HOW TO SELECT AND TAKE CARE OF BEEF, MUTTON, LAMB, VEAL, AND PORK.
Reading edition
Ox beef is the best; next to this the flesh of an heifer; and both are in perfection during the first three months of the year. Choose that, the lean of which is red and of a fine grain, and the fat of which is white.[10] In cold weather, if you have a large family, it is good economy to buy a quarter. The hind quarter is considered best. Have the butcher cut it up. Pack the roasting pieces, which you do not want soon, in a barrel of snow, and set it where it will not melt. It is not necessary to freeze the meat first. The leg will furnish, besides a piece to cook alamode, two or three to smoke. The thin pieces at the end of the ribs are good corned, and the flank also; or it may be used for mince pies. The shank, although it has but little meat, is very good for some purposes. It should be cut up into several pieces and boiled four or five hours, no matter how long. There is a great deal of marrow and fat in it which, when cold, should be taken off and clarified for various uses. The meat is good used as is directed in the receipt for brawn, and the liquor makes excellent soup and gravies.
The best roasting pieces of beef are the sirloin, the second cut in the fore quarter, and the rump. If you buy a sirloin for a family of six or eight, get eight or ten pounds. Cut off the thin end in which there is no bone. It is very good corned, and not very good roasted. The roasting piece will still be large enough for the family dinner, and the corned piece will do for another day, with a pudding or another small dish of meat. The back part of the rump is a convenient and economical piece, especially for a small family. It is a long and rather narrow piece, weighing about ten pounds, and contains less fat and bone than any other, equally good, in the ox. The thickest end affords nice steaks, and next to them is a good roasting piece, and the thinnest end which contains the bone, is very good corned, or for a soup. The whole is an excellent piece for roasting, in case so large a one is needed.
The spring is the best season for mutton. That which is not very large is to be preferred. It should be of a good red and white, and fine grained. There is a great difference between mutton and lamb killed from a pasture, and that which has been driven a distance to market.
Lamb is best in July and August.
Veal is best in the spring. It should look white and be fat. The breast is particularly nice stuffed; the loin should be roasted. The leg is an economical piece, as you can take off cutlets from the large end, make broth of the shank, and stuff and roast the centre.
Roasting pieces of all kinds of ribbed meat, except beef, should be jointed by the butcher, else the carving will be extremely difficult.
Always provide a sharp knife for carving. The juices of meat are extracted by its being haggled. An invalid, speaking of the kindness of a neighbor in sending him some slices of corned beef, said, "They were cut with a sharp knife." For the sake of economy, if for no other reason, carve smoothly, and only as much as is wanted at first. It is easy to cut more for replenishing plates; and meat is far better not to lie sliced in the dish. If no more is cut than is used, a handsome piece may often be reserved for the next day; whereas if all is cut up it cannot be so good, and some of it will certainly be wasted.
Ham and tongue should be sliced very thin.
Pork, to be the best, should not be more than a year old. The chine is the best roasting piece; the spare-ribs are very sweet food, but too rich to be healthy. The shoulder is good roasted, stuffed with bread and sage. If too large, half of it can be laid a week or two in brine, and will be good boiled, to eat cold. It is well for a small family, in November to buy half of a spring pig; this will furnish several nice pieces to roast, strips for salting, a ham and shoulder for smoking, and leaf enough for a pot or two of lard, besides remnants for sausage meat.
In winter, all meat may be kept a long time; and, with the exception of pork, is much better for it; therefore it is easier to furnish a table without waste in winter than in summer. Meat will keep in an ice-house or a good refrigerator several days in hot weather; if you have neither, take your meat the moment it is brought in, wipe it dry if at all damp, and hang it in the cellar, sprinkling first a little pepper and salt over it, especially over the parts which flies are most apt to visit. In mutton and lamb, these are the tenderloin and the large end of the leg. The pepper and salt will also tend to preserve the meat from taint.
If you wish to keep it longer than two days, wrap it in a piece of cloth (no matter if it is very thin), and lay it in a charcoal bin, and throw a shovel of coal over it. A leg of mutton will keep several days wrapped in a cloth which has been dipped in vinegar, laid upon the ground of a dry cellar.
Meat that is to be salted for immediate use, should, if the weather is cool, be hung up a day or two first.[11] Where a large quantity of beef is to be salted, a different method is pursued. In winter, unless you wish to keep meat several weeks, place it where it will be cold without freezing. Mutton never looks as nice after being frozen hard; it has a dark, uninviting appearance.
To thaw frozen meat, bring it over night into a warm room. If this has been forgotten, lay it, early in the morning, into cold water. If meat is put to roast, boil, or broil, before being entirely thawed, it will be tough. It is best to preserve fowls without freezing. They will keep very well packed in snow; the liver, &c., being taken out and laid by themselves in the snow, and the body filled with it.
Meat that has been kept perfectly clean, or a beef steak just cut off, should not be washed; but, generally, it is necessary to wash a roasting piece. Pork having the rind on, needs great care in washing and scraping, to make it fit to cook.
Trim off the superfluous fat from beef, mutton, and fresh pork before cooking it.
Tough steak is made more tender by being pounded with a rolling-pin; but some of the juice of the meat is lost by the operation.