IT may be useful to give a general idea of the quantities required in
providing for a party of, say, eighty guests.
Five gallons of tea, allowing five ounces of good tea to each gallon.
Six gallons of coffee, half to be served hot with milk, and half
to be served iced, allowing eight ounces of coffee to each gallon.
Three gallons of claret-cup, allowing for each gallon four bottles of
claret and four bottles of soda-water. Twelve quarts of water-ice; six
quarts to be of lemon ice and six of strawberry ice. Twelve dishes
of sandwiches, of different kinds; these are sure to be popular, and
a tolerable supply should be kept in reserve. Four dishes of rolled
brown bread and butter, and the same quantity of white. Eight pounds of
plum-cake cut up into small thick pieces. Six pounds of freshly made
sponge finger biscuits. Two or more bowls of _macédoine_ of fruit.
Oatcake cut into long fingers and spread with Devonshire cream is
popular, and so are small scones split open and filled with Devonshire
cream. A few kinds of sandwiches suitable for garden-parties may be
mentioned here.
_Salad Sandwiches._—Use watercress picked from the hard stems, mustard
and cress, or shred lettuce leaves. Spread the bread with _maître
d’hôtel_ butter. For this, add to two ounces of butter the juice of
one lemon, a dessert-spoonful of chopped parsley leaf freed from all
moisture, a pinch of white pepper, and a pinch of salt.
_Cucumber Sandwiches._—Pare the cucumber, and just before the
sandwiches are wanted cut it into very thin slices. Place the cucumber
between thin pieces of white bread and butter stamped out with a round
cutter.
_Rolled Sandwiches._—Pound in a mortar two ounces of cooked tongue or
ham freed from skin and fat, a quarter of a pound of cooked chicken or
turkey, two table-spoonfuls of _maître d’hôtel_ butter, one ounce of
plain butter, and six table-spoonfuls of fine white of bread-crumbs.
When the mixture is smooth, add a dust of pepper and a small pinch of
salt, and pass it through a sieve. Sprinkle a few bread-crumbs lightly
on a pastry-board, take a little of the mixture, and pat it out with a
knife dipped in hot water. Make it two inches and a half long, and one
inch and a half wide. Trim the edges, and raise it carefully from the
board with the knife, rolling it over as you raise it. If the mixture
is too moist add a few more bread-crumbs, but if it is too dry it will
break and not roll. Dish the rolls on a bed or cress.
_Green Sandwich Rolls._—Pound the yolk of a hard-boiled egg with
a quarter of a pound of butter, six sprigs of watercress, and six
sprigs of parsley. Blanch the watercress and parsley by throwing
them for five minutes into boiling water. Press them dry in a cloth,
but do not squeeze them. Then add a dust of pepper and salt, and six
table-spoonfuls of brown bread-crumbs; and when the mixture is smooth
roll it as in the former recipe.
_Sweet Sandwiches_ can be made of any jam or marmalade. They are better
without butter, and the preserve should be very lightly spread. They
should be about four inches long and one inch wide. Chocolate, melted
in a little hot milk, and spread between slices of stale sponge cake,
makes a popular sandwich.
_Macédoine of Fruit._—Put three lumps of sugar and the thinly pared
rind of half a lemon into a quarter or a pint of water, and boil it for
ten minutes. Then add, if possible, twelve raspberries. If raspberries
cannot be had, add the juice of the half lemon. Let it boil up, skim
it, and set it on ice till quite cold. Then add a dessert-spoonful of
good brandy. Put into a china bowl currants freed from their stalks,
raspberries and strawberries picked from their stems, peaches and
apricots stoned and cut into quarters, black and white grapes, and a
few mulberries. Crack the stones of the peaches and apricots, peel
the kernels, and add them to the fruit in the bowl. Set the bowl on
ice. Ten minutes before the _macédoine_ is wanted, pour the cold syrup
gently over the fruit, and keep the bowl on a dish filled with crushed
ice. Help the _macédoine_ with a soup-ladle instead of a spoon.
_Travellers’ Sandwiches._—These are so often coarsely and carelessly
made that the traveller on whom the sandwiches are bestowed flies in
disgust to the dainties of the railway refreshment-room. Sandwiches
should be packed in the paper known as “butter paper,” and if they have
to be cut some time before they are wanted, they should be kept under
a damp cloth, as they soon become dry if covered with a dish. A small
leaf of young lettuce, or a little cress, improves most sandwiches.
[Illustration: SOME OLD MORTARS.]
_Ham Sandwiches._—Work a little mustard into the butter you mean to
use, and butter both the slices of bread on one side. Lay a thin slice
of ham between the pieces of buttered bread, and press the sandwiches
under a light weight.
_Beef Sandwiches._—Prepare these in the same way, but add a little
grated horseradish to the butter as well as the mustard.
_Chicken Sandwiches._—Use slices of chicken and ham, or chicken and
tongue, or pound the two together. Spread a little _maître d’hôtel_
butter on the bread.
_Gladstone Sandwiches._—Use crisp toast instead of bread, butter the
toast with _maître d’hôtel_ butter, and cover it with finely shred
celery. Cold game is best for these sandwiches.
_Travellers’ Rolls._—Make dinner rolls the size and shape of an egg,
scoop out part of the crumb, and fill the space with pounded cooked
meat moistened with _maître d’hôtel_ butter, and well mixed with shred
lettuce, mustard and cress, or sliced cucumber.
