Mead

“ Such are milk, honey, eggs, nuts, cereals, a few roots, legumina, and gums, and the countless variety of fruit, which are man-food par excellence. Our various kinds of bread, though artificially prepared, as well as other farinaceous dishes, are derived from an edible grain which is neither repulsive nor indigestible in its original state.
"To the second or adapted edibles belong different vegetables which are rendered palatable only by the process of cooking, as cabbage, beans, peas and lentils, and various roots and leaves. ”

“ The batter, or egg and bread-crumbs form a sort of crust which keeps it tender and juicy. Any attempt to fry cold meat without either results in a hard, stringy, uneatable dish.
White Meat of any kind is excellent warmed over in a little milk, in which you have cut a large onion, and, if you like it, a slice of salt pork or ham, and a little sliced cucumber, if it is summer; thicken with the yolks of one or two eggs, added after the whole has simmered twenty minutes; take care the egg thickens in the gravy, but does not boil, or it will curdle. ”

“ I particularly warn my readers against bakers seeking customers by cutting rates; they cannot [Pg 23] supply good bread at low rates without using inferior flour.
Home-made Bread.—To make good bread or rolls, take five potatoes; peel and cut them up, and boil in water enough to cover them; when done, mash them smooth in the water in which they were boiled; when cool, not cold, add a gill of liquid yeast, a dessert-spoonful of sugar, a salt-tablespoonful of lard, and a pint of flour. ”

“ The principal of these are wheat, oats, Indian corn, rice, rye, barley, buckwheat, millet, chestnuts, peas, beans, and lentils. They are prepared in various forms.
DIVISION I.—BREAD.
The true idea of bread is that coarse or cracked and unbolted meal, formed into a mass of dough by means of water, and immediately baked in loaves of greater or less thickness, according to the fancy.
Some use bolted meal; most raise bread by fermentation; many use salt; some saleratus, or carbonate of potash; and, in the country, many use milk instead of water to form the paste. ”

“ Wash, strain, boil, and cut up fine about two pounds of different vegetables, potatoes, spinach, cardoons, etc., and sweet herbs. Boil them in a sauce-pan with some good stock; when cooked, add a teacupful of cream (or milk) , stir well together and leave them to cool. Then add four yolks of eggs, some grated cheese, and the white of the eggs beaten up. Put the vegetables into a buttered shape, well covered with bread-crumbs, cook with fire above and below, or in the oven. ”

“ Wheat bread, reinforced by a little butter or fat bacon to add to its calorific value, shredded wheat with rich cream, crackers with cheese, bread and milk, eggs with bacon, meat with potatoes, etc.; the common, every-day household admixtures, provide combinations which can easily be made to accord with true physiological requirements. ”

“ We all know how difficult it is to obtain pure milk and butter, or pure bread from pure flour, or jams made with sugar from fresh and good fruit. Bread may be made from flour which has passed through no less than seven processes,—a sad contrast this to the old home-made bread, the product of home-ground meal, whole and sweet as nature made it. ”

“ Stuff it with any force meat that you like. You remember this morning that we made force meat by chopping a teaspoonful of onion and frying it in a tablespoonful of butter, then putting in with the fried onion a cupful of stale bread soaked in cold water, seasoning with salt and pepper and sweet herbs. I said also that you could add chopped meat, cold meat or eggs, or to make any desired addition to the force meat in the way of seasoning. A little grated cheese in stuffing is very nice. You scarcely will realize what the seasoning is. ”

“ Coarsely ground wheat 71meal, even when the bran is retained, makes decidedly sweeter and more wholesome bread than very finely ground meal. When the meal is ground, it should immediately be spread out to cool before it is put into sacks or casks:—for if it is packed or enclosed in a heated state, it will be far more likely to become sour and musty. And I say again, where families are in circumstances to do wholly as they choose in the matter, it is best to have but little ground at a time; as the freshly ground meal is always the liveliest and sweetest, and makes the most delicious bread. ”

“ It has the further advantage, over all other flour, that it requires in its preparation few culinary utensils, and neither sugar, yeast, eggs, spices, soda, potash, or other et ceteras, to qualify or perfect the bread. ”

