Foods and Household Management Part 34

Wipe beef and cut the lean meat in inch cubes. Brown one third of the meat in fat cut from meat or marrow from a marrow bone. Put remaining two thirds with bone and fat in soup kettle, add water and let stand for thirty minutes. Place on back of range, add browned meat, and heat gradually to the boiling point. Cover and cook slowly six hours, keeping below the boiling point during cooking. Add the vegetables and seasonings, cook one and one half hours, strain and cool as quickly as possible. This is called soup stock.

_To clarify bouillon._--When stock is cold, remove fat which has hardened on top and put quant.i.ty to be cleared into a stew pan.

Allow white and sh.e.l.l of one egg to each quart of stock. Put over fire and stir constantly until boiling point is reached. Boil two minutes. Set back on stove and let simmer twenty minutes. Remove sc.u.m and strain through double thickness of cheesecloth.

=4. General directions for meat soups.=

Soup making is an art that is well worth cultivating. The expert soup maker will obtain delicious flavors by adding bits of many kinds of left overs--almost anything that is found in the refrigerator in the way of fruit, vegetables, and pieces of meat.

With the coming of the gas stove, many people have given up soup making. These various left overs add much to the flavor of the soup and can be used in a thickened soup which is like the bouillon strained and thickened. The thickening may be flour, arrowroot, cold cereal, sago, tapioca, or rice. Spaghetti, vermicelli, and fancy forms of paste are sometimes served.

Vegetables may be cut into dice or fancy shapes and served in the clear soup. A great variety is possible in flavoring and serving soup if one will take the trouble to make it an art.

_Soup meat_ may be served in a soup of the old-fas.h.i.+oned kind, thickened and containing vegetables. In such a soup some fat is left, and the total result is a dish that makes a meal when served with bread.

When the soup is a clear soup, the meat that is left may be used for made over dishes; although some practical housekeepers think that it costs almost as much to make it palatable as to buy fresh meat. Try it in an escalloped dish with plenty of tomato, onion, and some dried herbs for additional flavor.

=5. Beef stew with dumplings.=

Lean meat 3 pounds Potatoes 4 cups, cut in 1/4 inch slices Turnip} 2/3 cup each, cut in half inch Carrot} cubes Onion 1/2 small one, cut in thin slices Flour 1/4 cup Salt Pepper

Wipe meat, cut in 1-1/2 inch cubes, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and dredge with flour. Cut some of the fat in small pieces and try out in frying pan. Add meat and stir constantly, that the surface may be quickly seared. When well browned, put in kettle, and rinse frying pan with boiling water, that none of the flavor may be lost. Cover with boiling water and boil five minutes, then cook below the boiling point until meat is tender (about 3 hours). Add vegetables except potatoes and seasoning the last hour of cooking. Parboil potatoes five minutes and add to stew 15 minutes before taking from fire. Thicken stew with 1/4 cup flour mixed with enough cold water to pour easily. Pour in deep hot platter and surround with dumplings.

TEACHER'S NOTE.--Broiled steak would be suitable for group work, using small steaks (Delmonico cut). A small roast may be prepared by a group and roasted after cla.s.s. This meat and that left from the steak should be used in a subsequent cla.s.s for a lesson on left over meat. Broiled or pan-broiled chops may be prepared individually.

=6. Dumplings.=

Flour 2 cups Baking powder 4 teaspoonfuls Salt 1/2 teaspoonful b.u.t.ter 2 teaspoonfuls Milk 7/8 cup

Mix and sift dry ingredients. Work in b.u.t.ter with a knife, add milk gradually. Remove enough liquid from stew so that when dumplings are dropped in they will rest on top of meat. Drop by spoonfuls and let cook about twenty minutes.

The stew should be thickened before dumplings are dropped in.

=7. Uses of left over meat.=

(1) _Rissoles._--Run meat together with small piece of onion through a chopper. Add salt, pepper, a little cold cereal, or bread crumbs, and beaten egg, allowing one egg to about a pound of meat. Shape into flat round cakes, roll in flour and saute in b.u.t.ter until well browned. These may be served with tomato sauce.

_Tomato Sauce._

Onion 1 teaspoonful chopped Salt 1/4 teaspoonful Pepper Flour 2 tablespoonfuls b.u.t.ter 2 tablespoonfuls Sugar 1 teaspoonful Cloves 3 Tomatoes 2 cups

Brown the onion in b.u.t.ter and stir in the flour. When it has bubbled up, add the tomatoes and seasonings. Stir constantly until it thickens. Strain into a hot bowl.

TEACHER'S NOTE.--One sixth of these recipes would be as small an amount as it would be practicable to use.

(2) _Croquettes._

Cold meat or chicken 2 cups Salt 1/2 teaspoonful Pepper 1/8 teaspoonful Cayenne Few grains Onion juice Few drops White sauce 1 cup, thick, hot Beaten egg Dried bread crumbs

Mix ingredients in order given and let mixture cool. Shape into croquettes, roll in crumbs, beaten egg and crumbs again, place in a frying basket and fry in deep fat to a golden brown.

