Little French dinners

Gateau de Saison (Gateau de Saison). — Make a sponge cake mixture with three eggs and the weight of two in sugar and flour, bake it in a fancy mould with a hollow in the centre (one holding about a pint and a half). The mould must not be filled up to the top, room being left for the sponge cake to rise. Turn it out carefully when done on a wire sieve and leave it to get cold. In the meantime melt in a saucepan ten ounces of sugar and a gill of water, bring it to the boil and then add one pound of red currants and half a pound of raspberries all carefully picked ; boil the whole for ten minutes, then pass through a hair sieve. Put all the pulp or thick part that adheres to the inside of the sieve in the centre of the sponge cake, which should be F 66 Little French Dinners. placed on the dish in which it is going to be served. Pour the juice into a small saucepan and let it boil fast for five minutes or till fairly thick, then strain it and pour it into the dish all over the cake in which a few holes should be made with a skewer. Keep covering the cake with the juice in the dish with the aid of a spoon and when the cake is well soaked and has a nice red glaze, put it away in the cool. At the time of serving, whisk up very stiffly a gill of cream, sweetened to taste and pile it up on the top of the fruit pulp in the centre of the cake. MENU.— XXIIL PTJREE D'HEEBES. CIVET DE LIEVRE. LONGE D'AGNEATT AFX POMMES MARQUISES. HARICOTS VERTS AU RIZ TOMATE. (ETJPS A L'ANGLAISE. Puree d'herbes (Vegetable puree Soup). — Take two handfuls of spinach, one of sorrel, the heart of a lettuce, the white part of a leek, an onion, and a few sprigs of chervil. Chop all these up finely and put them in a saucepan on the fire with a good sized piece of salt butter, and let them cook slowly for fifteen minutes, stirring them continually. Then add half an ounce of flour, stir well and moisten with a sufficient quantity of second stock. Let the soup boil up once or twice and then add to it off the fire, the yolks of two eggs, which should be first beaten up with a small quantity of the soup and then mixed with the rest. Serve very hot with croutons of fried bread. Little French Dinners. 67 Civet de Lievre (Jugged Hare). — Cut up a hare into convenient pieces and reserve the blood. Melt a small piece of butter in a stewpan, add a quarter of a pound of bacon cut in small pieces, and a dozen and a half small white onions. Fry them slowly to a golden colour. Then take out the onions and pieces of bacon and in the same saucepan fry the pieces of hare, afterwards dredge them with flour, cook for another five minutes, add a pint of stock and two glasses of claret with pepper and salt and a bouquet garni consisting of parsley, a bay leaf, a sprig of thyme, and half a shallot. A piece of celery is also a great improvement. Let the whole stew very gently for a couple of hours. Then add a teaspoonf ul of claret to the blood of the hare and strain it into the contents of the saucepan ; mix all well together, put in the onions and bacon, which were cooked at first, and simmer slowly for twenty minutes longer. At the time of serving remove the bouquet garni and turn all out into a hot dish. Potatoes may accompany this.