The Whitehouse Cookbook (1887) by Hugo Ziemann (ebook reader with android os .TXT) 📖

also some fresh fruit, if convenient.

SALADS.

Everything in the make-up of a salad should be of the freshest material, the vegetables crisp and fresh, the oil or butter the very best, meats, fowl and fish well cooked, pure cider or white wine vinegar—in fact, every ingredient first class, to insure success.

The vegetables used in salad are: Beet-root, onions, potatoes, cabbage, lettuce, celery, cucumbers, lentils, haricots, winter cress, peas, French beans, radish, cauliflower—all these may be used judiciously in salad, if properly seasoned, according to the following directions.

Chervil is a delicious salad herb, invariably found in all salads prepared by a French gourmet. No man can be a true epicure who is unfamiliar with this excellent herb. It may be procured from the vegetable stands at Fulton and Washington markets the year round. Its leaves resemble parsley, but are more divided, and a few of them added to a breakfast salad give a delightful flavor.

Chervil Vinegar.—A few drops of this vinegar added to fish sauces or salads is excellent, and well repays the little trouble taken in its preparation. Half fill a bottle with fresh or dry chervil leaves; fill the bottle with good vinegar and heat it gently by placing it in warm water, which bring to boiling point; remove from the fire; when cool cork, and in two weeks it will be ready for use.

MAYONNAISE DRESSING.

Put the yolks of four fresh raw eggs, with two hard-boiled ones, into a cold bowl. Rub these as smooth as possible before introducing the oil; a good measure of oil is a tablespoonful to each yolk of raw egg. All the art consists in introducing the oil by degrees, a few drops at a time. You can never make a good salad without taking plenty of time. When the oil is well mixed, and assumes the appearance of jelly, put in two heaping teaspoonfuls of dry table salt, one of pepper and one of made mustard. Never put in salt and pepper before this stage of the process, because the salt and pepper would coagulate the albumen of the eggs, and you could not get the dressing smooth. Two tablespoonfuls of vinegar added gradually.

The Mayonnaise should be the thickness of thick cream when finished, but if it looks like curdling when mixing it, set in the ice-box or in a cold place for about forty minutes or an hour, then mix it again. It is a good idea to place it in a pan of cracked ice while mixing.

For lobster salad, use the coral, mashed and pressed through a sieve, then add to the above.

Salad dressing should be kept in a separate bowl in a cold, place, and not mixed with the salad until the moment it is to be served, or it may lose its crispness and freshness.

DRESSING FOR COLD SLAW. (Cabbage Salad.)

Beat up two eggs with two tablespoonfuls of sugar, add a piece of butter the size of half an egg, a teaspoonful of mustard, a little pepper, and lastly a teacup of vinegar. Put all of these ingredients into a dish over the fire and cook like a soft custard. Some think it improved by adding half a cupful of thick sweet cream to this dressing; in that case use less vinegar. Either way is very fine.

SALAD CREAM DRESSING. No. 1.

One cup fresh cream, one spoonful fine flour, the whites of two eggs beaten stiff, three spoonfuls of vinegar, two spoonfuls of salad oil or soft butter, two spoonfuls of powdered sugar, one teaspoonful salt, one-half teaspoonful pepper, one teaspoonful of made mustard. Heat cream almost to boiling; stir in the flour, previously wet with cold milk; boil two minutes, stirring all the time; add sugar and take from fire. When half cold, beat in whipped whites of egg; set aside to cool. When quite cold, whip in the oil or butter, pepper, mustard and salt; if the salad is ready, add vinegar and pour at once over it.

CREAM DRESSING. No. 2.

Two tablespoonfuls of whipped sweet cream, two of sugar and four of vinegar; beat well and pour over the cabbage, previously cut very fine and seasoned with salt.

FRENCH SALAD DRESSING.

Mix one saltspoon of pepper with one of salt; add three tablespoonfuls of olive oil and one even tablespoonful of onion scraped fine; then one tablespoonful of vinegar; when well mixed, pour the mixture over your salad and stir all till well mingled.

The merit of a salad is that it should be cool, fresh and crisp. For vegetables use only the delicate white stalks of celery, the small heart-leaves of lettuce; or tenderest stalks and leaves of the white cabbage. Keep the vegetable portion crisp and fresh until the time for serving, when add the meat. For chicken and fish salads use the "Mayonnaise dressing." For simple vegetable salads the French dressing is most appropriate, using onion rather than garlic.

MIXED SUMMER SALAD.

Three heads of lettuce, two teaspoonfuls of green mustard leaves, a handful of water cresses, five tender radishes, one cucumber, three hard-boiled eggs, two teaspoonfuls of white sugar, one teaspoonful of salt, one teaspoonful of pepper, one teaspoonful of made mustard, one teacupful of vinegar, half a teacupful of oil.

Mix all well together, and serve with a lump of ice in the middle.

"Common Sense in the Household."

CHICKEN SALAD.

Boil the fowls tender and remove all the fat, gristle and skin; mince the meat in small pieces, but do not hash it. To one chicken put twice and a half its weight in celery, cut in pieces of about one-quarter of an inch; mix thoroughly and set it in a cool place—the ice chest.

