Henrietta Sowle

“So comes a reckoning when the banquet’s o’er,—

The dreadful reckoning, and men smile no more.”

THERE couldn’t be a better time than the present in which to have a smoke-talk, mesdames. There, there, now, pray don’t be alarmed; I’ve no notion of passing round any of the popular brands of cigars. Neither would I so much as offer you cigarettes, albeit the latest scientific utterance has pronounced them harmless.

No, our talk shall be of some of the smoked and salted viands that, while they may not perhaps come under the head of delicacies or indelicacies of the season, are decidedly appetizing, and quite worthy of having considerable attention given to the best ways and means of serving them.

And haven’t you been saddened hundreds of times when reflecting upon the disregard of details that makes of a dish of salt-fish and cream nothing but a pasty and altogether horrid mess? But a dish of salted cod becomes delicacy itself if the fish is shredded while raw, all skin and bone removed, washed several times in cold water and cooked in plenty of fresh water; then it should be drained and covered with cream, which has been heated and thickened with an egg or two beaten up well in a tablespoonful or so of cream; add a dash of cayenne, to give it a zest, and you have prepared for breakfast or luncheon a dainty that will quite justify you in fancying yourself for the rest of the day. And that’s a wonderfully comfortable state of mind in which to find oneself.

Perhaps, however, for a luncheon dish you would rather have the codfish served with brown butter. In which case you flake and freshen it as before, and cook in plenty of water. Take it up on a hot dish and pour over it a sauce made of butter, in which you have fried minced onion and a handful of chopped parsley till they are brown. And you can vary this sauce infinitely: add a bay leaf or two, or a few capers, or some chopped sweet red peppers, and get a new flavor with each addition.

The subject of codfish balls I won’t take up here. I fear I might make it too exhaustive. And, besides, every housekeeper seems to have a chosen way for preparing them.

I wish as much could be said about that too-little-appreciated genuine delicacy—fresh cods’ tongues. They are delicious when boiled till tender, and then served with brown butter, as suggested above for codfish. And they are just as good, and some think even better, if they are dipped in milk, then rolled one by one in flour, and fried in plenty of butter for about ten minutes. You can simply pour the butter on them when serving, with a little chopped parsley scattered over all, or you can put into the frying-pan, after taking the tongues out, a gill or two of tomato sauce, and serve this separately in a sauceboat, serving each tongue on a slice of toast. Usually it will be found necessary to soak the salted tongues for twenty-four hours or more in water, changing it once or twice, as seems necessary.

To be sure there’s considerable trouble and no small amount of care involved in having these edibles, or any others, for that matter, quite as one would like, but some old wiseacre has said that life’s cares are its comforts, and if one only has a firm belief, rooted and grounded in past experience, in this bit of philosophy it’s just as easy to apply it to cooking as to painting.

And a little of this care used in the broiling of smoked salmon redeems it from the charred and uninviting dish it too often makes. It is best to cut the salmon into small strips, wrap each strip in a piece of buttered paper, and then broil over a clear fire. When done remove the paper, and serve the fish on a piping hot dish, at once. And if you want a sauce for it make one by cooking a minced onion in a gill of vinegar and twice as much water, adding, as the onion shows signs of tenderness, two ounces of fresh butter, four finely chopped hard-boiled egg yolks, and a little chopped parsley.

Of course you know how to cook salt mackerel—you could sue me for libel if I said aught to the contrary. But do you, I wonder, ever try preparing it in my favorite way? This is the manner of it: Soak the mackerel for twelve hours, changing the water several times. Then boil it in an abundance of water, in which there is a bay leaf, two or three onions, some parsley and the juice of a lemon. The fish should cook very slowly, and not be allowed to come to pieces. When they are done, serve them on a folded napkin, with a sauce made by reducing a pint of cream to one-half, adding to it an ounce of butter, and thickening it with two egg yolks. Then add to it half its quantity of grated horse-radish, heating it again, without boiling. In most cases it is necessary to add salt to this sauce, but I prescribe no quantity. I only advise being skittish about the amount when it is to be used for a salt fish. If you are to have smoked mackerel, broil instead of boiling it and serve with it the cream horse-radish sauce.

And then there are smoked and salted herring, that if cooked judiciously make life at least a bit more comfortable. It is best to soak them for five or six hours in water and then for two hours in sweet, fresh milk, after which you can work out some wonderful dishes with them. If they have been salted only, fry in butter and serve them on potatoes mashed with cream. But if the herring are smoked as well as salted, split them down the back and cook in enough milk to cover. Cook till thoroughly done, and then serve on a very hot dish with branches of parsley around, and a little sweet rich cream poured over them.

