THE SICK-ROOM.
Reading edition
Beef Tea. ✠
1 lb. lean beef, cut into small pieces.
Put into a jar without a drop of water; cover tightly, and set in a pot of cold water. Heat gradually to a boil, and continue this steadily for three or four hours, until the meat is like white rags, and the juice all drawn out. Season with salt to taste, and when cold, skim. The patient will often prefer this ice-cold to hot. Serve with Albert biscuit or thin “wafers,” unleavened, made by a receipt given under the head of Bread.
Mutton Broth. ✠
1 lb. lean mutton or lamb, cut small.
1 quart water—cold.
1 tablespoonful rice, or barley, soaked in a very little warm water.
4 tablespoonfuls milk.
Salt and pepper, with a little chopped parsley.
Boil the meat, unsalted, in the water, keeping it closely covered, until it falls to pieces. Strain it out, skim, add the soaked barley or rice; simmer half an hour, stirring often; stir in the seasoning and the milk, and simmer five minutes after it heats up well, taking care it does not burn.
Serve hot with cream crackers.
Chicken Broth. ✠
Is excellent made in the same manner as mutton, cracking the bones well before you put in the fowl.
Veal and Sago Broth.
2 lbs. knuckle of veal, cracked all to pieces.
2 quarts of cold water.
3 tablespoonfuls best pearl sago, soaked in a cup of cold water.
1 cup cream, heated to boiling.
Yolks of two eggs, beaten light.
Boil the veal and water in a covered saucepan very slowly until reduced to one quart of liquid; strain, skim, season with salt, and stir in the soaked sago (having previously warmed it by setting for half an hour in a saucepan of boiling water, and stirring from time to time.) Simmer half an hour, taking care it does not burn; beat in the cream and eggs; give one good boil up, and turn out.
This is excellent for consumptives.
Beef and Sago Broth.
2 lbs. of beef—cut up small.
2 quarts of water.
1 cup of sago, soaked soft in a little lukewarm water.
Yolks of three eggs.
Salt to taste.
Stew the beef until it falls to pieces; strain it out, salt the liquid and stir in the sago. Simmer gently one hour, stirring often. Add the beaten yolks: boil up once and serve.
This is a strengthening and nice soup. Eat with dry toast.
Arrowroot Jelly (Plain.) ✠
1 cup boiling water.
2 heaping teaspoonfuls of best Bermuda arrowroot.
1 teaspoonful lemon juice.
2 teaspoonfuls of white sugar.
Wet the arrowroot in a little cold water, and rub smooth. Then stir into the hot, which should be on the fire and actually boiling at the time, with the sugar already melted in it. Stir until clear, boiling steadily all the while, and add the lemon. Wet a cup in cold water, and pour in the jelly to form. Eat cold with sugar and cream flavored with rose-water.
An invaluable preparation in cases where wine is forbidden.
Arrowroot Wine Jelly. ✠
1 cup boiling water.
2 heaping teaspoonfuls arrowroot.
2 heaping white sugar.
1 tablespoonful brandy or 3 tablespoonfuls of wine.
An excellent corrective to weak bowels.
Arrowroot Blanc mange. ✠
1 cupful boiling milk.
2 dessertspoonfuls best arrowroot, rubbed smooth in cold water.
2 teaspoonfuls white sugar.
Vanilla or other essence.
Boil until it thickens well, stirring all the while. Eat cold with cream, flavored with rose-water, and sweetened to taste.
Sago
May be substituted for arrowroot in any of the foregoing receipts, when you have soaked it an hour in water poured over it cold, and gradually warmed by setting the cup containing it in hot water. Boil rather longer than you do the arrowroot.
Sago Gruel. ✠
2 cups water.
2 tablespoonfuls sago.
3 teaspoonfuls white sugar.
1 glass of wine.
1 tablespoonful lemon juice.
Nutmeg to taste, and a pinch of salt.
Put the sago in the water while cold, and warm by setting in a saucepan of boiling water. Stir often, and let it soften and heat for one hour. Then boil ten minutes, stirring all the while; add the sugar, wine, and lemon, and pour into a bowl or mould to cool. Eat warm, if preferred. The wine and nutmeg should be omitted if the patient be feverish.
