Note 91-† — Chapter VII · BROTHS AND SOUPS.

89-* We prefer the form of a stew-pan to the soup-pot; the former is more convenient to skim: the most useful size is 12 inches diameter by 6 inches deep: this we would have of silver, or iron, or copper, lined (not plated) with silver.

89-† This may be always avoided by browning your meat in the frying-pan; it is the browning of the meat that destroys the stew-pan.

90-* In general, it has been considered the best economy to use the cheapest and most inferior meats for soup, &c., and to boil it down till it is entirely destroyed, and hardly worth putting into the hog-tub. This is a false frugality: buy good pieces of meat, and only stew them till they are done enough to be eaten.

91-* Mushroom catchup, made as No. 439, or No. 440, will answer all the purposes of mushrooms in soup or sauce, and no store-room should be without a stock of it.

91-†

Sliced onions fried, (see No. 299, and note under No. 517), with some butter and flour, till they are browned (and rubbed through a sieve), are excellent to heighten the colour and flavour of brown soups and sauces, and form the basis of most of the relishes furnished by the “Restaurateurs”—as we guess from the odour which ascends from their kitchens, and salutes our olfactory nerves “en passant.”

The older and drier the onion, the stronger its flavour; and the cook will regulate the quantity she uses accordingly.

92-* Burnet has exactly the same flavour as cucumber. See Burnet vinegar (No. 399).

92-† The concentration of flavour in CELERY and CRESS SEED is such, that half a drachm of it (finely pounded), or double the quantity if not ground or pounded, costing only one-third of a farthing, will impregnate half a gallon of soup with almost as much relish as two or three heads of the fresh vegetable, weighing seven ounces, and costing twopence. This valuable acquisition to the soup-pot deserves to be universally known. See also No. 409, essence of CELERY. This is the most frugal relish we have to introduce to the economist: but that our judgment in palates may not be called in question by our fellow-mortals, who, as the Craniologists say, happen to have the organ of taste stronger than the organ of accumulativeness, we must confess, that, with the flavour it does not impart the delicate sweetness, &c. of the fresh vegetable; and when used, a bit of sugar should accompany it.

92-‡ See No. 419, No. 420, and No. 459. Fresh green BASIL is seldom to be procured. When dried, much of its fine flavour is lost, which is fully extracted by pouring wine on the fresh leaves (see No. 397).

To procure and preserve the flavour of SWEET AND SAVOURY HERBS, celery, &c. these must be dried, &c. at home (see No. 417* and No. 461).

92-§ See No. 421 and No. 457. Sir Hans Sloane, in the Phil. Trans. Abr. vol. xi. p. 667, says, “Pimento, the spice of Jamaica, or ALLSPICE, so called, from having a flavour composed as it were of cloves, cinnamon, nutmegs, and pepper, may deservedly be counted the best and most temperate, mild, and innocent of common spices, almost all of which it far surpasses, by promoting the digestion of meat, and moderately heating and strengthening the stomach, and doing those friendly offices to the bowels, we generally expect from spices.” We have always been of the same opinion as Sir Hans, and believe the only reason why it is the least esteemed spice is, because it is the cheapest. “What folks get easy they never enjoy.”

92-‖ If you have not fresh orange or lemon-juice, or Coxwell’s crystallized lemon acid, the artificial lemon juice (No. 407) is a good substitute for it.

92-¶ The juice of the SEVILLE ORANGE is to be preferred to that of the LEMON, the flavour is finer, and the acid milder.

93-* The erudite editor of the “Almanach des Gourmands,” vol. ii. p. 30, tells us, that ten folio volumes would not contain the receipts of all the soups that have been invented in that grand school of good eating,—the Parisian kitchen.

93-† “Point de Légumes, point de Cuisinière,” is a favourite culinary adage of the French kitchen, and deserves to be so: a better soup may be made with a couple of pounds of meat and plenty of vegetables, than our common cooks will make you with four times that quantity of meat; all for want of knowing the uses of soup roots, and sweet and savoury herbs.

93-‡ Many a good dish is spoiled, by the cook not knowing the proper use of this, which is to give a flavour, and not to be predominant over the other ingredients: a morsel mashed with the point of a knife, and stirred in, is enough. See No. 402.

93-§ Foreigners have strange notions of English taste, on which one of their culinary professors has made the following comment: “the organ of taste in these ISLANDERS is very different from our delicate palates; and sauce that would excoriate the palate of a Frenchman, would be hardly piquante enough to make any impression on that of an Englishman; thus they prefer port to claret,” &c. As far as concerns our drinking, we wish there was not quite so much truth in Monsieur’s remarks, but the characteristic of the French and English kitchen is sauce without substance, and substance without sauce.

To make Cayenne of English chillies, of infinitely finer flavour than the Indian, see No. 404.

95-* We tried to make catchup of these by treating them like mushrooms (No. 439), but did not succeed.

96-* “A poor man, being very hungry, staid so long in a cook’s shop, who was dishing up meat, that his stomach was satisfied with only the smell thereof. The choleric cook demanded of him to pay for his breakfast; the poor man denied having had any, and the controversy was referred to the deciding of the next man that should pass by, who chanced to be the most notorious idiot in the whole city: he, on the relation of the matter, determined that the poor man’s money should be put between two empty dishes, and the cook should be recompensed with the jingling of the poor man’s money, as he was satisfied with the smell of the cook’s meat.” This is affirmed by credible writers as no fable, but an undoubted truth.—Fuller’s Holy State, lib. iii. c. 12, p. 20.

98-* If the gravy be not completely drained from it, the article potted will very soon turn sour.

99-* Economists recommend these to be pounded; they certainly go farther, as they call it; but we think they go too far, for they go through the sieve, and make the soup grouty.