Crumpet

“ Sift the Indian meal and the flour into a pan, and mix them well. Then stir them into the milk, a handful at a time; adding the salt. Beat the eggs very light in another pan, and then stir them, gradually, into the milk and meal. Lastly, add the yeast. Stir the whole well; then cover it, and set it to rise in a warm place, such as a corner of the hearth. When it has become very light, and is covered with bubbles, have the griddle ready heated to begin to bake the cakes; first greasing the griddle. For each crumpet pour on a large ladle-full of batter. ”

“ ‘How many crumpets, at a sittin’, do you think, ’ud kill me off at once?’ says the patient. ”

“ Have the crab prepared as for plain, lay in the empty shell a layer of the soft part, then a layer of American crackers or biscuit, grated, then add the fleshy part of the crab over, on which pour a tablespoonful of mushroom ketchup, cover it with slices of cold, hard eggs, cut crosswise; season with a little salt, pepper, and cayenne; cover all with the remainder of the soft part of the crab, make it even with a knife; egg, and breadcrumb over, or more grated biscuit; put a few nuts of butter on the top, set in an oven for twenty minutes or half an hour, and serve very hot. ”

“ To half a pint of drawn-butter sauce add one-third of a pint of picked boiled shrimps, whole, or chopped a little. Add at last moment a few drops of lemon-juice, and a very little Cayenne pepper. Let the sauce simmer, not boil. Some add a tea-spoonful of anchovy paste; more, perhaps, prefer it without the anchovy flavor.
Shrimps are generally sold at market already boiled. If they are not boiled, throw them into salted boiling water, and boil them until they are quite red. When cold, pick off the heads, and peel off the shells. Always save a few of the shrimps whole for garnishing the dish. ”

“ Lay the roe on one side, the liver on the other side of the fish. Serve oyster, shrimp sauce, or plain melted butter; also scalloped oysters.—Garnish with lemon, and horse-radish. If the fish be in slices, the water should be made to boil as soon as possible after they are in it, and 10 minutes will cook them: pour shrimp or anchovy sauce over the slices. If you wish it to be rich, having some clear broth, put in a boned anchovy, some pickled oysters, chopped fine, pepper, salt, a glass of Port wine, and a thickening of butter and flour; boil this up, skim it, and pour over the slices of cod. ”

“ SOLE À LA NORMANDY—IV Butter a baking-dish and put the fish into it with two dozen oysters, a dozen mussels, a chopped onion, a sprig each of thyme and parsley, a tablespoonful of butter, and salt and pepper to season. Add one cupful each of red wine and stock, cover, and cook until nearly done. Drain and keep warm, lay the oysters and mussels over the sole. Add to the liquid enough stock to make the required quantity of sauce, strain, and thicken with flour cooked in butter. Take from the fire, add the beaten yolks of two eggs, pour over the fish, and serve. ”

“ Take a boil’d crab, take the meat out of the shell, and mince the claws with a good fresh eel, season it with cloves, mace, some sweet herbs chopped, and salt, mingle all together with some yolks of eggs, some grapes, gooseberries, or barberres, and sometimes boil’d artichocks in dice-work, or boil’d asparagus, some almond-paste, the meat of the body of the crab, and some grated bread, fill the shells with this compound, & make some into balls, bake them in a dish with some butter and white wine in a soft oven ”

“ The shrimps and prawns are found in salt and brackish water, while the crayfish are inhabitants of fresh water.
Curry of Prawns.—Prawns are at their best served as a curry. Boil two quarts of live prawns thirty minutes, drain when slightly cooled, break away the shells, and set them aside. Put two ounces of butter in a frying-pan; when very hot add a clove of garlic and one sliced apple; brown slightly, remove the garlic, and add a dessertspoonful of curry-powder mixed with a gill of water; stir, and add half a pint of soup-stock and half a teaspoonful of flour ”

“ Pick up the meat of 2 crabs, seasoning with salt, pepper, a pinch of mustard and a good tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce. Put in a saucepan a piece of butter twice the size of an egg; when melted stir in 2 tablespoons of flour, and add a cup of rich cream, stirring constantly. Mix in the prepared crab and set aside to cool. Then mould into cutlets, which [23] you roll in egg and bread crumbs. Stick the claws you have saved into the cutlets, and fry. Serve with or without parsley and slices of lime. ”