Indian Meal Gruel. ✠
2 quarts of boiling water.
1 cup of Indian meal, and
1 tablespoonful flour, wet up with cold water.
Salt to taste—and, if you like, sugar and nutmeg.
Wet the meal and flour to a smooth paste, and stir into the water while it is actually boiling. Boil slowly one hour, stirring up well from the bottom. Season with salt to taste. Some sweeten it, but I like it better with a little pepper added to the salt.
If a cathartic is desired, omit the wheat flour altogether.
Oatmeal Gruel
Is made in the same way.
Milk and Rice Gruel.
1 quart boiling milk.
2 tablespoonfuls (heaping) of ground rice, wet with cold milk.
1 saltspoonful of salt.
Stir in the rice-paste and boil ten minutes, stirring all the while. Season with sugar and nutmeg, and eat warm with cream.
You may use Indian meal instead of rice-flour, which is an astringent. In this case, boil an hour.
Dried Flour for Teething Children.
1 cup of flour, tied in a stout muslin bag and dropped into cold water, then set over the fire.
Boil three hours steadily. Turn out the flour ball and dry in the hot sun all day; or, if you need it at once, dry in a moderate oven without shutting the door.
To use it—
Grate a tablespoonful for a cupful of boiling milk and water (half and half). Wet up the flour with a very little cold water, stir in and boil five minutes. Put in a little salt.
Tapioca Jelly. ✠ (Very good.)
1 cup of tapioca.
3 cups of cold water.
Juice of a lemon, and a pinch of the grated peel.
Sweeten to taste.
Soak the tapioca in the water four hours. Set within a saucepan of boiling water; pour more lukewarm water over the tapioca if it has absorbed too much of the liquid, and heat, stirring frequently. If too thick after it begins to clear, put in a very little boiling water. When quite clear, put in the sugar and lemon. Pour into moulds. Eat cold, with cream flavored with rose-water and sweetened.
Tapioca Blanc-mange. ✠
1 cup of tapioca soaked in two cups cold water.
3 cups boiling milk.
3 tablespoonfuls white sugar.
Rose-water or vanilla.
Soak the tapioca four hours, and stir, with the water in which it was soaked, into the boiling milk. Sweeten and boil slowly, stirring all the while, fifteen minutes. Take off, flavor and pour into moulds.
Eat cold with cream. Wash tapioca well before soaking.
Arrowroot Custard. (Nice.)
2 cups of boiling milk.
3 heaping teaspoonfuls arrowroot, wet up with a little cold milk.
2 tablespoonfuls white sugar, beaten with the egg.
1 egg very well beaten.
Mix the arrowroot paste with the boiling milk; stir three minutes; take from the fire and whip in the egg and sugar. Boil two minutes longer, flavor with vanilla or rose-water, and pour into moulds.
Rice-Flour Milk.
2 cups of milk, boiling.
2 tablespoonfuls rice-flour, wet up with cold milk.
2 tablespoonfuls white sugar.
Boil ten minutes, stirring all the while, and flavor to taste. Eat warm with cream.
Sago Milk. ✠
3 tablespoonfuls sago, soaked in a large cup cold water one hour.
3 cups boiling milk.
Sweeten and flavor to taste.
Simmer slowly half an hour. Eat warm.
Tapioca Milk
Is made in the same way.
Boiled Rice. ✠
½ cup whole rice, boiled in just enough water to cover it.
1 cup of milk.
A little salt.
1 egg, beaten light.
When the rice is nearly done, turn off the water, add the milk and simmer—taking care it does not scorch—until the milk boils up well. Salt, and beat in the egg.
Eat warm with cream, sugar, and nutmeg.
Panada. ✠
6 Boston crackers, split.
2 tablespoonfuls white sugar.
A good pinch of salt, and a little nutmeg.
Enough boiling water to cover them well.
Split the crackers, and pile in a bowl in layers, salt and sugar scattered among them. Cover with boiling water and set on the hearth, with a close top over the bowl, for at least one hour. The crackers should be almost clear and soft as jelly, but not broken.
Eat from the bowl, with more sugar sprinkled in if you wish it. If properly made, this panada is very nice.