_Egg Sandwiches._—Put some fresh eggs into water which is already
boiling fast, and let them boil for fifteen minutes. Peel off the
shells, cut the eggs into slices lengthwise (not across, or the yolk
and white will not be equally divided), and place them between slices
of bread and butter. Mix both salt and pepper into the butter before
you spread it. Or pound the eggs when they are cold and shelled,
pounding the white and the yolk together in a mortar. Add a little
butter, salt, pepper, and a dust of cayenne, and spread the mixture on
thin slices of bread.
_Cheese and Celery Sandwiches._—Mix freshly grated cheese with an ounce
of butter till it becomes a thick paste. Spread this on thin slices of
bread, and cover it with celery shred as finely as possible.
_Beef Roll._—This is excellent for a journey if cut into sandwiches.
Mince very finely one pound of raw beefsteak and a quarter of a pound
of cooked ham. The meat should be passed twice through the mincing
machine. Add to the meat one well-beaten egg and two ounces of dried
and sifted bread-crumbs. Season with pepper and salt, but be careful
not to put too much. Then mix all well together with a wooden spoon.
Shape the meat into a roll, and tie it up in a cloth, fastening the
ends tightly. Boil the roll for three hours, and glaze it. When cut up
into sandwiches, the mustard spread on the meat should be mixed with
water in which a little horseradish has been grated.
_Out-of-Door Meals._—A good way of packing a light summer luncheon
is to take two strong biscuit-tins of the two-pound size, then to
line them with lettuce leaves at the bottom and sides, and finally to
arrange packets of sandwiches in one tin, with more lettuce to cover
them. In the other tin set a loaf of bread and a plain luncheon cake,
with a good clasp knife, and pack the space left with fruit and whole
tomatoes. Bottles of cold tea should be taken in another basket,
with a bottle or two of claret or light beer, and a few tumblers. For
a boating-trip lasting a day or two the following suggestions may
be found useful. When you encamp by the riverside, and your fire is
burning, put on the saucepan with ten potatoes roughly peeled, three
unpeeled onions, and a couple of carrots sliced. Pour in just enough
water to cover the vegetables, and boil them for twenty minutes,
keeping the lid of the saucepan tightly closed. After twenty minutes
pour off the water, and put into the saucepan the contents of a
one-pound tin of haricot-mutton, or beef, or Irish stew, and stir in
two large spoonfuls of Bovril or Liebig’s Essence of Meat. If Worcester
sauce is liked, add a tea-spoonful of that. Stir all well together,
and continue to stir the stew over a hot fire for five or six minutes.
This makes a good dinner for two hungry men. If you can buy from a
neighbouring garden some young potatoes and carrots use twenty of each.
Do not peel the potatoes, only wash them and rub them with a coarse
cloth. In washing up after such a meal use absolutely boiling water,
for merely _hot_ water is of no use. Fill your saucepan or cooking-pot
with water, and when it boils scour it round a few times with a piece
of house-flannel tied firmly to a stick. Do the same to the frying-pan.
Put metal cups and plates into boiling water, also the blades of knives
and the prongs of forks (keeping the handles out of the water). In this
way they will soon be quite clean, and after a final dip in the river,
and a rub with a dry cloth, they will shine like silver. If a bit of
bacon can be procured do not fry it, but toast it on a toasting-fork
before a clear part of the fire. The rashers of bacon should be
cut thin, and they will be sufficiently toasted when the fat looks
transparent. A gingerbread loaf, made according to the following family
recipe, is useful for boating-trips, as the longer it lasts the better
it is. Two pounds of brown flour, two pounds of treacle, a quarter
of a pound of brown sugar, a breakfast-cupful of cream, two eggs, a
tea-spoonful of carbonate of soda dissolved in a little hot water, two
ounces and a half of ground ginger, and a little chopped citron. Mix
all well together, and bake in a moderately hot oven.
_Cold Tea._—Cold tea, properly made, is much appreciated on journeys,
and is generally liked by shooting-parties on hot days. But good cold
tea cannot be made by filling bottles with the remains of the tea at
breakfast. Cold tea should be drunk unsweetened, and if carelessly made
it is flat and unpalatable. Wide-mouthed glass bottles with screw-tops,
such as are sold for jam, are the best to use. Cold tea should be made
from the best tea and freshly boiling water; it should stand four
minutes only, and should then be poured into the bottles through a tin
strainer. A couple of lemons and a sharp clasp-knife should be packed
in the basket with the bottles of tea, and a little metal box of sugar
can be added for those who like it.
_Iced Coffee._—Make strong coffee from freshly ground berries, add cold
milk and a little sifted sugar. Put the coffee into glass jugs, and set
these on ice for at least two hours before use. If pieces of ice are
put into the coffee the flavour is spoilt.
_Water Biscuits. Family Recipes._—(1) One pound of fine flour and two
ounces of butter well rubbed together. Add a pinch of salt. Mix with
cold water to a very stiff paste, and beat it well with a rolling-pin.
Break the paste into pieces the size of a walnut, and roll each into a
round. Prick each biscuit with a biscuit-pricker. Put them on a very
hot baking-sheet, and bake in a very quick oven.
(2) Rub an ounce of butter into a handful of fine flour. Make it into
a stiff, smooth paste with warm milk and the white of an egg beaten to
a froth. Beat the paste with a rolling-pin for half an hour or longer,
for the delicacy of the biscuits depends upon the length of time they
are beaten. Then take small pieces of the paste and roll them out to
the size of a saucer. They must be so thin as to be almost transparent.
Bake the biscuits very lightly.
Water biscuits are often liked at dinner instead of bread or toast.