LENTILS A LA PROVENCALE.--Soak the lentils overnight and put them into a stew-pan with five or six spoonfuls of oil, a little b.u.t.ter, some slices of onion, some chopped parsley, and a teaspoonful of mixed savoury herbs.

Stew them in this till the lentils are tender, and then thicken the sauce with yolks of eggs, add a squeeze of lemon-juice, and serve.

N.B.--Haricot beans can be cooked in a similar manner.

CHAPTER VIII.

VEGETABLES, FRESH.

ARTICHOKES, FRENCH, PLAIN BOILED.--Put the artichokes to soak in some well salted water, upside down, as otherwise it is impossible to get rid of the insects that are sometimes hidden in the leaves. Trim off the ends of the leaves and the stalk, and all the hard leaves round the bottom should be pulled off. Put the artichokes into a saucepan of boiling water sufficiently deep to nearly cover them. The tips of the leaves are best left out; add a little salt, pepper, and a spoonful of savoury herbs to the water in which they are boiled. French cooks generally add a piece of b.u.t.ter. Boil them till they are tender. The time depends upon the size, but you can always tell when they are done by pulling out a single leaf.

If it comes out easily the artichokes are done. Drain them off, and remember in draining them to turn them upside down. Some kind of sauce is generally served with artichokes separately in a boat, such as b.u.t.ter sauce, sauce Allemande, or Dutch sauce.

ARTICHOKES, BROILED.--Parboil the artichokes and take out the part known as the choke. In the hollow place a little chopped parsley and light-coloured bread-raspings soaked in olive oil. Place the bottoms of the artichokes on a gridiron with narrow bars over a clear fire, and serve them as soon a they are thoroughly hot through.

ARTICHOKES, FRIED.--The bottoms of artichokes after being boiled can be dipped in batter and fried.

ARTICHOKES A LA PROVENCALE.--Parboil the artichokes and remove the choke, and put them in the oven in a tin with a little oil, pepper and salt, and three or four heads of garlic, whole. Let them bake till they are tender, turning them over in the oil occasionally; then take out the garlic and serve them with the oil poured over them, and add the juice of a lemon.

ARTICHOKES, JERUSALEM, BOILED, PLAIN.--The artichokes must be first washed and peeled, and should be treated like potatoes in this respect. They should be thrown into cold water immediately, and it is best to add a little vinegar to the water. If the artichokes are young, throw them into boiling water, and they will become tender in about a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes. It is very important not to over-boil them, as they turn a bad colour. If any doubt exists as to the age of the artichokes, they had better be tested with a fork. Immediately they are tender they should be drained and served.

Old artichokes must be treated like old potatoes, _i.e._, put originally into cold water, and when they come to the boiling point allowed to simmer till tender; but these are best mashed. When the artichokes have been drained, they can, of course, be served quite plain, but they are best sent to table with some kind of sauce poured over them, such as Allemande sauce, Dutch sauce, white sauce, or plain b.u.t.ter sauce. They are greatly improved in appearance, after a spoonful of sauce has been poured over each artichoke, if a little blanched chopped parsley is sprinkled over them, and a few red specks made by colouring a pinch of bread-crumbs by shaking them with a few drops of cochineal.

Another very nice way of sending artichokes to table is to place all the artichokes together in a vegetable-dish, and, after pouring a little white sauce over each artichoke, to place a fresh-boiled bright green Brussels sprout between each. The white and green contrast very prettily.

JERUSALEM ARTICHOKES, FRIED.--Peel and slice the artichokes very thin; throw these slices into smoking hot oil in which a frying-basket has been placed. As soon as the artichokes are of bright golden-brown colour, lift out the frying-basket, shake it while you pepper and salt the artichokes, and serve very hot. They can be eaten with thin brown bread-and-b.u.t.ter and lemon-juice, and form a sort of vegetarian whitebait.

ARTICHOKES, MASHED.--These are best made from old artichokes. They must be rubbed through a wire sieve, and the strings left behind. It is best to mash them up with a little b.u.t.ter, and a spoonful or two of cream is a very great improvement.

ASPARAGUS, BOILED.--Cut the asparagus all the same length by bringing the green points together, and then tr.i.m.m.i.n.g the stalks level with a sharp knife. Throw the asparagus into boiling salted water. Time, from fifteen to twenty-five minutes, according to thickness. Serve on dry toast, and send b.u.t.ter sauce to table separate in a tureen.

BEANS, BROAD, PLAIN BOILED.--Broad beans, if eaten whole, should be quite young. They should be thrown into boiling water, salted. They require about twenty minutes to boil before they are tender. Serve with parsley and b.u.t.ter sauce.

BROAD BEANS, MASHED.--When broad beans get old, the only way to serve them is to have them mashed. Boil them, and remove the skins, then mash them up with a little b.u.t.ter, pepper, and salt, and rub them through a wire sieve, make them hot, and serve. You can if you like boil a few green onions and a pinch of savoury herbs with the beans, and rub these through the wire sieve as well. This dish is very cheap and very nourishing. Very young beans, like very young peas, are more nice than economical.