“ Of these the principal are,—Scotch barley, pearl barley, wheat flour, oatmeal, bread-raspings, pease, beans, rice, vermicelli, macaroni, isinglass, potato-mucilage, mushroom or mushroom-ketchup, champignons, parsnips, carrots, beetroot, turnips, garlic, shalots, and onions. Sliced onions, fried with butter and flour till they are browned, and then rubbed through a sieve, are excellent to heighten the colour and flavour of brown soups and sauces, and form the basis of many of the fine relishes furnished by the cook. The older and drier the onion, the stronger will be its flavour. ”

“ If every woman would see that her flour is sweet and good, that her yeast is fresh and lively, that her bread trough is kept perfectly clean and sweet, that her dough is properly mixed and thoroughly kneaded, and kept at a proper temperature, and at the proper time moulded into the loaf, and put into the oven, which has been properly heated, and there properly baked, then good bread would be as common as poor bread now is. ”

“ Of bread, the fifteenth century had several descriptions in use: pain-main or bread of very fine flour, wheat-bread, barley-meal bread, bran-bread, bean-bread, pease-bread, oat-bread or oat-cakes, hard-bread, and unleavened bread. The poor often used a mixture of rye, lentils, and oatmeal, varied according to the season and district. ”

“ Mince some mutton with beef-suet, some orange-peel, grated nutmeg, grated bread, coriander-seed, pepper, salt, and yolks of eggs, mingle all together, and fill any breast, or leg, or any Joynt of sweet, and make sauce with gravy, strong broth, dates, currans, sugar, salt, lemons, and barberries. ”

“ Watch the bread-box, and see that every bit of bread is used in some way; the unused crusts should be dried, rolled, sifted, and kept in a covered jar for stuffing, crumbing croquettes, brown bread, puddings, or other dishes in which the color is not objectionable; cold toast or cut slices should be made into croutons, or used for canapés or French toast; other pieces should be used for croustades, or made into crumbs, both coarse and fine, for use in fondues, griddle cakes, omelets, sauces, and soups. Bits of crackers should be dried, rolled, and used the same as bread crumbs. ”

“ Of bread made of wheat we have sundry sorts daily brought to the table, whereof the first and most excellent is the manchet, which we commonly call white bread, in Latin primarius panis, whereof Budeus also speaketh, in his first book De asse; and our good workmen deliver commonly such proportion that of the flour of one bushel with another they make forty cast of manchet, of which every loaf weigheth eight ounces into the oven, and six ounces out, as I have been informed. ”

“ Milk and its products, butter and cheese, are foremost growth promotors. In this class comes also the yolk of eggs, glandular meats, and grains with the living germ still intact. Leafy vegetables, such as spinach, lettuce, cabbage, chard, cauliflower, kale, all greens, water cress, onions, string beans, and a few others are classed with protective foods. ”

“ It is perfectly certain that if two portions of wheat meal or flour be taken from the same barrel or sack, and one portion be made into unleavened bread, and the other portion be made into the very best fermented or raised bread, and both be eaten as soon as they are baked, the fermented bread will digest with more difficulty, and oppress and disturb the stomach more than the unleavened bread will. ”

“ Mince a leg of mutton or lamb with beef-suet, and all manner of sweet herbs minced, cloves, mace, salt, currans, sugar, and fill the leg with half the meat: than make the rest into little cakes as broad as a shilling, and put them in a pipkin, with strong mutton broth, cloves, mace, vinegar, and boil the leg, or bake it, or rost it. ”

“ Cook meal in stock as directed in Corn Meal Mush (see No. 293) , add meat, and pour into a deep bread [Pg 118] pan; when cold, either slice and serve cold, or dip in flour and sauté in butter, or dip in crumbs, then in egg, and then again in crumbs, and fry in deep fat. If stock is very salt, dilute with water or milk. Any kind of stock or meat may be used in place of corned beef.
309.—WHEAT AND SAUSAGE SCRAPPLE
Stir wheat slowly into boiling salted water, cook five minutes, place over hot water, and cook half an hour. ”

“ Very good bread is made by flour and water kneaded into a thin cake called a chou-patty; and if an egg and a bit of butter be added, it is still better. Beef, mutton, and pork are very good; all being carefully fed on grain some months before being killed. ”