Bread Panada, or Jelly. ✠
Pare some slices of stale baker’s bread and toast nicely, without burning. Pile in a bowl, sprinkling sugar and a very little salt between; cover well with boiling water, and set, with a tight lid upon the top, in a pan of boiling water. Simmer gently, until the contents of the bowl are like jelly. Eat warm with powdered sugar and nutmeg.
Chicken Jelly. (Very nourishing.) ✠
Half a raw chicken, pounded with a mallet, bones and meat together.
Plenty of cold water to cover it well—about a quart.
Heat slowly in a covered vessel, and let it simmer until the meat is in white rags and the liquid reduced one half. Strain and press, first through a cullender, then through a coarse cloth. Salt to taste, and pepper, if you think best; return to the fire, and simmer five minutes longer. Skim when cool. Give to the patient cold—just from the ice—with unleavened wafers. Keep on the ice. You can make into sandwiches by putting the jelly between thin slices of bread spread lightly with butter.
Calves’ Feet Broth.
2 calves’ feet.
2 quarts cold water.
1 egg, beaten up with two tablespoonfuls milk for each cupful of broth.
Pepper and salt.
Boil the feet to shreds; strain the liquor through a double muslin bag; season to taste, and set by for use, as you need it. Warm by the small quantity, allowing to each cupful a beaten egg and two tablespoonfuls of milk. Give a good boil up to cook these, and serve “with thin, crisp toast. If the patient can take it, a dash of lemon-juice improves the broth.
Toast Water. ✠
Slices of toast, nicely browned, without a symptom of burning.
Enough boiling water to cover them.
Cover closely, and let them steep until cold. Strain the water, sweeten to taste, and put a piece of ice in each glassful. If the physician thinks it safe, add a little lemon-juice.
Apple Water. ✠
1 large juicy pippin, the most finely-flavored you can get.
3 cups of cold water—1 quart if the apple is very large.
Pare and quarter the apple, but do not core it. Put it on the fire in a tin or porcelain saucepan with the water, and boil, closely covered, until the apple stews to pieces. Strain the liquor at once, pressing the apple hard in the cloth. Strain this again through a finer bag, and set away to cool. Sweeten with white sugar, and ice for drinking.
It is a refreshing and palatable drink.
Jelly Water. ✠
1 large teaspoonful currant or cranberry jelly.
1 goblet ice-water.
Beat up well for a fever-patient.
Wild cherry or blackberry jelly is excellent, prepared in like manner for those suffering with summer complaint.
Flax-seed Lemonade. ✠
4 tablespoonfuls flax-seed (whole.)
1 quart boiling water poured upon the flax-seed.
Juice of two lemons, leaving out the peel.
Sweeten to taste.
Steep three hours in a covered pitcher. If too thick, put in cold water with the lemon-juice and sugar. Ice for drinking.
It is admirable for colds.
Slippery-elm Bark Tea.
Break the bark into bits, pour boiling water over it, cover and let it infuse until cold. Sweeten, ice, and take for summer disorders, or add lemon-juice and drink for a bad cold.
Apple Toddy. ✠
Boil a large juicy pippin in a quart of water, and when it has broken to pieces strain off the water. While it is still boiling-hot, add a glass of fine old whiskey, a little lemon-juice, and sweeten to taste.
Take hot at bed-time for influenza.
Milk Punch. ✠
1 tumbler of milk, well sweetened.
2 tablespoonfuls best brandy, well stirred in.
I have known very sick patients to be kept alive for days at a time by this mixture, and nothing else, until Nature could rally her forces. Give very cold with ice.
Egg and Milk Punch ✠
Is made by the preceding receipt, with an egg beaten very light with the sugar, and stirred in before the brandy is added.
Iceland or Irish Moss Lemonade. ✠
1 handful Irish or Iceland moss, washed in five waters.
2 quarts boiling water, poured upon the moss, and left until cold.
2 lemons, peeled and sliced, leaving out the peel.
Sweeten very well and ice.
Do not strain, and if it thicken too much, add cold water.
Excellent for feverish colds and all pulmonary troubles.
Iceland or Irish Moss Jelly. ✠
1 handful moss, washed in five waters, and soaked an hour.
1 quart boiling water.