In the meantime prepare a "Mayonnaise dressing," and when ready for the table pour this dressing over the chicken and celery, tossing and mixing it thoroughly. Set it in a cool place until ready to serve. Garnish with celery tips, or cold hard-boiled eggs, lettuce leaves, from the heart, cold boiled beets or capers, olives.

Crisp cabbage is a good substitute for celery; when celery is not to be had use celery vinegar in the dressing. Turkey makes a fine salad.

LOBSTER SALAD. No. 1.

Prepare a sauce with the coral of a fine, new lobster, boiled fresh for about half an hour. Pound and rub it smooth, and mix very gradually with a dressing made from the yolks of two hard-boiled eggs, a tablespoonful of made mustard, three of salad oil, two of vinegar, one of white powdered sugar, a small teaspoonful of salt, as much black pepper, a pinch of cayenne and yolks of two fresh eggs. Next fill your salad bowl with some shred lettuce, the better part of two leaving the small curled centre to garnish your dish with. Mingle with this the flesh of your lobster, torn, broken or cut into bits seasoned with salt and pepper and a small portion of the dressing. Pour over the whole the rest of the dressing; put your lettuce-hearts down the centre and arrange upon the sides slices of hard-boiled eggs.

LOBSTER SALAD. No. 2.

Using canned lobsters, take a can, skim off all the oil on the surface, and chop the meat up coarsely on a flat dish. Prepare the same way six heads of celery; mix a teaspoonful of mustard into a smooth paste with a little vinegar; add yolks of two fresh eggs; a tablespoonful of butter, creamed, a small teaspoonful of salt, the same of pepper, a quarter of a teaspoonful of cayenne pepper, a gill of vinegar, and the mashed yolks of two hard-boiled eggs. Mix a small portion of the dressing with the celery and meat, and turn the remainder over all. Garnish with the green tops of celery and a hard-boiled egg, cut into thin rings.

FISH SALAD.

Take a fresh white fish or trout, boil and chop it, but not too fine; put with the same quantity of chopped cabbage, celery or lettuce; season the same as chicken salad. Garnish with the tender leaves of the heart of lettuce.

OYSTER SALAD.

Drain the liquor from a quart of fresh oysters. Put them in hot vinegar enough to cover them placed over the fire; let them remain until plump, but not cooked; then drop them immediately in cold water, drain off, and mix with them two pickled cucumbers cut fine, also a quart of celery cut in dice pieces, some seasoning of salt and pepper. Mix all well together, tossing up with a silver fork. Pour over the whole a "Mayonnaise dressing." Garnish with celery tips and slices of hard-boiled eggs arranged tastefully.

DUTCH SALAD.

Wash, split and bone a dozen anchovies, and roll each one up; wash, split and bone one herring, and cut it up into small pieces; cut up into dice an equal quantity of Bologna or Lyons sausage, or of smoked ham and sausages; also, an equal quantity of the breast of cold roast fowl, or veal; add likewise, always in the same quantity, and cut into dice, beet-roots, pickled cucumbers, cold boiled potatoes cut in larger dice, and in quantity according to taste, but at least thrice as much potato as anything else; add a tablespoohful of capers, the yolks and whites of some hard-boiled eggs, minced separately, and a dozen stoned olives; mix all the ingredients well together, reserving the olives and anchovies to ornament the top of the bowl; beat up together oil and Tarragon vinegar with white pepper and French mustard to taste; pour this over the salad and serve.

HAM SALAD.

Take cold boiled ham, fat and lean together, chop it until it is thoroughly mixed and the pieces are about the size of peas; then add to this an equal quantity of celery cut fine, if celery is out of season, lettuce may be substituted. Line a dish thickly with lettuce leaves and fill with the chopped ham and celery. Make a dressing the same as for cold slaw and turn over the whole. Very fine.

CRAB SALAD.

Boil three dozen hard-shell crabs twenty-five minutes; drain and let them cool gradually; remove the upper shell and the tail, break the remainder apart and pick out the meat carefully. The large claws should not be forgotten, for they contain a dainty morsel, and the creamy fat attached to the upper shell should not be overlooked. Line a salad bowl with the small white leaves of two heads of lettuce, add the crab meat, pour over it a "Mayonnaise" garnish with crab claws, hard-boiled eggs and little mounds of cress leaves, which may be mixed with the salad when served.

COLD SLAW.

Select the finest head of bleached cabbage—that is to say one of the finest and most compact of the more delicate varieties; cut up enough into shreds to fill a large vegetable dish or salad bowl—that to be regulated by the size of the cabbage and the quantity required; shave very fine and after that chop up, the more thoroughly the better. Put this into a dish in which it is to be served, after seasoning it well with salt and pepper. Turn over it a dressing made as for cold slaw; mix it well and garnish with slices of hard-boiled eggs.

PLAIN COLD SLAW.

Slice cabbage very fine; season with salt, pepper and a little sugar; pour over vinegar and mix thoroughly. It is nice served in the centre of a platter with fried oysters around it.

HOT SLAW.

Cut the cabbage as for cold slaw; put it into a stewpan and set it on the top of the stove for half an hour, or till hot all through; do not let it boil. Then make a dressing the same as for cold slaw, and, while hot, pour it over the hot cabbage. Stir it until well mixed and the cabbage looks coddled. Serve immediately.

TOMATO SALAD.

Peel and slice