SOUPS.
The delicate and proper _blending of savors_ is the chief art of good
soup-making.
Be sure and skim the grease off the soup when it _first_ boils, or it
will not become clear. Throw in a little salt to bring up the scum.
Remove _all_ the grease.
Be sure and _simmer softly_, and never let a soup boil hard.
Put the meat into cold water, and let it grow warm slowly. This
dissolves the gelatine, allows the albumen to disengage, and the scum
to rise, and diffuses the savory part of the meat. But if the soup is
over a hot fire the albumen coagulates and hardens the meat, prevents
the water from penetrating, and the savory part from disengaging
itself. Thus the broth will be without flavor, and the meat tough.
Allow about two tablespoonfuls of salt to four quarts of soup, where
there are many vegetables, and one and a half where there are few.
Be sure not to leave any fat floating on the surface.
A quart of water, or a little less, to a pound of meat is a good rule.
Soup made of uncooked meat is as good the second day, if heated to the
boiling point.
If more water is needed, use _boiling_ hot water, as cold or lukewarm
spoils the soup.
It is thought that potato water is unhealthy; and therefore do not boil
potatoes in soup, but boil elsewhere, and add them when nearly cooked.
The water in which poultry, or fresh meat is boiled should be saved for
gravies, or soup, the next day. If you do not need it, give it to the
poor.
Keep the vessel covered tight in which you boil soup, that the flavor
be not lost.
Never leave soup in _metal_ pots, as sometimes a family is thus
poisoned.
Thickened soups require more seasoning; nearly double the quantity used
for thin soups.
_French Vegetable Soup._
Take a leg of lamb, of moderate size, and four quarts water. Of
potatoes, carrots, cabbage, onions, tomatoes, and turnips take a
tea-cup full of each, chopped fine. Salt and black pepper to your taste.
Wash the lamb, and put it into the four quarts of cold water. When the
scum rises take it off carefully with a skimmer. After having pared
and chopped the vegetables, put them into the soup. Carrots require
the most boiling, and should be put in first; onions require the least
boiling, and are to be put in the last.
This soup requires about three hours to boil.
_Plain Calf’s Head Soup._
Boil the head and feet in just water enough to cover them; when tender
take out the bones, cut in small pieces, and season with marjoram,
thyme, cloves, salt, and pepper.
Put all into a pot, with the liquor, and four spoonfuls of thin batter,
stew gently an hour, then, just as you take it up, add two or three
glasses of Port wine, and the yolks of eggs boiled hard.
_An Excellent Simple Mutton Soup._
Put a piece of the fore quarter of mutton into salted water, enough to
more than cover it, and simmer it slowly two hours. Then peel a dozen
turnips, and six tomatoes, and quarter them, and boil them with the
mutton till just tender enough to eat. Thicken the soup with pearl
barley. Some add sliced tomatoes, or the juice and rind of a lemon. Use
half a tea-cup of rice if you have no pearl barley.
_Pea Soup._
Soak dry peas over night, putting a quart of water to each quart of
peas. Next morning boil them an hour in this water, and ten minutes
before the hour expires put in a teaspoonful of saleratus. Change them
to fresh water, put in a pound of salt pork, and boil three or four
hours, till the peas are soft. Green peas need no soaking, and must
boil not more than an hour. When taken up, add butter.
_Portable Soup._
Boil down the meat to a thick jelly, season it highly with salt,
spices, and wine, or brandy; when cold, cut it in square inches, and
dry them in the sun. Keep them in a tight tin vessel, and when you use
them put a quart of boiling water to one, or two of the cakes, which
should be one inch square, and the fourth of an inch thick. Vegetables
can be added.
_A Rich Mock Turtle Soup._
Divide the lower from the upper part of the head, and put the head in a
gallon of water, and boil till tender.