(3) _Escalloped meat_

Cold meat Bread crumbs, soft 2 cups Onion 1 slice, chopped fine Salt 1/2 teaspoonful Mixed poultry seasoning 1 tablespoonful

A little chopped celery is desirable

This is a simple method of serving left over meat that needs no specific recipe. Layers of bread crumbs are alternated with layers of meat which may be chopped or cut into small pieces. Liquid may be used like tomato or tomato juice, or soup that is left over, or plain water. The flavor may be varied by the use of the different materials that are suitable to meat. Layers of mashed potato may be used instead of bread.

POULTRY

In selecting poultry see that the flesh is firm, that there is a good amount of fat underneath the skin, and that the skin is whole and a good yellow. Notice the odor of the fowl particularly. The skin of cold-storage poultry has not such a good color and is sometimes broken. Often the flesh is shrunken, and if the cold storage has been too long continued the odor is unpleasant. Refrigeration is allowable for a period. Another way to judge cold-storage poultry is by the price. Well-fed poultry freshly killed brings a high market price and a bargain quite often proves to be poultry too long in cold storage. Good quality poultry is at present a high-priced food.

To prepare poultry for cooking, the "dressing" of the chicken is often done now at the market. If it is necessary to do this at home, make an incision with a sharp knife just inside of one of the legs, in the groin.

Insert the hand and remove all the entrails. The skin must be loosened at the neck and the crop removed. In any case, wash the chicken thoroughly inside and out, even holding the cavity under running water. If there is hair remaining on the chicken, singe this off over burning paper or over a gas flame.

The composition is essentially the same as that of meat. The white of chicken, fowls, and turkeys is thought to be more digestible than the dark meat.

GENERAL METHODS AND RECIPES

=The principles of cookery= are the same as with the meat. Chicken soup is made on the same principle as beef soup. After straining, it is delicious with the addition of milk or cream. The meat of the chicken may be chopped fine and used as a thickening. Rice may be added or a hard-boiled egg chopped fine.

Chicken may be served cold, for luncheon or supper, and is always very desirable in made-over dishes. Any stuffing left over may be used in the made dishes.

=1.= =Roast chicken.=

Dress and clean a chicken. Fill the cavity with stuffing and sew edges together. Truss chicken and place on its back in a roasting pan. Rub surface with salt and spread breast and legs with b.u.t.ter. Dredge with flour. Put a little water in bottom of pan.

Place in hot oven and when flour is well browned, reduce the temperature. Baste frequently during roasting with liquid in pan.

When breast meat is tender and a brown crust formed the bird is cooked. A four-pound chicken requires about 1-1/2 hours.

_Stuffing._ (See recipe for stuffing, page 237.)

Mix all together. No moisture need be added as the juices of the chicken will be sufficient.

_Gravy._--Pour off liquid from pan in which chicken has been roasted. Add 2 tablespoonfuls of either chicken fat or b.u.t.ter.

Stir in 2 tablespoonfuls of flour and let bubble up. Add one cup stock, in which giblets, neck, and tips of wings have been cooked, and stir steadily until thickened. Add 1/2 teaspoonful salt.

=2.= =Chicken frica.s.see.=

Clean and cut up a fowl. Cover with boiling water and let boil 5 minutes. Simmer until meat is tender. Remove chicken from kettle and place pieces in hot, greased frying pan. Saute until browned.

Put on platter. Melt 4 tablespoonfuls chicken fat in pan. Add 4 tablespoonfuls flour. Stir and let bubble up. Add 2 cups chicken stock, stir and let boil until thickened. Pour over chicken on platter.

_Laboratory management._--A lesson on poultry is a very expensive one and difficult to manage so that each may have a share of the work. Such a lesson is suitable where the pupils have had work in previous years and are used to working in groups.

=Preserved meats and poultry.=--Smoked and salted meats are valuable foods, although the nutritive content is somewhat less available for digestion. The salted and smoked meats need long and slow cooking below the boiling temperature of water.

_Canned meats_ and _poultry_ of good quality are now in the market, and they are convenient and useful when not used to excess. Buy well-known brands. The government inspection of canned meats is of great importance, for the individual cannot protect himself. Canned soups are convenient for those who cook by gas and who live in small quarters. Buy good brands even if they are somewhat more expensive. The best firms manufacturing canned soup are scrupulously clean in their methods and pride themselves on using good material.

=Other parts of meat and poultry.=--Some of the internal organs of the animals and fowl are used for food. Most of them are comparatively cheap, and may be made palatable.

The _liver and kidneys_ are organs having to do with the waste products of the body and objection is raised to their use on that account. If used, they should be soaked in cold salted water, put into fresh cold water, and allowed to heat very slowly. This water should be poured off, and then a brown stew can be made. What flavors are pleasant with liver and kidneys?