Receipt for "red rice."

* Perelli Rocco, Greek Street, Soho, furnishes an excellent sauce in small tins.

Risotto a la Milanaise.

The Pilau-Rice for Curry.

For a Turkish pilau, well wash six ounces of East India rice, and boil in a pint of water for five minutes at the most; then throw it into a colander that it may thoroughly drain.

Next place it in a stewpan with an ounce of butter, salt and pepper to taste, stirring well, and adding by degrees about half a pint of good fowl broth. After about fifteen or twenty minutes it should be properly done, turning out with the grains separate. It is to be served perfectly hot. The foregoing is a true pilau, but additions may be made of portions of the meat of the fowl, of thin slices of bacon, or grated beef or ham; of a little curry powder; of chutney; of fried onions, mushrooms, etc. It can also be made with beef and veal broth and treated as above, but in none of these forms could be regarded as the true Oriental dish.

After many trials, for the purpose of producing rice in its most perfect condition to accompany a curry, that is, with every grain separate, sufficiently cooked but not soft, and white as snow, I can recommend the following: Take six ounces of good Patna rice, sift, wash, and pick out all foreign seeds, etc. Throw it into a saucepan containing two quarts of boiling water with a small teaspoonful of salt and the juice of half a lemon, which makes it white. Stir with a wooden spoon,, and in about ten or twelve minutes the rice should be sufficiently cooked. This may be ascertained by pressing a few grains, which should be still firm, but softened throughout, without a hard portion in the centre. If so, add a pint of cold water to check the boiling at once, and then drain all the water from the saucepan, leaving the rice therein only. Set it on the hot plate, covered, not by the lid, but by a napkin, so that the rice may dry, giving it a shake or a stir occasionally, when every grain will be separate. Serve on a hot dish with cover until it reaches the table.*

A Turkish pilau.

Receipt for boiling rice for curry.

Mincing

There is an important mode of preparing flesh for food, especially for the purpose of rendering it more easily digested, which may be briefly described here. I refer to the use of a good mincing machine for the purpose of producing very fine divisions of the muscular fibres. I do not so much refer to its employment for serving afresh the remains of food which have been already cooked, as for its preparation of fresh meat with a special object in view. For the former, in order to produce mince - meat, or material for rissoles, etc., the process is, of course, extremely useful. I refer rather to the value of this treatment of fresh meat, where sufficient mastication is difficult, owing to imperfect teeth or tender gums, or where habitual mastication is neglected, or when time cannot really be bestowed on it. The human stomach being adapted almost solely for the digestion of flesh, and not at all for that of vegetable and farinaceous matters, which are chiefly digested in the first intestine beyond the stomach, it is of the highest importance that animal fibre, whether of butcher's meat, game, or poultry, should be minutely divided by a prolonged mechanical action of the teeth before it is subjected to the chemical process, that is, digestion by the gastric juice which takes place in the stomach. Accordingly, if we are able to introduce into that organ, say, the flesh of rump-steak or mutton chop (which especially when fresh, as in hot weather, is by no means tender), in a state of minute division, the process of digestion is rendered far easier and the nutritious elements are assimilated much sooner than if they are imperfectly masticated. Thus also a considerable expenditure of nervous energy on the digestive process is saved for other purposes, and after the meal heaviness or undue fulness is rarely experienced.

* The above receipt is based on the instructions given in one of the best practical cook's guides I know, a work written by an accomplished officer of her Majesty's service in India, "Culinary Jottings: a Treatise in Thirty Chapters," etc., by Wyvern. Fifth Edition. Madras: Higginbotham & Co. 1885. Amost interesting and suggestive work to the European, although designed for Anglo-Indians. In my opinion no culinary library, even of modest pretensions, is complete without it.

The foregoing note, which has appeared in two or three previous editions, I purposely retain in this also, for Colonel Kenney-Herbert, the author, known at that date as "Wyvern," has returned to this country; and still devoting his leisure to the improvement of culinary art, has written various interesting and useful small works, e.g. "Fifty Breakfasts," "Fifty Lunches," "Fifty Dinners," and "Fifty Suppers." But his chief and most complete volume, entitled "Common Sense Cookery for English Households," pp. 504, 1894 : E. Arnold, London, is admirably adapted for heads of families, as well as to cooks of the present day who take interest in their duties and desire to improve.

