Must be cooked twice as long as beef or mutton, and very well basted,
the flesh being fibrous and dry. To the made gravy add two teaspoonfuls
of stewed and strained tomato, or one tablespoonful of tomato catsup,
and cook one minute before pouring into the gravy-boat.
Roast Turkey, Chicken or Duck.
It would not be possible for me to write such directions as would
enable you to prepare a fowl for cooking. Yet I advise you to learn
how to draw and dress poultry. Watch the process closely, if you have
opportunity, or else ask some experienced friend to instruct you.
For the present we will suppose that our fowl is ready for the
roasting pan. Lay it in tenderly, breast uppermost, pour a bountiful
cup of boiling water, slightly salted, over it, if it be a chicken
or duck, two cupfuls, if a turkey, and roast, basting often, about
twelve minutes for each pound. When the breastbone browns, turn the
fowl on one side, and as this colors, on the other, that all may be
done evenly. Dredge once with flour fifteen minutes before taking up
the roast and when this browns, rub all over with a tablespoonful of
butter. Shut up ten minutes longer and it is ready for dishing.
Chop the liver and soft parts of the gizzard—which have been roasted
with the fowl—fine, and stir into the gravy while you are making it.
Fricasseed Chicken.
Cut up a full-grown fowl into joints, dividing the back and breast into
two pieces each. Lay these in cold water, slightly salted, for half
an hour. Wipe dry with a clean cloth. In the bottom of a pot scatter
a handful of chopped fat salt pork, with half a teaspoonful of minced
onion. On this lay the pieces of chicken. Sprinkle a double handful
of pork on the top with another half teaspoonful of onion, pour in
carefully, enough cold water to cover all, fit on a close top, and set
the pot where it will heat slowly. It should not boil under one hour
at least. Increase the heat, then, but keep at a _very_ gentle boil
for another hour, or until the chicken is tender. The time needed for
cooking will depend on the age of the fowl. Fast stewing will harden
and toughen it.
When done, take out the chicken with a fork and arrange on a warm dish,
covering and keeping it hot in the plate warmer or over boiling water.
Add to the gravy left in the pot two tablespoonfuls of chopped parsley,
a heaping tablespoonful of butter cut up in the same quantity of flour,
half a teaspoonful of salt, and a quarter of a teaspoonful of pepper.
Stir to a boil. Meanwhile, beat up an egg in a bowl, add a teaspoonful
of cornstarch, and a small cupful of milk, and when these are mixed, a
cupful of the boiling gravy. Beat hard and pour into the pot where is
the rest of the gravy. Bring to a quick boil, take _at once_ from the
fire and pour over the chicken. Cover and let it stand over hot water
three minutes before sending to table.
Smothered Chicken.
The chicken must be split down the back as for broiling, washed well
and wiped dry. Lay it, breast upward, in a baking pan; pour in two cups
of boiling water, in which has been dissolved a heaping tablespoonful
of butter, and cover with another pan turned upside down and fitting
exactly the edges of the lower one. Cook slowly half an hour, lift the
cover and baste plentifully with the butter water in the pan; cover
again and leave for twenty minutes more. Baste again, and yet once more
in another quarter of an hour. Try the chicken with a fork to see if it
is done.
An hour and ten minutes should be enough for a young fowl. Baste the
last time with a tablespoonful of butter; cover and leave in the oven
ten minutes longer before transferring to a hot dish. It should be of a
fine yellow brown all over, but crisped nowhere.
Thicken the gravy with a tablespoonful of browned flour, wet up in a
little water, salt and pepper to taste, boil up once and pour a cupful
over the chicken, the rest into a gravy boat.
There is no more delightful preparation of chicken than this.
Boiled Corn Beef.
Lay in clean cold water for five or six hours when you have washed off
all the salt. Wipe and put it into a pot and cover deep in cold water.
Boil _gently_ twenty-five minutes per pound. When done, take the pot
from the fire and set in the sink with the meat in it, while you make
the sauce.
Strain a large cupful of the liquor into a saucepan and set it over
the fire. Wet a tablespoonful of flour up with cold water, and when
the liquor boils, stir it in with a great spoonful of butter. Beat it
smooth before adding the juice of a lemon. Serve in a gravy-dish. Take
up the beef, letting all the liquor drain from it, and send in on a hot
platter.
(Save the pot-liquor for bean soup.)
Boiled Mutton.
Sew up the leg of mutton in a stout piece of mosquito net or of “cheese
cloth;” lay it in a pot and cover several inches deep with boiling
water. Throw in a tablespoonful of salt, and cook twelve minutes to the
pound. Take up the cloth with the meat in it and dip in _very_ cold
water. Remove the bag and dish the meat.
Before taking up the mutton, make your sauce, using as a base a cupful
of the liquor dipped from the pot. Proceed with this as you did with
the drawn butter sauce for the corned beef, but instead of the lemon
juice, add two tablespoonfuls of capers if you have them. If not, the
same quantity of chopped green pickle.
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