Sprats, to Pickle

Ingredients

• 21b. common salt
• 4oz. bay salt
• 4oz. saltpetre
• 2oz. sal prunella
• a little cochineal
• a peck of sprats

Method

1. 1

   Pack sprats in a jar with layers of the salt mixture, pressing down until full.

2. 2

   Cover and keep in a cool, dry place for six months.

As published

This recipe was extracted from The "Queen" cookery books: Pickles and Preserves (1902) by S. Beaty-Pownall, page 82. The excerpt below is the record exactly as published.

oz. bay salt, loz. saltpetre, and |lb. coarse sugar, pounded and well mixed. (A few grains of powdered cochineal added to this pickle improves the colour.) Rub this piclde well into the beef for a week, turning and basting it daily, then leave it in the pickle three or four days longer, only turning, but not rubbing it. It is excellent for cooking in eight days or so, but if to be smoked, leave it sixteen days in the pickle, then drain it, and smoke for a few days. This makes delicious sand- wiches. Beef, Salted in a Hurry. — Rub some 51b. 01 61b. of beef well with salt, then flour well a coarse clean cloth, and fold the meat up in this, lay it in a pan of boiling water and cook as long as you would any other salt beef of the same size, and it will eat as salt as if salted for four or five days. Hound, to Salt. — For 251b. of round take 2oz. of saltpetre, 4oz. of pepper, 6oz. of sugar, and ^lb. each of bay and common salt ; rub the meat well all over with this mixture, rubbing, basting, and turning it daily for a month. It can then be hung up and dried, or boiled straight as it comes out of the pickle. As in most of these old-fashioned recipes, it must be observed that the boiling here spoken of is in reality gentle simmering. Whole, to Salt. — Take as much cold spring water as will well cover the meat you wish to salt, and with this water and bay salt make a brine strong enough to float a potato ; boil this well together till the salt is dissolved and all the scum has ceased to rise, leb it stand till cold, then pom- it MEAT, &c., TO CURE. 167 over the meat in the pickling tub or barrel. This is an old Scotch recipe used when a “ mart ” or bullock was killed and the whole salted down for the winter use of the family. Mutton Hams: — These can be cured by almost any recipe given for pork ham, and if smoked make excellent rashers. Sprats, to Pichle. — Pound together 21b. common salt, 4oz. each of bay salt and saltpetre, 2oz. sal prunella, and a little cochineal. Now have ready a peck of sprats

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