COOKING MEAT IN WATER

1st. Method. pufc a piece of lean meat into cold water, heat it very slowly and watch the effect. The water becomes slightly red, then cloudy, and as the heat increases, yellowish in color, and finally it clears, sending a scum to the surface. If we examine this scum, we find that the water has soaked out much soluble albumen and a large proportion of the salts of the meat as well as other substantives called extrac- tives; and now the odor of the boiling meat begins to fill the kitchen. The longer and slower the warming process, the more of all these things we shall extract, and the meat when taken out will be in just that proportion poor.

34 First Method of Cooking Meat.

Soup making. This is the process known as soup making, — very simple, if we care noth- ing for the piece of meat but to soak out of it all the food and flavors possible. After some hours of cook- ing we find it shrunken, gray and tasteless. A dog if fed on that alone could not live many days. How- ever, as we have before said, we are not to conclude, that it contains no more nutriment, but the stomach rejects it now that it is separated from all the flavoring matters.

2nd Method. Now put a piece of meat into

boiling water and continue the boiling. The sur- face of the meat suddenly whitens and a little scum rises on the water, though very little compared with what we saw in the former method. We have coagulated the albumen contained in all the little cells in the surface of the meat, and the soluble albu- men, flavoring matters and salts cannot get out; the sealing up is not quite perfect, enough escaping into the water to make it a weak soup, but it is a good meth- od of cooking a large piece if properly completed from this point. But if we go on boiling our meat, that is, keeping the temperature at 212°, we shall overcook the albumen in the outer layers before that in the center is coagulated. By overcooking, we mean making it horny and flavorless, as we do the white of an egg if we cook it in the old-fashioned way, by dropping into boiling water and keeping it at that heat. Having seared the outside of the meat to keep the juices in, we must lower the temperature. The albumen coagulates at between 160° and 170°, but the water in the kettle may be a little above this? as

Second Method of Cooking Meat. 35

it must constantly transfer heat to the interior of the meat. The general rule is that it should "bubble" or "simmer" only, and if the cook can do no better she must follow these indications. That the true temperature for cooking meat is below the boiling point, many an intelligent housekeeper knows, but how is she to know when the water is at 170°? Here we come upon the weakest point in household cookery ; various degrees of heat have different effects on the foods we cook, but of only one temperature is the housekeeper certain — that of boiling water.

For the use of the thermometer and the heat saver see pages 43 and 44.

But to return ; is there no way of cooking that will keep in the meat all these flavors and salts and albu- mens, just as nature mixed them ? Yes, there are three ways, — frying in fat, baking in an oven, and broiling over coals.

We will examine the first. If we plunge a thin piece of meat, as a cut- let coated with egg and breadcrumbs, into boiling fat, the albumen in the surface or rather in that of the egg surrounding it is coagulated as in boiling, but this time the outer rind preserves the juices still better because the fat will not mix with them as will water. Everyone knows how an oyster cooked in this way retains its juices.

When we bake a piece of meat in the

3at* oven, we start in the same way; we

sear the outside in fat, turning the roast about in a

small quantity of fat made hot in a kettle; we then

transfer it, still in the kettle or pan, to a hot oven

36 Baking Meat.

where the process of cooking is completed, but at short intervals we moisten the surface with the fat in the pan. If we did not baste the roast, we would find a thick layer of grey, tasteless meat inside the outer brown crust, and indeed the whole piece would dry long before the center of our roast had reached the coagulating point; we baste, in order to keep in the juices which, as we know, will not mix with the fat, and also that only a mild degree of heat, not exceeding the coagulating point of proteids, may be transmitted to the interior. In the intervals of our basting, some water is driven out of the meat and evaporated into steam, and the high heat of the oven expends itself in evaporating this, in heating the basting fat, and perhaps ( if it reach so high a tem- perature ) in decomposing part of it, and in changing the chemical character of small quantities of extrac- tives, thus making the meat "tasty," and so it hap- pens that only a mild degree of heat is passed into the center of the piece. We would hardly believe that the inside of a roast, with its light pink color, registers only 160° by the thermometer, yet this can be proved by anyone with a long chemist's thermom- eter.

Although some of the water of our meat has evap- orated, the extractives and salts are retained to a larger extent than in boiling, as we shall see by the table given later.

In broiling, the principle applied is

exactly the same as in baking, the

cooking being done by the medium of heated air.

The dry heat of the coals affects the outer layer of

Broiling Meat. 3?

the meat, as does the hot air of the oven. In both these methods, just as in boiling, we try to hold the temperature of our cooking medium just high enough to keep the heat traveling toward the in- terior of the meat.

We have now learned to cook the albumen enough and not too much and to keep the flavors of our meat; what about the connective tissue, and how has that fared with our different modes of cooking?

If our meat is cut from the tenderer

Tender meat. „ , . ,, . , , ,,

parts of an animal of the right age, well fed and fattened, and if it has been kept long enough after killing, the connective tissue will soften into eatable condition in the length of time required to cook the albumen by the methods described. Such meat, so cooked, will always be tender and full of flavor.

But if the meat is cut from the

Toug-h meat. , .

tougher parts, or from an old or ill- fattened animal, or cooked too soon after killing, the connective tissue will not soften in that time ; we must continue the application of heat till this tissue softens.

Methods com- Therefore, what method of cooking pared: 1st, as ^aH use, depends on the quality of

to quality of J

meat. the meat we have. Trimmings and

tough portions we will make into soup, expecting to chop the tasteless meat next day and add other flavors to make it palatable. Somewhat better pieces, but still requiring long cooking to soften the connective tissue, may be made into a stew or ragout ; or if the piece is large and compact, boiled in water; but meat

38 Methods Compared.

that is tender and juicy (and for improving tough meat see page 45 ) should be boiled, baked or broiled, choosing oftenest the last two methods, because of the more perfect retentidto of the juices and the fine flavor given to the outer layer.

We are told that baking or broiling

2d, as to economy. , ,, , „ , .

is a very wasteful way of cooking meat ; that if we would be truly economical we would always boil or stew, using our meat or its juices to flavor vegetables. From this we must dissent for it would condemn us to such a monotony as would be unen- durable even to the poor. Better sometimes a smaller piece of broiled or baked meat with its deli- cious and stimulating flavor, and make our soup of vegetables and season it with herbs. Besides, accord- ing to the scientists, baking and broiling are not wasteful methods. I quote from a table of Prof. Konig's, wherein are given the results of analysis of beef raw, after boiling and after "braten." Eaw, it contained .86$ extractives (nitrogenous bodies most- ly; very important as giving the stimulating smell

and taste) and 1.23$ salts.

Extractives Salts

Raw 86$ 1.23$

After boiling 40$ 1.15$

After "bratm"...: 72$ 1.45$

The advantage is seen to be in favor of " braten " both in regard to extractives and salts. The loss of water was nearly the same in both cases. As for the fat lost in broiling a beef steak, that is indeed a loss, but one to be made up in some measure by the smaller quantity of fuel necessary to cook the meat. The

Soup Making. £9

loss of this fat need not be made so much of, until we have learned to do better in many other still more important directions.

The philosophy of cooking meat according to the different methods has been treated, and we will now give a few additional directions as to carrying out these methods.