2 lemons—the juice only.
1 glass of wine.
¼ teaspoonful cinnamon. (Measure scantily.)
Soak the washed moss in a very little cold water; stir into the boiling, and simmer until it is dissolved. Sweeten, flavor, and strain into moulds. You may use two glasses of cider instead of one of wine for a fever-patient, putting in a little less water.
Good for colds, and very nourishing.
Sea-moss Blanc-mange
Is made in the same way, using boiling milk instead of water, and leaving out the lemons and wine. Flavor with vanilla or rose-water.
Dry Toast.
Pare off the crust from stale light bread; slice half an inch thick and toast quickly. Graham bread is very nice toasted.
Butter lightly if the patient can eat butter.
Milk Toast. ✠
Toast as just directed; dip each slice, as it comes from the toaster, in boiling water; butter, salt slightly, and lay in a deep covered dish. Have ready in a saucepan enough boiling milk to cover all well. When your slices are packed, salt this very slightly; melt in it a bit of butter and pour over them. Cover closely and let it stand five minutes before using it. It is excellent when made of Graham bread.
This is a good dish for a family tea as well as for invalids.
Unleavened Biscuit, or Wafers. ✠
Mix good, dry flour to a stiff dough with milk; salt, and roll out thin. Cut into round cakes and roll these again almost as thin as letter-paper. Bake very quickly.
They may also be mixed with water. These are very simple and palatable, and go well with all kinds of broth, especially oyster-soup.
Dried Rusk. (See Bread.)
Beef Steak and Mutton Chops.
Choose the tenderest cuts and broil over a clear hot fire with your wisest skill. Let the steak be rare—the chops well-done. Salt and pepper, lay between two hot plates three minutes, and serve to your patient. If he is very weak, do not let him swallow anything except the juice, when he has chewed the meat well.
The essence of rare beef—roast or broiled—thus expressed, is considered by some physicians to be more strengthening than beef-tea, prepared in the usual manner.
Sangaree or Porteree.
One-third wine or porter mixed with two-thirds cold water. Sweeten, grate nutmeg on the top, and ice.
Serve dry toast with it. Taken hot, it is good for a sudden cold.
Wine Whey.
1 pint boiling milk.
1 large glass pale wine, poured in when the milk is scalding hot. Boil up once, remove from the fire and let it cool. Do not stir it after the wine is put in. When the curd forms, draw off the whey and sweeten.
Herb Teas
Are made by infusing the dried or green leaves and stalks in boiling water, and letting them stand until cold. Sweeten to taste.
Sage tea, sweetened with honey, is good for a sore throat, used as a gargle, with a small bit of alum dissolved in it.
Catnip tea is the best panacea for infant ills, in the way of cold and colic, known to nurses.
Pennyroyal tea will often avert the unpleasant consequences of a sudden check of perspiration, or the evils induced by ladies’ thin shoes.
Chamomile and gentian teas are excellent tonics taken either cold or hot.
The tea made from blackberry-root is said to be good for summer disorders. That from green strawberry leaves is an admirable and soothing wash for a cankered mouth.
Tea of parsley-root scraped and steeped in boiling water, taken warm, will often cure strangury and kindred affections, as will that made from dried pumpkin-seed.
Tansy and rue teas are useful in cases of colic, as are fennel seeds steeped in brandy.
A tea of damask-rose leaves, dry or fresh, will usually subdue any simple case of summer complaint in infants.
Mint tea, made from the green leaves, crushed in cold or hot water and sweetened, is palatable and healing to the stomach and bowels.
Mint Julep. ✠
Some sprigs of green mint, slightly bruised in a tumbler with a teaspoon. Put in a generous teaspoonful of white sugar; add gradually, stirring and rubbing lightly, enough water to fill the glass three-quarters of the way to the top. Fill up with pounded ice; stir hard; pour into a larger glass that you may shake up well, and put in two tablespoonfuls fine brandy.
This is called a “hail-storm julep.”
Eau Sucré. ✠
Dissolve three or four lumps of loaf sugar in a glass of ice-water, and take a teaspoonful every few minutes for a “tickling in the throat,” or a hacking cough. Keep it ice-cold.
A simple, but often an efficacious remedy.