But, to my thinking, the best of all the smoked and salted fish are the finnan haddies. And one of the best ways of cooking them is as per that last described for cooking herring. But the haddies are much less salt, and require little, if any, soaking. Or, if you prefer, you can put them in a buttered baking-pan, pour cream and bread crumbs over them and brown in a hot oven. Give them a little more cream when serving. And again after you and your household have partaken of this dish and pronounced it good, hard to beat, etc., you will have occasion to be pleased with yourself, which, being interpreted, means of course being perfectly satisfied with all the world.

It is possible, nay, probable, that you, mesdames, with all the calls that the Lenten season makes upon your spiritual selves, find little time for ordering or arranging dinners; furthermore—and it’s in no way to your discredit—it may be that with so much of each day given over to reflection and concentrated thought you experience a sort of disinclination to give heed to things material. Therefore it behooves me to be alive to my duty, which in the premises certainly seems to prescribe that I shall think and plan a bit for you; and I herewith submit, as the result of a goodly amount of cogitation on my part, a menu which I hope will strike you as being a very good sort of “working model,” should you not care to follow it to the letter:—

ConsommÉ maigre with asparagus points.
Lake trout with court bouillon.
Macaroni timbales with tomato sauce.
Casserole of fillets of sole.
Oyster soufflÉs.
Coffee cream glacÉe.Almond pudding.

You see that such a menu provides a dinner perfectly within the rule implied by “diner maigre,” though it can in no sense be called a fast-day dinner. In fact, the very phrase is a contradiction. If you are fasting, you do not dine; you simply eat to live—a very different thing.

And now for particulars. No need to tell you how to make the soup; you have stacks of cookery books that will give you the information necessary for the making of a good clear consommÉ. As for the asparagus points, it will be quite as well from all points of view to buy the canned asparagus tips, and cook a little in salted water, adding them to the soup about five minutes before it is served.

Perhaps your housekeepers’ guides may not be sufficiently explicit in regard to cooking the lake trout in the manner suggested, so I will tell you in detail. In the first place, you take equal quantities of white French wine—as inexpensive as you please—and water, one small onion, a bouquet of parsley, thyme, etc., some peppercorns, and a proper amount of salt. Let this boil for fifteen minutes, and you have as good a court bouillon as one could wish. Into it put the trout, tied into any shape you desire, and boil until tender; remove it, and serve on a fish paper or napkin; garnish with fresh green parsley sprays. For the sauce, you will melt some butter in a part of the court bouillon, and serve separately. You should find good lake trout in the market now, and at a price that doesn’t confine them to the list of luxuries. Aren’t you glad?

Have you any idea how many ways are known to expert cooks for preparing macaroni? I haven’t. But I should not be surprised to see offered for sale any day a publication setting forth “One Thousand Ways to Cook Macaroni,” and I hope that macaroni timbales, in case such an event comes to pass, will be given the place of honor. Try making them in this way, and you will agree with me. Boil the macaroni in plenty of salted water till it is tender, but not “mushy.” Drain off the water, and add, with all thoughts of economy thrown to the winds, melted butter; stir it in well, and add a goodly sprinkling of grated Parmesan cheese and cayenne pepper. Line a mould with the very best puff-paste you know how to make, rolled as thinly as possible, and put in the macaroni; cover with a round of the paste, lay a sheet of buttered paper over the top, and bake in a hot oven for about thirty minutes. Unmould on a hot dish, and pour round it some tomato sauce made from the best recipe given in any of your gastronomical literature.

Then consult the aforesaid literature still further, and select therefrom the most appetizing recipe for making a stuffing of bread-crumbs, when you have it properly prepared spread with it some fillets of sole, and tie them into shape with a little thread. Now put into a casserole, or stewpan, three or four ounces of butter, two minced onions, and the fish; let it fry for five or six minutes, then add to it two or three gills of bÉchamel sauce (see cookery books once more), a cupful of chopped mushrooms, and a claret-glass of claret. Cover the pan closely, and cook in the oven for half an hour. When finished, remove the strings from the fillets, and serve in a deep dish with the liquor in which they were cooked poured over them. And there you have a dish fit to tickle the palate of any king, or knave, that ever lived. Later in the season, when lobsters are selling at a more reasonable price, try substituting them for the soles, and your delight will be increased several-fold.

Very likely you know as much or more than I do about making oyster soufflÉs, but, be that as it may, I have the floor, and am going to tell you what I do know about them, for I may never get another chance. My way is to blanch two dozen good oysters in their own liquor, then cut them into dice, and while they are cooling prepare a sauce of two ounces each of butter and flour, a dust of cayenne, a little salt, the yolks of three eggs, and half a pint of rich milk; when it is thick enough and smooth enough I put in the oysters and their liquor, pour the mixture into little soufflÉ cases, sprinkle each with browned bread-crumbs and bits of butter, and bake in a moderate oven for eighteen minutes; then serve at once. How do you think you would like to try that way of making them?