Strain the liquor, and let it stand till the next day, and then take
off the fat. Three quarters of an hour before serving it, hang it over
the fire and season it with pepper, salt, mace, cloves, and sweet
herbs, tied up in a small bag; add half a pint of rich gravy. Darken it
with fried sugar, or browned flour; add the juice of two lemons, the
yolks of eight eggs, boiled hard, and force meat balls. Just before
taking up, pour in half a pint of wine.
_Another Dry Pea Soup._
Soak the peas over night. Put a pound and a half of split peas into
four quarts of water, with roast beef, or mutton bones, and a ham bone,
or slices of ham. Add two heads of celery and two onions, and stew
slowly till the peas are soft. Then strain the peas through a coarse
sieve, and put them back and season to your taste with pepper and salt.
Let it boil one hour longer. When you have no celery use a teaspoonful
of essence of celery, or a spoonful of celery vinegar.
_Clam Soup._
Wash a peck of clams and boil them in a pint of water, till those on
the top open and they come out easily. Strain the liquor, and add a
quart of milk. When it just boils thicken with two and a half spoonfuls
of flour, worked into three of butter, with pepper, mace, and other
spices to your taste. It is better without spice.
_Oyster Soup._
Put a gallon of water to a knuckle of veal, boil it to two quarts,
strain and add the juice of the oysters you are to use. Add pepper and
salt to your taste. Fifteen minutes before taking it up, put in the
oysters. Ten minutes before taking up, put in eight rolled crackers,
and after it stops boiling, add half a pint of milk.
_Veal Soup._
Take the knuckle and put it into salted water, enough to cover it, and
also put in a pound of ham. When it is boiled very tender take up the
meat, and strain the soup, and add a head of celery, cut small, one
onion, a turnip and carrot sliced, four sliced tomatoes, a dozen corns
of pepper, and salt to your taste. Thicken with three great spoonfuls
of rice, or vermicelli, or a thin flour paste. Simmer it gently till
all the vegetables are done.
Almost any kind of meat can be made into soup, by taking the broth, and
adding various kinds of seasoning and thickening; such as tomatoes,
ochra, vermicelli, sweet herbs, and vegetables, and in such proportions
as each one likes best. The preceding kinds of soup will be a guide as
to proportions.
_Macaroni Soup (Mrs. F.’s Receipt)._
Take six pounds of beef, and put it into four quarts of water, with
two onions, one carrot, one turnip, and a head of celery. Boil it down
three or four hours slowly, till there is about two quarts of water,
and let it cool. Next day take off the grease, without shaking the
sediment, and pour it off into the kettle, half an hour before dinner
(leaving the sediment out), and add salt to suit the taste, a pint of
macaroni, broken into inch pieces, and a tablespoonful and a half of
tomato catsup.
_Southern Gumbo (Mrs. L.’s Receipt)._
This is a favorite dish at the South and West, and is made in a variety
of ways. The following is a very fine receipt, furnished by a lady, who
has had an extensive opportunity for selection.
Fry one chicken, when cut up, to a light brown, and also two slices of
bacon. Pour on to them three quarts of boiling water. Add one onion and
some sweet herbs, tied in a rag. Simmer them gently three hours and a
half. Strain off the liquor, take off the fat, and then put the ham and
chicken, cut into small pieces, into the liquor. Add half a tea-cup
of _ochre_, cut up; if dry, the same quantity; also half a tea-cup of
rice. Boil all half an hour, and just before serving add a glass of
wine and a dozen oysters, with their juice. Ochre is a fine vegetable,
especially for soups, and is easily cultivated. It is sliced and dried
for soups in winter.
_Giblet Soup._
Take the feet, neck, pinions, and giblets of two fowls, and add a pound
and a half of veal, and a slice of lean ham. Pour on three quarts of
cold water, and boil gently till the meat is very soft. Strain off the
liquor, and, when cold, take off the fat. Cut the giblets and meat into
half-inch pieces; add a tablespoonful of flour with one of butter, and
some of the soup to thin it. Then put into the soup the butter and
meat, with some sweet herbs tied in a bag, with salt to your taste.
Boil it half an hour and it is done.