“ Chop fish up fine with 1 stalk of celery and 2 sprigs of parsley, 1 pint milk, 2 tablespoonfuls flour, 1⁄4 pound butter. Mix butter and flour together; boil the milk and pour it into the flour and butter, making a rich sauce. Boil 1⁄2 pint oysters scalded, take the hearts out, cut them up in small bits and put in the sauce. Put fish in the sauce and keep stirring till it begins to boil. When done pour out on a [22] platter and let it get cold. Make croquettes in shape of pears or apples, roll in beaten eggs and then in bread crumbs. Boil in a croquette kettle of lard. ”

“ But if the clam is good what shall we say of crabs. Hard-shell crabs must be boiled about twelve minutes, drained, and set away to cool. Eaten with sandwiches and a dressing they are considered a delicacy for supper. They can be more cooked with chopped eggs, or treated like a chicken pasty, and cooked in a paste shell they are very good.
Take half an ounce of butter, half an onion minced, half a pound of minced raw veal, and a small carrot shredded, a chopped crab, a pint of boiling cream; simmer an hour, then strain into a saucepan, and what a sauce you have! ”

“ Take a carp, scale, and scrape off the slime with your knife, wipe it with a dry cloth, bone it, and mince it with a fresh water eel being flayed and boned; season it with beaten cloves, mace, salt, pepper, and some sweet herbs, as tyme, parsley, and some sweet marjoram minced very small, stew it in a broad mouthed pipkin, with some claret wine, gooseberries, or grapes, and some blanched chesnuts; being finely stewed, serve it on carved sippets about it, and run it over with beaten butter, garnish the dish with fine grated manchet searsed, and some fryed oysters in butter, cockles, or prawns. ”

“ Cut off the tops of some small French rolls, take out the crumb, fry them brown and crisp with clarified butter, then fry some breadcrumbs; stew the requisite quantity of oysters, bearded and cut in two, in their liquor, with a little white wine, some gravy, and seasoned with grated lemon-peel, powdered mace, pepper and salt; add a bit of butter, fill the rolls with oysters, and serve them with the fried breadcrumbs in a dish.
SCALLOPED OYSTERS. What will not luxury taste? Earth, sea, and air,
Are daily ransack’d for the bills of fare. ”

“ Crabs.—Crabs are boiled like lobsters, and may be served like lobster, in salad. They are often eaten, only boiled, without any seasonings.
Like lobsters also, to be good, crabs must be put in the water alive.
When well washed and clean, they may be prepared in the following way: Put them in a saucepan with slices of onions, same of carrots, parsley, chives if handy, thyme, bay-leaves, cloves, salt, and pepper-corns; half cover them with white wine, add butter, set on a good fire, and boil till done. Serve with parsley only. ”

“ When wanted for patties, melt an ounce of butter. While whisking it, gradually add a pint of the sauce. Mix it with a quart of prepared crab-meat, obtainable at the grocer’s. When hot, fill the shells with it.
Soft-shell Crabs.—When the blue crab is desirous of increasing his growth, he sheds his shell, and for a short period is perfectly helpless. The male usually retires to a secluded spot out of the reach of eels and other enemies, but the female soft shell is protected by a male companion whose shell is hard. At Sheepshead Bay these are called elopers or double crabs. ”

“ They are very abundant, but so little is in them, that when better things are to be had, they are scarcely worth the trouble of boiling and picking out the shell. They are cooked like lobsters, in boiling salt and water, and brought to table piled on large dishes, and are eaten with salt, pepper, sweet oil, and [137] vinegar. The meat of two dozen crabs, when all is extracted, will make but a small dish. Season it with cayenne, mustard, oil, vinegar, and eat it cold; or stew it with fresh butter, powdered mace, and nutmeg, and serve it up hot. ”

“ Have six small silver scallop-shells, lightly butter the interior of each, then evenly spread a tablespoonful of fresh bread-crumbs in each shell, gently lay six oysters in each shell over the crumbs, and then sprinkle a tablespoonful of bread-crumbs on the oysters in each shell; place half a teaspoonful of good butter in the centre of each shell; place them in a very hot oven to bake for fully fifteen minutes, or until they have obtained a good golden color. Remove them from the oven. Dress the six shells on a hot serving-dish, with a folded napkin, and send to the table. ”

“ When the fish have stewed about twenty minutes, take them up, and mix a couple of tea spoonsful of flour with a little water, and stir it into the gravy, also, a little butter and pepper. Half a pint of white wine, spices, and catsup, will improve it. Bass and cod make the best chowder—black fish and clams make tolerably good ones. The hard part of the clams should be cut off, and thrown away. ”