“ Sometimes for variety you may make brewis with some fresh beef or good mutton broth, with some of the fat of the beef-pot; put it in a pipkin with some large mace, a handful of parsley and sorrel grosly chopped, and some pepper, boil them together, and scald the bread, then lay on the boil’d tongue, mace, and some of the herbs, run it over with beaten butter, slic’t lemon, gooseberries, barberries, or grapes. ”

“ The ingredients of bread.—The essential ingredients are flour, water, and yeast. The liquid may be milk, or milk and water, the milk changing the flavor slightly and increasing the nutritive value, while the cream in the milk increases the tenderness of the crumb and crust. The non-essentials include salt to develop flavor, sugar sometimes added to hasten fermentation and also for flavor, and a fat to increase tenderness, as, for instance, butter or some cheaper fat. ”

“ Bread, in the real sense of the word, he scarcely uses at all, and even the little lumps of dough which may be reckoned as such, are sodden in fat, not baked. Flour and rice,—the latter a frequent dish only among the rich,—also serve to give variety to the everlasting monotony of milk and meat dishes. ”

“ In a natural and rational system of dietetics wheat and the allied seed-foods, including beans, lentils, peas, and rice, must, he holds, take the place now usurped by animal foods, including, besides flesh-meats, butter, cheese, eggs, and milk. ”

“ An excellent soup is prepared with meat and maize-flour. The inhabitants of some countries, where wheat is scarce, make, with maize and water, or milk and salt, a kind of biscuit, which is pleasant in taste, but indigestible. Some of the preparations of maize-flour are very good, and, when partaken in moderation, suitable food for almost everybody. ”

“ Ingredients.—One quart of milk, two cupfuls of bread crumbs, four eggs, whites and yolks beaten separately, butter the size of an egg, one cupful of white sugar, one large lemon—juice and grated rind. Heat the milk and pour over the bread crumbs, add the butter, cover and let it get soft. When cool, beat the sugar and yolks and add to the mixture, also the grated rind. ”

“ Good whole-wheat or Graham bread of some kind, rolls, crisps, beaten biscuit, sticks, fruit rolls, and wafers, with a cup of canned fruit or a bottle of rich milk as an accompaniment, with plenty of nice, fresh fruits or almonds or a few stalks of celery, is as tempting a lunch as any child need desire. ”

“ The cooking of greens, both wild and cultivated, is not only simple but practically the same for all varieties. When they are not used as a salad vegetable, they are merely boiled until tender and then dressed in any desired way. ”

“ Besides taking part in this composition, the bran, being in a great measure insoluble, passes in bulk through the bowels, assisting daily laxation—a most important consideration. If wheat is such a perfect food, it must follow that wholemeal bread must be best for our daily use. ”

“ Noisette Sandwiches Use one-half recipe for Milk and Water Bread made with entire wheat flour (see p. 54) , and add two tablespoons molasses and one cup English walnut meats or pecan nut broken in small pieces. ”

“ Chop up one quart of any cold meat very fine, to which add one pint stale bread. Mix up one egg, mustard, pepper, salt and butter, and pour over the bread and meat; roll into balls, which must be rolled into the white of an egg, then into bread crumbs, and bake a nice brown. ”

“ Take out their Meat and Mince it small, and set it over a Chafing dish of Coals with a little white Wine, a little Salt, and a blade of Mace, and when it is very hot, put in some Butter and some Crums of white bread, then warm the shells against the fire, and fill them again with their Meat, and so serve them in. ”

“ Besides march-pain or pain-main, and pain-puff, two sorts baked on special occasions, and rather entering into the class of confectionery, our better-to-do ancestors usually employed three descriptions of bread: manchete for the master's table, made of fine boulted flour; chete, of unboulted flour, but not mixed with any coarser ingredient; and brown-bread, composed of flour and rye meal, and known as maslin (mystelon) . ”

“ Angell, "the true life-giving and mental, moral, and physical force-producing bread is neither more nor less than sound, ripe wheat when deprived of its thin outer silicious husk, coarsely ground and mixed with water, and subjected to just that degree of kneading and baking which will suffice to prepare it for mastication, insalivation, and the subsequent action of the gastric juice." ”