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Show DINING-ROOM NOTES. "Do tell me how long it must cook as well as how to prepare it for cooking, I'm so ignorant in such matters. Yesterday the roast pork wasn't half done, and I cooked it almost as long as the last roast of beef, which was so overdone as to be unfit for anything. You tell us that veal cutlets are nice for breakfast, and how to dip them in egg and roll them in cracker crumbs, and behold, they are as rare as a beefsteak, because you didn't tell us they required more cooking. Experience is a good teacher, but we shall starve before we are taught. You who have passed through the trial, or had more teaching in your younger days, or more of the ‘judgement' which we are told we must use, tell us young housekeepers how to pass through this terrible first year of housekeeping in comparative ease." <br><br> I think perhaps this fragment of a letter, only one among the many, will be a good text for my little homily. I remember a lady telling me of the mortification she felt once, in the early days of housekeeping, when her husband came home to dinner and laughed till he cried over the "roast" corned beef, which he had sent home for an old-fashioned "boiled dinner." But it is leaving considerable to the "judgment," when the young and inexperienced housekeeper is expected to roast, boil, and fry, without an occasional mistake. <br><br> In roasting beef, fifteen minutes to the pound will be a good rule for those who like it rare, eighteen or twenty will make it well done. The oven should be very hot when the beef is first put in, and neither water nor salt should be added. The secret of juicy roast beef is in having no steam to prevent it from crisping over as quickly as possible. When well browned, and at least half done, it may be well salted, and the heat a little less intense. <br><br> Mutton needs a slow oven at first, and unless one likes it rare it should bake from twenty five to thirty minutes to the pound, a little water put in the pan, and the meat well salted. <br><br> Pork and veal require a slow oven at first, and should be well done, half an hour to a pound being a good rule. Veal cutlets are fried slowly until well done; they must be white all through when cut. Drain them, salt on both sides, dip into beaten eggs, then in rolled cracker, and brown nicely on both sides. Pour off the fat from the frying pan, pour in a little boiling water, dredge in flour enough to thicken, stirring rapidly, season if not salt enough, and pour over the cutlets. Stewed tomatoes should always be served with veal cutlets, if possible, and are sometimes poured over them instead of the gravy. <br><br> Cranberry or apple sauce is served with roast pork, currant jelly with veal, and either currant and cranberry with beef. Celery is used with all meats and poultry, and is one of our most healthful vegetables. [line unreadable] with pork, white corn, peas and beans, in their season, or canned, can be used at any time. <br><br> Potatoes should be mashed when served with roast meats, boiled or baked with steaks. With fowls always serve celery and cranberry or currant jelly, if possible, squash, mashed potatoes, and baked sweet potatoes in their season. Stewed parsnips are especially nice with roast meats. <br><br> Cranberries should be cooked in plenty of water, a pint to a quart of berries, cooked as fast as possible, and mash the berries with a wooden or silver spoon, sift through a coarse sieve, return to the kettle, (porcelain, never iron or tin,) add sugar to taste, and boil two or three minutes. Pour into bowls or molds, or fill fruit cans. When cranberries are plenty, it is a good plan to cook and sift a quantity, canning them like other fruit, excepting that no sugar is needed-in fact they keep better without-until you wish to use the sauce. It will be a thick jelly, and can be made thinner, if liked, adding a little water when heated to sweeten. The seeds will rub through the sieve, but will do no harm, the object being to get rid of the tough, indigestible skins. <br><br> Poultry is frequently spoiled by being underdone. A turkey to be roasted should be prepared, all ready for the oven, the day before it is to be cooked, and will be much nicer, having the flavor of the seasoning all through. Half an hour to a pound is a good rule for roasting poultry. When one lives in the country and raises her own turkeys and chickens, she can vary the time for cooking according to the age, but when one is dependent upon markets, it is best to be on the safe side, and allow plenty of time for cooking. <br><br> If it is found to be done too early, remove the fowl from the oven, keeping it warm, and replacing it for a half hour before dinner. It will not be injured in the least by so doing. Of course this method can be followed with nothing but poultry; meats would lose all their nice flavor. For all poultry, the oven should be slow for the first hour. It should be basted frequently while baking, after it begins to brown, and care should be taken that the fire does not get too hot.<br><br> For chicken salad the white meat only is used. The chicken should be boiled in water just salt enough to season it. When cold, cut the white meat in small pieces, some prefer chopping it, add about half the quantity of white, crisp celery, cut fine, mix and pour the dressing over it. The dark meat of the chicken can be used for many nice dishes, so that one needn't spoil the salad for economy's sake. <br><br> The white, crisp leaves of lettuce may be used, if celery cannot be procured. A favorite way to serve lettuce is to pile the crisp leaves on a wooden or glass salad plate, with lemons cut in halves placed about the edge. The lemons should be rolled before cutting, and cut with a very sharp knife. Serve half a lemon with each dish of lettuce. After using lemon and sugar on lettuce few people will care for it served in any other manner.-Household. |