Mincing, a Valuable Process.

Mincing: useful for ordinary purposes, also for a special product; for fresh meat when teeth are imperfect.

A pound of rump-steak, free from all fat and skin, or an equal quantity of the best mutton steak, should suffice for a lunch for three persons. Treat it as follows: First, broil it over a clear fire, only about half as much as you would do for serving it as a broiled steak, not more, so that it will be quite red throughout, although not raw when cut. Slice the meat into small strips, removing as you do so any portion of fat or skin-like matter met with, which is not to be used. The mincer having been carefully rinsed with hot water, pass the strips through it three times consecutively, which ought to yield a soft, thoroughly divided mass. Put this into a Bain-marie, with about half or three-quarters of a pint of cold stock, free from fat, with a little salt and pepper, and mix thoroughly with a wooden spoon. Place the vessel on the corner of the fire, gradually bringing the water below to a boil, stirring all the time until the red tint has almost disappeared, which will probably be in about seven or ten minutes. It should now be a perfectly smooth puree, and should be served quite hot. An excellent accompaniment is a little macaroni au jus(see p. 162), with some bread thoroughly toasted through, so as to be brittle, as all toast ought to be. Some cold toast spread with butter may follow, in order to furnish the fatty element and render the light meal complete.

To facilitate digestion.

Directions for using the machine.

Directions for Mincing Meat.

I can conceive no better means of supporting at midday, after a long morning's work, an exhausted system, when it is really impossible to devote an hour to rest and the ordinary lunch. Midday rest, however, should be the invariable rule both before and after that meal, and then it would still be hard to find a better form of repast than this now indicated.*

Passing rapidly on without naming the ordinary and well-known service of cold meats, fresh and preserved, poultry and game, open or under paste, in some form, to be found in profusion on table or sideboard, and in which this country is unrivalled, a hint or two relating to some lighter cold entrees may be suggested. It is scarcely possible to treat these apart from the salad which, admirable by itself, also forms the natural garnish for cold dishes. A simple aspic jelly, little more than the consomme of yesterday, first diluted, then flavoured with a little lemon peel and tarragon vinegar, furnishes another form of garnish, or a basis in which to present choice morsels in tempting forms, such as poultry livers, ox-palates, quenelles, fillets of game, chicken, wild fowl or fish, prawns, plover's eggs, etc., associated with a well-made salad. On this system an enterprising cook can furnish many changes of light but excellent nutritious dishes, for summer breakfasts and lunches, as well as for dinner.

* The best form of mincer I have seen claims, I believe, to be an American design, and is known as the "Enterprise." The agency is 86, Dale Street, Liverpool. It is inexpensive, and is sent post free anywhere.

Invaluable for midday meal for business men.

Variations.

Garnish for cold dishes.

Aspic jelly, however, is now so popular, and deservedly so, that a special receipt, to which personal trials and consideration have been given under my own eye, as in all such offered in the text, is here presented as a ready way of preparing it. For this purpose a good beef extract is particularly useful and efficient. Hence it is quite unnecessary to make now, as formerly, a clear meat stock with much labour for this purpose; especially when, as in hot weather, it will not keep well, and prolonged stove heat should not be employed unnecessarily. At very short notice a capital aspic can be prepared as follows: Slice a large carrot or turnip, a small head of celery, adding two cloves, pepper and salt, a bay leaf, a small bunch of sweet herbs; all to be put into a saucepan with three pints of water, and allowed to simmer for two hours until reduced to two pints. Pour off through a strainer and let stand until cold. When required, add two ounces of gelatine in hot summer weather (one and a half ounce suffices when it is cool) to a pint of the cold liquor, and let it stand two hours. Then heat the remaining pint to boiling point, and add to the pint which contains the gelatine, together with a thin paring of lemon peel, two teaspoonfuls of lemon juice, the same of mild vinegar, and one or two teaspoonfuls of tarragon vinegar. Then pour in two or three whites of eggs, lightly beaten, and stir well to fine the liquor. Bring the whole just up to the boiling point; then at once remove and keep on the hot plate close by, but not boiling, for three minutes only. Take it off and set it aside for three minutes longer, and then strain through flannel. It is now quite hot and clear; stir in at once a large teaspoonful of the meat extract, and set aside to cool until wanted.