Now, you will admit that I very seldom presume to tell you how to prepare sweets, but to-day my story would be incomplete if I were to omit the directions for making a coffee cream glacÉe. It is easy as can be; that is, if you can freeze things. Beat the yolks of four eggs in a basin with four ounces of powdered sugar, standing the basin in another of hot water, so that they may get quite warm, but not hot; add to them a gill of strong coffee, beat it all together till it is light and creamy and quite cold. Then add to it a pint of stiffly whipped cream, pour the mixture into a mould, and bury in ice and salt for two hours. Unmould on the prettiest piece of lace paper you have when serving.

Perhaps I run the risk of overdoing the matter by telling you how to make an almond pudding, but it does harmonize so delightfully with coffee glacÉe that ’twould be actually sinful to leave you in ignorance of how it is made. It’s simple, too, simple as abc. You just beat up the yolks of five and the whites of three eggs with a large tablespoonful of rose-water, and add gradually to it four ounces of powdered sugar and four ounces of freshly ground almonds, mixed with a few small whole ones. Beat this thoroughly for ten or fifteen minutes, pour into a well-buttered pie-dish and bake. When half-cooked, garnish with strips of candied orange peel and blanched almonds. And if you have any of the pudding left, which is doubtful, you will find that it makes an excellent five-o’clock tea cake, for it is quite as good cold as hot.

Now, have I not given you a good ground plan, so to speak, for Lenten dinners? It is the easiest thing in the world to leave out a part of it, or add to it, for that matter, for it is composed wholly of neutral tints, you might say, and almost any viand under the sun will dovetail with it, if you wish to elaborate it.

I really don’t know the first thing about the dietetic properties of eggs, for which ignorance I am truly grateful, because I have always noticed that once a man or a woman gets where the healthfulness or the hurtfulness of any edible becomes the first consideration all real pleasure to be found in dining has for that man or woman lost half its charm.

Neither could I guess, though I had a dozen chances, whether the fact that eggs form the backbone of so many meals during Lent has its foundation in history, or some religious rite. And I am also content to remain uninformed on this point.

But I do know that at market these days the sign “strictly fresh eggs” is the most noticeable feature on every hand; and I know, too, that there are a good many housekeepers who fairly long to know of some way in which to improve upon the neutral flavor of an egg so that it may become dainty, savory or delicately sweet as the case may seem to require.

To begin with the savory list: Some fine morning when you are to have for breakfast just an appetizing bit of broiled salted herring, try cooking some eggs in this way—Put half a pint of cream into a saucepan and let it boil. Stir into it five well-beaten eggs, seasoned with salt and pepper. Let this mixture curdle, then turn it out on to a hot dish and brown it quickly with a salamander; and you’ll be at a loss to know whether it’s the herring that makes the egg taste so well, or if it’s the egg that makes the herring so remarkably palatable.

Another delicious way of serving eggs for breakfast is to have, as a beginning, say one dozen eggs and boil them till hard; take off their shells, cut them in halves and rub the yolks through a fine sieve; put an ounce of butter and one cupful of cream into a saucepan, season it with salt and white pepper and thicken with a very little flour. When it is quite hot but not boiling stir into it half of the whites of the eggs, chopped, and the yolks. Arrange the remainder of the whites on a dish, pour the mixture over them, and serve piping hot. You see the eggs can be boiled and prepared the day before, and there’s very little to be done to get them ready for breakfast. Now, should you want to make this into a more savory dish, you could easily add a little minced ham, the juice of an onion, or some minced olives and a few mushrooms, and have by so doing a delectable luncheon dish that would go admirably with, say, some cold sliced tongue or with pickled lambs’ tongues.

A particularly savory dish of eggs is made by frying two small minced onions in butter till they are brown; then mix with them a dessertspoonful of vinegar, a very little salt, and some pepper. Butter a dish, spread the onions over it, break over them half a dozen eggs, and put into a hot oven. When the eggs are cooked sufficiently, cover them with a layer of bread-crumbs that have been fried in butter, and serve. The bread-crumbs must be hot, of course. Try this some day at luncheon when you are having broiled pigs’ feet and potato croquettes.

And if it doesn’t turn out the success you hoped, the next day you might take some very thin slices of bread, trim off the crusts, lay on a well-buttered dish, and cover with very thin slices of cheese. Beat up well enough eggs to cover the bread, season with salt and a little cayenne pepper, and pour them over the slices. Put the dish in a moderate oven and bake until the eggs are set. Serve while very hot in the same dish. If you prefer, you may use in place of the sliced cheese some grated Parmesan cheese sprinkled over the bread, and sprinkle a little over the eggs too.

Eggs scrambled in tomato purÉe make a delectable dish for luncheon, or for dinner as an entrÉe. Have half a pint of rich tomato purÉe, and cook in it half-a-dozen well beaten eggs; pour the whole into a deep dish, and serve with it some bread croutons. Some finely cut up chives will at times be thought an improvement to this dish.

