PLAIN VEAL CUTLETS

Take them if possible free from bone, and after having trimmed them into proper shape, beat them with a cutlet-bat or paste-roller until the fibre of the meat is thoroughly broken; flour them well to prevent the escape of the gravy, and fry them from twelve to fifteen minutes over a fire which is not sufficiently fierce to burn them before they are quite cooked through: they should be of a fine amber brown, and _perfectly done_. Lift them into a hot dish, pour the fat from the pan, throw in a slice of fresh butter, and when it is melted, stir or dredge in a dessertspoonful of flour; keep these shaken until they are well-coloured, then pour gradually to them a cup of gravy or of boiling water; add pepper, salt, a little lemon-pickle or juice, give the whole a boil, and pour it over the cutlets: a few forcemeat balls fried and served with them, is usually a very acceptable addition to this dish, even when it is garnished or accompanied with rashers of ham or bacon. A morsel of _glaze_, or of the jelly of roast meat, should when at hand be added to the sauce, which a little mushroom powder would further improve: mushroom sauce, indeed, is considered by many epicures, as indispensable with veal cutlets. We have recommended in this one instance that the meat should be thoroughly _beaten_, because we find that the veal is wonderfully improved by the process, which, however, we still deprecate for other meat.

12 to 15 minutes.

VEAL CUTLETS A L’INDIENNE, OR INDIAN FASHION. (ENTRÉE.)

Mix well together four ounces of very fine stale bread-crumbs, a teaspoonful of salt, and a tablespoonful of the best currie powder. Cut down into small well-shaped cutlets or collops, two pounds of veal free from fat, skin, or bone; beat the slices flat, and dip them first into some beaten egg-yolks, and then into the seasoned crumbs; moisten them again with egg, and pass them a second time through bread-crumbs. When all are ready, fry them in three or four ounces of butter over a moderate fire, from twelve to fourteen minutes. For sauce, mix smoothly with a knife, a teaspoonful of flour and an equal quantity of currie-powder, with a small slice of butter; shake these in the pan for about five minutes, pour to them a cup of gravy or boiling water, add salt and cayenne if required and the strained juice of half a lemon; simmer the whole till well flavoured, and pour it round the cutlets. A better plan is, to have some good currie sauce ready prepared to send to table with this dish; which may likewise be served with only well-made common cutlet gravy, from the pan, when much of the pungent flavour of the currie-powder is not desired.

Bread-crumbs, 4 oz.; salt, 1 teaspoonful; currie powder, 1 tablespoonful; veal, 2 lbs.: 12 to 14 minutes.

_Obs._—These cutlets may be broiled; they should then be well beaten first, and dipped into clarified butter instead of egg before they are passed through the curried seasoning.

VEAL CUTLETS, OR COLLOPS, À LA FRANÇAISE. (ENTRÉE.)

Cut the veal into small, thin, round collops of equal size, arrange them evenly in a sauté-pan, or in a small frying-pan, and sprinkle a little fine salt, white pepper, and grated nutmeg on them. Clarify, or merely dissolve in a clean saucepan with a gentle degree of heat, an ounce or two of good butter, and pour it equally over the meat. Set the pan aside until the dinner-hour, then fry the collops over a clear fire, and when they are lightly browned, which will be in from four to five minutes, lift them into a hot dish, and sauce them with a little _Espagnole_, or with a gravy made quickly in the pan, and flavoured with lemon-juice and cayenne. They are excellent even without any sauce.

3 to 4 minutes.

SCOTCH COLLOPS. (ENTRÉE.)

Prepare the veal as for the preceding receipt, but dip the collops into beaten egg and seasoned bread-crumbs, and fry them directly in good butter, over a moderate fire, of a light golden brown; drain them well in lifting them from the pan, and sauce them like the collops _à la Française_.

VEAL CUTLETS À LA MODE DE LONDRES, OR, LONDON FASHION. (ENTRÉE.)

Raise the flesh entire from the upper side of the best end of a neck of veal, free it from the skin, and from the greater portion of the fat, slice it equally into cutlets little more than a quarter of an inch thick, brush them with egg, strew them with fine bread-crumbs, and fry them of a light brown. Toast, or fry apart as many small slices of bacon as there are cutlets, and let them be trimmed nearly to the same shape; place them alternately on their edges round the inside of a hot dish (so as to form a sort of chain), and pour into the middle some rich gravy made in the pan, and very slightly flavoured with eschalot; or substitute for this some good brown mushroom sauce. Savoury herbs, grated lemon-rind, nutmeg or mace, salt, and white pepper or cayenne, should be mixed with the bread-crumbs, in the proportions directed at page 213, for cutlets of calf’s head; or they may be varied at pleasure. A cheek of bacon is best adapted to this dish.

SWEETBREADS SIMPLY DRESSED. (ENTRÉE.)

In whatever way sweetbreads are dressed, they should first be well soaked in lukewarm water, then thrown into boiling water to _blanch_ them, as it is called, and to render them firm. If lifted out after they have boiled from five to ten minutes according to their size, and laid immediately into fresh spring water to cool, their colour will be the better preserved. They may then be gently stewed for three quarters of an hour in veal gravy, which with the usual additions of cream, lemon, and egg-yolks, may be converted into a fricassee sauce for them when they are done; or they may be lifted from it, _glazed_, and served with good Spanish gravy; or, the glazing being omitted, they may be sauced with the sharp _Maître d’Hôtel_ sauce of page 117. They may also be simply floured, and roasted in a Dutch oven, being often basted with butter, and frequently turned. A full sized sweetbread, after having been blanched, will require quite three quarters of an hour to dress it.

