Crayfish Soup

Ingredients

• two heaping tablespoonfuls of butter
• two heaping tablespoonfuls of flour
• a gill of cream
• half a pint of white wine
• palatably seasoned with salt
• palatably seasoned with cayenne

Method

1. 1

   Continue to boil the soup; as soon as the crayfish can be handled, break the tails away from the bodies.

2. 2

   Remove the flesh of the tails and put it aside.

3. 3

   Crush the shells and add them to the soup, boiling for an hour.

4. 4

   Strain the soup, pressing the vegetables and shells to extract flavor.

5. 5

   Mix butter and flour over the fire, then gradually add the strained soup, stirring to prevent lumps.

6. 6

   Add cream, white wine, and crayfish tails just before serving.

Nutrition per serving

As published

This recipe was extracted from Miss Corson's practical American cookery and household management (1885) by Juliet Corson, page 110. The excerpt below is the record exactly as published.

two heaping tablespoonfuls each of butter and flour until they are smoothly blended, and gradually add to them the strained soup, stirring constantly to prevent the formation of lumps ; when all the soup has been stirred in, add a gill of cream and half a pint of white wine, put in the crayfish tails, see that the soup is palatably seasoned with salt and cayenne, and serve it at once. BISQUE OF PRAWNS. Put a hundred prawns into two quarts of boiling water, after first washing them in plenty of cold water, and boil them until the shells turn red ; meantime, wash two pounds of eels in cold water, cut them in inch pieces, and put them over the fire in sufficient cold water to cover them, together with a gill of vinegar, a level teaspoonful of whole pepper- corns, a blade of mace, an onion peeled and stuck with a dozen whole cloves, a sprig of any sweet herb except sage, a small sprig of parsley with root attached, a stalk of celery, and a level tablespoonful of salt ; as soon as the prawns are red, put the pot-liquor in which they were boiled with the above-named ingredients, and then take the prawns from th? SOUPS. 191 shells ; put the flesh of the prawns aside until the soup is nearly done, add the shells to the other ingredients, cover the soup-kettle, and boil until they are reduced to a pulp ; then strain the soup through a towel laid in a colander; put two tablespoonfuls each of butter and flour in a sauce- pan, and stir them over the fire until they bubble; then gradually stir in the strained soup, about half a cupful at a time, until a creamy soup is made ; add the flesh of the prawns to this, season it palatably, put with it about a gill of Sauterne, let it heat to the boiling-point, and then serve it hot. If prawns are not plentiful, some lobster flesh may be shredded and used for the soup. LOBSTER SOUP. Plunge a large lobster, or two of medium size, into a large pot half full of boiling salted water, and boil it until the shell is quite red ; then take it from the water, cool it until it can be handled, and remove the flesh from the shell, rejecting the soft fins which lie close to the body under the legs, the stomach, which is enclosed in a rather hard membrane back of the eyes, and the intestine which runs down the middle of the tail, and saving all the coral and green fat; cut the flesh of the lobster in small pieces ; put over the fire a sauce- pan containing two heaping tablespoonfuls each of b

Cook this with the app: pantry check, scaling, and the assistant.