And there are scrambled eggs with truffles that are good enough for any time or place. Cook four sliced truffles in a wineglass of Madeira for about two minutes; then put in a tablespoonful of butter, and season with salt and white pepper. Break eight eggs and without beating stir them well with a wooden spoon in the wine for three minutes, cooking quickly all the while. Serve in a hot dish.

If one is fond of caviare (and who isn’t nowadays?), an omelet with caviare is most tempting. Make an omelet of the desired number of eggs, and just before folding over spread it with a layer of caviare diluted with a little bÉchamel sauce. After the omelet is dished, garnish with parsley.

You will find in your hunts for Spanish omelet recipes that they will turn up as thick as bees in a hive, after which you will let the different directions for this savory dish foment in your mind till you get what seems to be the best from each and turn out one that is your very own, and entitled to be known to your friends as “Spanish omelet À la Madame Featherstonaugh”—or whatever name has the honor to belong to you. My recipe you shall have till you get one of your own, however. To begin with, have a rich tomato purÉe; to this you add chopped pimentos or sweet Spanish peppers con amore, then a bit of fried chopped onion, a few mushrooms, also cooked, and diced cold cooked tongue or ham, preferably tongue. Take any liberties with it that you like, pray. Don’t think you must follow it to the letter. I rarely do, to be candid with you. I have used cold chicken, cold duck, and also cold goose, when the larder has been bereft of ham or tongue; and not one of my household dared to say anything shady about it.

Of course, every housekeeper has a chicken liver omelet recipe among her belongings, and made in the most ordinary way they are pretty sure to be worth the eating; but if the livers are cooked in a little butter, and then a little Madeira is added to the butter, the omelet is far and away ahead of those made by ordinary recipes, as you will see by trying it.

When it comes to an omelet for dessert, nothing can be better than an omelet stuffed with preserves or fresh fruit. If preserves are used, there’s a wide range from which to select, and any taste can be satisfied. Fill it with currant jelly, or apricot or grapefruit marmalade, or any other fruit that you like. In almost any case a little grated lemon peel and a handful of chopped almonds will be an improvement. After the omelet is dished it should always be sprinkled with finely powdered sugar.

You might in the way of fresh fruits use some of the strawberries that are of respectable flavor and price now. Get a box some day of the best-looking ones you can find, and sort them over. Save out about half of them, the fairest ones in the lot, cut in halves, and put them in a bowl with two heaping tablespoonfuls of sugar, a piece of orange peel, and two teaspoonfuls of rum, and set them in a cool place. Press the remainder of the strawberries through a fine sieve, and sweeten well. Make an omelet of six eggs, and before folding over fill it with the cut-up strawberries, without any of the liquid. Dish the omelet, sprinkle with powdered sugar, and pour around it the juice of the strawberries, to which has been added the liquid from the halved strawberries. It’s a delicate dish, indeed, and you will find that it will be a favorite at any table.

If you have a recipe for CÉlestine omelets, small ones, of which you are very much enamored, this paragraph will not interest you. But if you are at odds with the one you have, glance through this. Make as many small omelets as you think will be required, one egg to each, with yolk and white beaten separately. Put them on a hot dish, cover with a thin layer of peach marmalade, and on this sprinkle chopped candied fruits with a few chopped almonds, and over all spread whipped cream. Work at chain-lightning speed in preparing this after the omelets are dished, and get to the table in even quicker time, if you would know this dish in perfection. Though if anything happens to cause you to slacken your pace a bit, it will be worth the having, for it will bear shading down a trifle from the top-notch. Or, make the eggs into one large omelet, and before folding it over fill with the jam and fruits, and sprinkle the almonds and whipped cream over it after it is dished.

Then there’s a dish called “Snow Eggs” that’s just as inoffensive as it sounds. You beat the whites of four eggs to a stiff froth, and then drop them a spoonful at a time into boiling milk till they poach a bit. Take them out, thicken the milk with the yolks, adding sugar and any desired flavoring. Pour this over the poached whites, dish, and sprinkle with chopped macaroons before serving.

It wouldn’t be fair to omit any mention of an omelette soufflÉe in a chapter on eggs; so here it shall go, though for myself I don’t care for it. It has always seemed to me like a dessert to be served when a dessert wasn’t really needed or wanted, but because a dessert of some kind must go down to make the luncheon or dinner complete. Separate, then, the yolks and whites of five eggs. Beat the yolks and half a cup of sugar together for ten minutes. Flavor with a little rose-water. Then turn to the whites, and beat them to the stiffest kind of a froth. Butter a soufflÉ dish, and pour the mixture into it. Bake for twelve minutes, and send to table. The guests should always be waiting for an omelette soufflÉe, mind. Never force the omelet to do the waiting—it isn’t giving it a fair chance.