basil. Nutmeg. Yolks of hard eggs. Yolk and white of eggs well beaten Garlic shalot. to bind the mixture. Chives and cloves. The first column contains the articles of which the forcemeat may be made without any striking flavour, and to those may be added some of the different ingredients from the second column to vary the taste. A good forcemeat is made as follows : — Mince fine half a pound of veal or fowl previously cooked and four ounces of ham ; add one teacupful of grated bread and moisten with an egg, season with a little nutmeg, lemon, and white pepper. Perhaps I have written too lengthily upon subjects which have been already described in other culinary works ; but to make entrees and savouries the knowledge of what I have written is most necessary, as they cannot be perfectly cooked without a thorough knowledge of the rudiments of cookery any more than any one can excel in art and science without rudimental knowledge, and the entrees' recipes here given cannot be successfully cooked without it. Pressed Beef a la Cornwall