A great saving is made by the proper care and use of cooked and
uncooked food. The first and great consideration is perfect
cleanliness. The ice chest and cellar should be thoroughly cleaned
once a week; the jars in which bread is kept must be washed, scalded
and dried thoroughly at least twice a week. When cooked food is placed
in either the ice chest or cellar it should be perfectly cool; if not,
it will absorb an unpleasant flavor from the close atmosphere of
either place. Meat should not be put directly on the ice, as the water
draws out the juices. Always place it in a pan, and this may be set on
the ice. When you have a refrigerator where the meat can be hung, a
pan is not needed. In winter, too, when one has a cold room, it is
best to hang meats there. These remarks apply, of course, only to
joints and fowl. The habit which many people have of putting steaks,
chops, etc., in the wrapping paper on ice, is a very bad one. When
purchasing meat always have the trimmings sent home, as they help to
make soups and sauces. Every scrap of meat and bone left from roasts
and broils should be saved for the soup-pot. Trimmings from ham,
tongue, corned beef, etc., should all be saved for the many relishes
they will make. Cold fish can be used in salads and warmed up in many
palatable ways. In fact, nothing that comes on the table is enjoyed
more than the little dishes which an artistic cook will make from the
odds and ends left from a former meal. By artistic cook is meant not a
professional, but a woman who believes in cleanliness and hot dishes,
and that there is something in the appearance as well as in the taste
of the food, and who does not believe that a quantity of butter, or of
some kind of fat, is essential to the success of nearly every dish
cooked. The amount of food spoiled by butter, _good_ butter too,
is surprising.
One should have a number of plates for cold food, that each kind may
be kept by itself. The fat trimmings from beef, pork, veal, chickens
and fowl should be tried out while fresh, and then strained. The fowl
and chicken fat ought to be kept in a pot by itself for shortening and
delicate frying. Have a stone pot for it, holding about a quart, and
another, holding three or four quarts, for the other kinds. The fat
that has been skimmed from soups, boiled beef and fowl, should be
cooked rather slowly until the sediment falls to the bottom and there
is not the shadow of a bubble. It can then be strained into the jar
with the other fat; but if strained while bubbles remain, there is
water in it, and it will spoil quickly. The fat from sausages can also
be strained into the larger pot. Another pot, holding about three
quarts, should be kept for the fat in which articles of food have been
fried. When you have finished frying, set the kettle in a cool place
for about half an hour; then pour the fat into the pot through a fine
strainer, being careful to keep back the sediment, which scrape into
the soap-grease. In this way you can fry in the same fat a dozen
times, while if you are not careful to strain it each time, the crumbs
left will burn and blacken all the fat. Occasionally, when you have
finished frying, cut up two or three uncooked potatoes and put into
the boiling fat. Set on the back of the stove for ten or fifteen
minutes; then set in a cool place for fifteen minutes longer, and
strain. The potatoes clarify the fat. Many people use ham fat for
cooking purposes; and when there is no objection to the flavor, it is
nice for frying eggs, potatoes, etc. But it should not be mixed with
other kinds. The fat from mutton, lamb, geese, turkey or ducks will
give an unpleasant flavor to anything with which it is used, and the
best place for it is with the soap-grease. Every particle of soup and
gravy should be saved, as a small quantity of either adds a great deal
to many little dishes. The quicker food of all kinds cools the longer
it keeps. This should be particularly remembered with soups and bread.
Bread and cake must be thoroughly cooled before being put into box or
jar. If not, the steam will cause them to mold quickly. Crusts and
pieces of stale bread should be dried in a slow oven, rolled into fine
crumbs on a board, and put away for croquettes, cutlets or anything
that is breaded. Pieces of stale bread can be used for toast, griddle-
cakes and puddings and for dressing for poultry and other kinds of
meat. Stale cake can be made into puddings; The best tub butter will
keep perfectly well without a brine if kept in a cool, sweet room. It
is more healthful and satisfactory to buy the choicest tub butter and
use it for table and cooking purposes than to provide a fancy article
for the table and use an inferior one in the preparation of the food.
If, from any cause, butter becomes rancid, to each pint of it add one
table-spoonful of salt and one teaspoonful of soda, and mix well; then
add one pint of cold water, and set on the fire until it comes to the
boiling point Now set away to cool, and when cool and hard, take off
the butter in a cake. Wipe dry and put away for cooking purposes. It
will be perfectly sweet.
Milk, cream and butter all quickly absorb strong odors; therefore,
care must be taken to keep them in a cool, sweet room or in an ice
chest. Cheese should be wrapped in a piece of clean linen and kept in
a box. Berries must be kept in a cool place, and uncovered.