Today we’ll feature a menu that is for an ordinary winter
evening meal. Filled with bounty from the cold cellar and comfort food classics hot out of the hearth-fire, this menu is a perfect tease that spring is on it's way.
Our Menu from page 375 of The Lady's Receipt Book, as an Economical Winter Dinner for Small Families:
- pork pie with apples
- oyster fritters
- potatoes
- turnips
- stewed pumpkin
- boiled bread pudding
Take the lean of
a leg or loin of fresh pork, and season it with pepper, salt, and nutmeg. Cover
the bottom and sides of a deep dish with a good paste, made with a pound of
butter to two pounds of flour, and rolled out thick. Put in a layer of pork,
and then a layer of pippin apples, pared, cored, and cut small. Strew over the
apples sufficient sugar to make them very sweet. Then place another layer of
pork, and so on till the dish is full. Pour in half a pint or more of water, or
of white wine. Cover the pie with a thick lid of paste, and notch and ornament
it according to your taste.
Set it in a brisk oven, and bake
it well.
(From Directions for Cookery.
page 122)
Hare ready some of the finest and largest oysters; drain them
from the liquor and wipe them dry.
Beat six eggs very light, and stir into them gradually six
table-spoonfuls of fine sifted flour. Add by degrees a pint and a half of rich
milk and some grated nutmeg, and beat it to a smooth batter.
Make your frying-pan very hot, and put into it a piece of butter
or lard. When it has melted and begins to froth, put in a small ladle-full of
the batter, drop an oyster in the middle of it, and fry it of a light brown.
Send them to table hot.
If you find your batter too thin,
so that it spreads too much in the frying-pan, add a little more flour beaten
well into it. If it is too thick, thin it with some additional milk.
(From Directions for Cookery.
page 59-60)
(From Directions for Cookery. page 185 )
—Take large fine potatoes; wash
and dry them, and either lay them on the hearth and keep them buried in
hot wood ashes, or bake them slowly in a Dutch oven. They will not be
done in less than two hours. It will save time to half-boil them before
they are roasted. Send them to table with the skins on, and eat them
with cold butter and salt. They are introduced with cold meat at supper.
Potatoes keep best buried in sand or earth. They should never be wetted till they are washed for cooking.
If you have them in the cellar, see that they are well covered with
matting or old carpet, as the frost injures them greatly. (From Directions for Cookery. page 185 )
Take off a thick
paring from the outside, and boil the turnips gently for an
hour and a half. Try them with a fork, and when quite tender, take them up,
drain them on a sieve, and either send them to table whole with melted butter,
or mash them in a cullender, (pressing and squeezing them well;) season with a
little pepper and salt, and mix with them a very small quantity of butter.
Setting in the sun after they are cooked, or on a part of the table upon which
the Sub may happen to shine, will
give to turnips a singularly unpleasant taste, and should therefore be avoided.
When turnips are very young, it is customary to serve them up
with about two inches of the green top left on them.
If stewed with meat, they should
be sliced or quartered."
Mutton, either boiled or roasted, should always be
accompanied by turnips.
(From Directions for Cookery. page 189)
Deep coloured
pumpkins are generally the best. In a diy warm place they can be kept perfectly
good all winter. When you prepare to stew a pumpkin, cut it in half and take
out all the seeds. Then cut it in thick slices, and pare them. Put it into a
pot with it very little water, and stew it gently for an
hour, or till soft enough to mash. Then take it out, drain, and squeeze it till
it is as dry as you can get it. Afterwards mash it,
adding a little pepper and salt, and a very little butter.
Pumpkin is frequently stewed with fresh beef or fresh pork.
The water in which pumpkin has been boiled, is said to be
very good to mix bread with, it having a tendency to improve it in sweetness
and to keep it moist.
(From Directions for Cookery. page 191-192)
—Boil a quart of rich milk. While
it is boiling, take a small loaf of baker's bread, such as is sold for five or six cents. It may be either fresh or stale.
Pare off all the crust, and cut up the crumb into very small pieces. You should
have baker's bread if you can procure it, as home-made bread may not make the
pudding light enough. Put the bread into a pan; and when the milk boils, pour
it scalding hot over the bread. Cover the pan closely, and let it steep in the
hot steam for about three quarters of an hour. Then
remove the cover, and allow the bread and milk to cool. In the mean time, beat
four eggs till they are thick and smooth. Then beat into them a table-spoonful
and a half of fine wheat flour. Next beat the egg and flour into the bread and
milk, and continue to beat hard till the mixture is as light as possible; for on this the success of the pudding chiefly depends.
Have ready over the fire a pot of boiling water. Dip your pudding-cloth
into it, and shake it out. Spread out the cloth in a deep dish or pan, and
dredge it well with flour. Pour in the mixture, and tie up the cloth, leaving
room for it to swell. Tie the string firmly and
plaster up the opening (if there is any) with flour moistened with water. If
any water gets into it the pudding will be spoiled.
See that the water boils when you
put in the pudding, and keep it boiling hard. If the pot wants replenishing, do
it with boiling water from a kettle. Should you put in cold water to supply the
place of that which has boiled away, the pudding will chill, and become hard
and heavy. Boil it an hour and a half.
Turn it out of the bag the minute before you send it to
table. Eat it with wine sauce, or with sugar and butter, or molasses. It will
be much improved by adding to the mixture half a pound of whole raisins, well
floured to prevent their sinking. Sultana raisins are best, as they have no
seeds.
If these directions
are exactly followed, this will be found a remarkably good and wholesome
plain pudding.
For all boiled puddings, a square
pudding-cloth which can be opened out, is much better than a bag. It should be
very thick.
(From Directions for Cookery. page 293-294)