“ The fish, when done, is served on a hot platter in a swimming position, three crabs are placed on the fish's back, the other seven along its sides. The pieces of sweetbread are also arranged neatly around the fish and the champignons and truffles, as well as the fish dumplings. All must be very hot and kept so until the gravy is done.
The Gravy: Into the butter in which the sweetbreads were fried stir some flour and add bouillon or water, pour it into the pan in which the fish was fried and cook for 3 minutes, taste and strain. ”

“ Only, bear in mind that the lesser and tougher shell-fish needs more boiling than does the aristocratic lobster. If underdone, crabs are very unwholesome. Also, in consideration of the crab’s deficiency in the matter of the coral which lends lusciousness and color to lobster salads and stews, use more butter and cream in “getting him up” for the table.
Cayenne pepper is regarded by many as necessary in dishes of lobster or crab, because of its supposed efficacy in preventing the evil effects which might otherwise follow indulgence in these delicacies. ”

“ Put the crabs in a sauté pan with one ounce of butter, season with salt and 273 pepper, and toss over the fire for five minutes. Then add a pony of sherry wine, and simmer for two minutes. Then add one-half cup of cream sauce, or white wine sauce, and fill the patties. Serve hot. For garnishing fish, make very small patties. If served as a fish course, serve on a platter garnished with parsley in branches.
Larded tenderloin of beef, Sigurd. Roast a larded tenderloin of beef, place on a platter, and garnish one side with stuffed tomatoes Créole ”

“ Take a good large silver eel, draw it, and flay it in pieces of four inches long, spit it on a small spit with some bay-leaves, or large sage leaves between each piece spit it cross ways, and roast it; being roasted, serve it with beaten butter, beaten with juyce of oranges, lemons, or elder vinegar, and beaten nutmeg, or serve it with venison sauce, and dredge it with beaten caraway-seed, cinamon, flour, or grated bread. ”

“ Beat up three eggs thoroughly; add half a pint of oyster-juice, a pepper-spoonful of cayenne, a saltspoonful of black pepper, a tablespoonful of salt, and a teaspoonful of English mustard. Work the mixture to a batter, and gradually add a gill of oil. Now comes the more particular part of the formula. Cover a board or part of a table with a layer of cracker-crumbs half an inch deep. Drain fifty oysters free from liquid, place them on the cracker-crumbs, and dredge over them more cracker-crumbs. See to it that one oyster is not on top of another. ”

“ Stew one dozen oysters in their own liquor gently, till tender enough to chop very small; mix with them one cup of bread crumbs, some grated nutmeg and lemon peel, salt and pepper to taste; bind all together with a well-beaten egg or two, form into cutlets, and fry in butter a pale yellow; [36] drain on a sieve. Serve with fried sippets of bread and parsley round them. ”

“ Buy a very nice, fresh crab. A very delicious dish is made by mixing a cup of rich cream sauce with the crab meat, seasoning it well with salt and pepper, and putting in the crab-shells; cover with crumbs, dot with butter, and brown in the oven. ”

“ Heat butter, add flour, then other ingredients. Cook until smooth, then add shrimp. Fill the ramikins with mixture and cover with cracker crumbs and butter. Bake six minutes.
SHRIMP WIGGLE Mrs. Willard Brown
Make a rich cream sauce; add one can of shrimp and one can of green peas; allow to cook until all is well heated, serve on toast.
CRAB A LA CREOLE
One can Japanese crab meat; four tablespoonfuls shortening; two green peppers; one large onion; three tomatoes; one cupful milk; two tablespoonfuls flour; one teaspoonful Kitchen Bouquet, one teaspoonful salt, one-fourth teaspoonful pepper. ”

“ See No. 48. The water with caraway seeds, salt and sliced onion is boiled and the crabs put in one by one. The water must boil constantly, so that the crabs are killed instantly. Boil 3 minutes, then set aside to simmer 3⁄4 to 1 hour. Serve the hot crabs on a napkin. For gravy or dressing, take hot butter mixed with minced parsley.
No. 54—CRAB CUTLETS WITH VEGETABLES.
Quantity for 6 Persons.
36 crabs 1 oz. of butter 2 yolks of eggs 1 egg Salt, pepper 1 tsp. of lemon juice 1 cupful of roll crumbs 1⁄2 lb. of butter for frying Preparation: The crabs are prepared and cooked as given under No. ”