Blanched 5 to 10 minutes. Stewed 3/4 hour or more.

SWEETBREAD CUTLETS. (ENTRÉE.)

Boil the sweetbreads for half an hour in water or veal broth, and when they are perfectly cold, cut them into slices of equal thickness, brush them with yolk of egg, and dip them into very fine bread-crumbs seasoned with salt, cayenne, grated lemon-rind, and mace; fry them in butter of a fine light brown, arrange them in a dish placing them high in the centre, and pour _under_ them a gravy made in the pan, thickened with mushroom powder and flavoured with lemon-juice; or, in lieu of this, sauce them with some rich brown gravy, to which a glass of sherry or Madeira has been added. When it can be done conveniently, take as many slices of a cold boiled tongue as there are sweetbread cutlets; pare the rind from them, trim them into good shape, and dress them with the sweetbreads, after they have been egged and seasoned in the same way; and place each cutlet upon a slice of tongue when they are dished. For variety, substitute _croutons_ of fried bread stamped out to the size of the cutlets with a round or fluted paste or cake cutter. The crumb of a stale loaf, very evenly sliced, is best for the purpose.

STEWED CALF’S FEET.

(_Cheap and Good._)

This is an excellent family dish, highly nutritious, and often very inexpensive, as the feet during the summer are usually sold at a low rate. Wash them with nicety, divide them at the joint, and split the claws; arrange them closely in a thick stewpan or saucepan, and pour in as much cold water as will cover them about half an inch: three pints will be sufficient for a couple of large feet. When broth or stock is at hand, it is good economy to substitute it for the water, as by this means a portion of strong and well-flavoured jellied gravy will be obtained for general use, the full quantity not being needed as sauce for the feet. The whole preparation will be much improved by laying a thick slice of the lean of an unboiled ham, knuckle of bacon, hung beef, or the end of a dried tongue, at the bottom of the pan, before the other ingredients are added; or, when none of these are at hand, by supplying the deficiency with a few bits of lean beef or veal: the feet being of themselves insipid, will be much more palatable with one or the other of these additions. Throw in from half to three quarters of a teaspoonful of salt when they begin to boil, and after the scum has been all cleared off, add a few branches of parsley, a little celery, one small onion or more, stuck with half a dozen cloves, a carrot or two, a large blade of mace, and twenty corns of whole pepper; stew them softly until the flesh will part entirely from the bones; take it from them, strain part of the gravy, and skim off all the fat, flavour it with catsup or any other store sauce, and thicken it, when it boils, with arrow-root or flour and butter; put in the flesh of the feet, and serve the dish as soon as the whole is very hot. A glass of wine, a little lemon juice, and a few forcemeat balls, will convert this into a very superior stew; a handful of mushroom-buttons also simmered in it for half an hour before it is dished, will vary it agreeably.

Calf’s feet (large), 2; water, 3 pints; salt, 1/2 to 1/3 teaspoonful; onions, 1 to 3; cloves, 6; peppercorns, 20; mace, large blade; little celery and parsley; carrots, 1 or 2: stewed softly, 2-1/2 to 3-1/4 hours. Mushroom catsup, 1 tablespoonful; flour, or arrow-root, 1 large teaspoonful; butter, 1 to 2 oz. Cayenne, to taste.

CALF’S LIVER STOVED, OR STEWED.

From three to four pounds of the best part of the liver will be sufficient for a dish of moderate size. First lard it quite through by the directions of page 181, with large lardoons, rolled in a seasoning of spice, and of savoury herbs very finely minced; then lay it into a stewpan or saucepan just fitted to its size, and pour in about half a pint of broth or gravy; heat it very gently, and throw in, when it begins to simmer, a sliced carrot, a small onion cut in two, a small bunch of parsley, and a blade of mace; stew the liver as softly as possible over a very slow fire from two hours and a half to three hours; thicken the gravy with a little brown roux (see page 107), or with a dessertspoonful of browned flour; add a couple of glasses of white wine, and a little spice if needed, and serve it very hot, after having taken out the herbs and vegetable.

The liver may be stewed without being larded; it may likewise be browned all over in a carefully made _roux_, before the gravy is poured to it: this must then be made to boil, and be added in small portions, the stewpan being well shaken round as each is thrown in. The wine can be altogether omitted; or a wineglassful of port mixed with a little lemon-juice, may take the place of sherry. After the liver has been wiped very dry, minced herbs may be strewed thickly over it before it is laid into the stewpan; and it may be served in its own gravy, or with a _sauce piquante_.

Liver, 3 to 4 lbs: 2 to 3 hours.

TO ROAST CALF’S LIVER.

Take the whole or part of a fine white sound liver, and either lard it as a fricandeau upon the surface, or with large strips of highly-seasoned bacon in the inside (see Larding, page 181); or should either of these modes be objected to, merely wrap it in a well buttered paper, and roast it from an hour to an hour and a quarter at a moderate distance from a clear fire, keeping it constantly basted. Remove the paper, and froth the liver well from ten to fifteen minutes before it is done. It should be served with a sauce of some piquancy, such as a _poivrade_, or brown eschalot, in addition to some good gravy. French cooks steep the liver over-night in vinegar, with a sliced onion and branches of savoury herbs laid over it: this whitens and renders it firm. As an economical mode, some small bits of the liver may be trimmed off, floured, and lightly fried with a sliced onion, and stewed down for gravy in three quarters of a pint of water which has been poured into the pan, with the addition of a few peppercorns, and a small bunch of herbs. A seasoning of salt must not be forgotten, and a little lemon pickle, or juice, would generally be considered an improvement.

1 to 1-1/4 hour.