American Cookery: Thanksgiving Menus and Recipes, - [i have read the book a hundred times TXT] 📗

Measure three cups of graham flour into a large mixing-bowl; add one cup of bran, and sift on to these one cup and one-half of white flour, to which one and one-fourth a teaspoonful of salt has been added. Stir together until mixed. Dissolve one teaspoonful of baking soda in a tablespoonful of hot water, and add to two cups of buttermilk. Melt two tablespoonfuls of butter and one of any preferred substitute, mix with one-half a cup of molasses, stir into the buttermilk, and add all to the dry ingredients, stirring vigorously. Lastly, add one-half a compressed yeast cake to the batter, and stir again until the yeast is thoroughly incorporated with the batter, which should be very stiff. Place in a greased bread pan, cover, set in a warm place until batter has risen to top of pan or doubled in bulk. Bake one hour in an oven with gradually increasing heat. This bread keeps fresh for a long time, and is particularly good sliced thin for sandwiches.

Beat, until light, the yolks of six eggs; add one-half a teaspoonful of salt, one teaspoonful of soda, dissolved in one tablespoonful of vinegar, then two cups of sifted flour, alternately, with the beaten whites of the eggs, and if necessary add enough milk to make a thin batter. Pour a small ladleful at a time on the griddle; spread each cake, when cooked, with raspberry jam, roll up like a jelly roll, pile on a hot platter, dust over with powdered sugar, and serve with each one a spoonful of Aigre-Doux Sauce.

Add to two cups of sour cream the juice and fine-grated rind of one large lemon. Stir in enough sugar just to develop a sweet taste, one-half a cup or more, and beat hard and long with a Dover beater until the sauce is quite light.

Pare four large cucumbers and cut in quarter-inch slices; season by sprinkling with salt and pepper, then dip in beaten egg, and afterwards in fine, sifted crumbs. Proceed in the same manner with two firm tomatoes, removing the skin by dipping first into boiling water, then into cold, and rubbing the skin off. The tomatoes should be cut in half-inch slices. Heat a large spider until very hot; add two or more tablespoonfuls of dripping or other fat, and sauté in this, first the cucumbers, then the tomatoes, turning the slices when browned on one side, and cooking until crisped. Serve in a hot vegetable dish.

Make a rich stuffing by chopping together three-fourths a pound of veal, one-half a pound of ham, and an ounce of beef suet or other fat. Add the grated rind of a small lemon, and a teaspoonful of dried, mixed herbs, or of kitchen bouquet, two beaten eggs, a grate of nutmeg, and one cup of cream. Cook all together over hot water until mixture is the consistency of custard; thicken further with fine bread crumbs, and let cool. Divide a two-pound skirt steak into halves, crosswise, spread the stuffing over both parts, roll up each one and tie. Let steam for half an hour, then put into a hot oven to finish cooking and brown. Serve with Raisin Sauce.

Add one-half a cup of seeded raisins to one pint of cold water, set over fire, bring slowly to a boil and let simmer, gently, for fifteen minutes. Blend two tablespoonfuls of flour with one-half a teaspoonful of salt and one-fourth a teaspoonful of white pepper, and stir this into two scant tablespoonfuls of melted butter or butter substitute; add to the raisins and water, and let boil, keeping stirred, for three minutes. Remove from fire and add the juice of one-half a lemon or two tablespoonfuls of vinegar.

Cook a dozen small onions, sliced, in a saucepan with one cup of sweet leaf-lard. While cooking put through the meat chopper one-half a pound, each, of fresh pork and the dark and white meat of a fowl or chicken. Add to saucepan containing onions and lard, and stir in enough fine bread crumbs to make the whole the consistency of a soft dough. Add seasoning of salt and pepper with a spoonful of mixed dried herbs. Lastly, add one cup of sweet cream and three well-beaten eggs, and stir the whole until the eggs are set. Stuff this into pig entrails, making links six inches long. Keep stored in a cool place, and cook like sausage. Or the boudin may be packed into jars, and sliced or cut into dice and sautéed when cold.