BEANS A LA POULETTE.--Boil some young beans till they are tender, and put them into a saucepan with a little b.u.t.ter, sugar, pepper, and salt, and sufficient flour to prevent the b.u.t.ter cooking oily; stew them in this a short time, _i.e._, till they appear to begin to boil, as the water from the beans will mix with the b.u.t.ter and flour and look like thin b.u.t.ter sauce thicken this with one or two yolks of eggs, and serve.

BEANS A LA BOURGEOISE.--Place the beans in a saucepan, with a piece of b.u.t.ter, a small quant.i.ty of shallot chopped fine, and a teaspoonful of savoury herbs; toss them about in this a little time, and then add a little water, sufficient to moisten them so that they can stew; add a little sugar, and when tender thicken the water with some beaten-up egg.

BEANS, FRENCH, PLAIN BOILED.--French beans are only good when fresh gathered, and the younger they are the better. When small they can be boiled whole, in which case they only require the tips cut off and the string that runs down the side removed. When they are more fully grown they will require, in addition to being trimmed in this manner, to be cut into thin strips, and when very old it will be found best to cut them slanting. They must be thrown into boiling salted water, and boiled till they are tender. The time for boiling varies with the age; very young ones will not take more than a quarter of an hour, and if old ones are not tender in half an hour they had better be made into a puree. As soon as the beans are tender, drain them off, and serve them very hot; the chief point to bear in mind, if we wish to have our beans nice, is, they must be eaten directly they are drained from the water in which they are boiled.

They are spoilt by what is called being kept hot, and possess a marvellous facility of getting cold in a very short s.p.a.ce of time.

In vegetarian cookery, when beans are eaten without being an accompaniment to meat, some form of fat is desirable. When the beans are drained we can add either b.u.t.ter or oil. When a lump of _Maitre d'hotel_ b.u.t.ter is added they form what the French call _haricots vert a la Maitre d'hotel_. In this case, a slight suspicion of garlic may be added by rubbing the stew-pan in which the French beans are tossed together with the _Maitre d'hotel b.u.t.ter_. When oil is added, a little chopped parsley will be found an improvement, as well as pepper, salt, and a suspicion of nutmeg.

French beans are very nice flavoured with oil and garlic, and served in a border of macaroni.

FRENCH BEAN PUDDING.--When French beans are very old they are sometimes made into a pudding as follows:--They must be trimmed, cut up, boiled, with or without the addition of a few savoury herbs. They must be then mashed in a basin, tied up in a well-b.u.t.tered and then floured cloth, and boiled for some time longer. The pudding can then be turned out. A still better way of making a French bean pudding is to rub the beans through the wire sieve, leaving the strings behind, flavouring the pudding with a few savoury herbs, a little sugar, pepper, and salt, and, if liked, a suspicion of garlic; add one or two well-beaten-up eggs, and put the mixture in a round pudding-basin, and bake it till it sets. This can be turned out on the centre of a dish, and a few young French beans placed round the base to ornament it, in conjunction with some pieces of fried bread cut into pretty shapes.

BROCOLI.--Trim the outer leaves off a brocoli, and cut off the stalk even, so that it will stand upright. Soak the brocoli in salt and water for some time, in order to get rid of any insects. Throw the brocoli into boiling water that has been salted, and boil till it is tender, the probable time for young brocoli being about a quarter of an hour. It should be served on a dish with the flower part uppermost; and b.u.t.ter sauce, sauce Allemande, or Dutch sauce can be served separately, or poured over the surface.

When several heads of brocoli are served at once, it is important to cut the stalks flat, as directed, before boiling. After they have been thoroughly drained _upside down_, they should be placed on the dish, flower part uppermost, and placed together as much as possible to look like one large brocoli. If sauce is poured over them, the sauce should be sufficiently thick to be spread, and every part of the flower should be covered. Half a teaspoonful of chopped blanched parsley may be sprinkled over the top, and improves the appearance of the dish.

N.B.--We would particularly call attention to the importance of draining brocoli and cauliflower very thoroughly, especially when any sauce is served with the brocoli. When the dish is cut into, nothing looks more disagreeable than to see the white sauce running off the brocoli into green water at the bottom of the dish.

BROCOLI GREENS.--The outside leaves of brocoli should not be thrown away, but eaten. Too often they are trimmed off at the greengrocer's or at the market, and, we presume, utilised for the purpose of feeding cattle. They can be boiled exactly like white cabbages, and are equal to them, if not superior, in flavour. To boil them, _see_ CABBAGE, WHITE, LARGE.

BRUSSELS SPROUTS.--These must be first washed in cold water and all the little pieces of decayed leaves trimmed away. Throw them into boiling salted water; the water must be kept boiling the whole time, without a lid on the saucepan, and if the quant.i.ty of water be sufficiently large not to be taken off the boil by the sprouts being thrown in they will be sent to table of a far brighter green colour than otherwise. In order to ensure this, throw in the sprouts a few at a time, picking out the big ones to throw in first. Sprouts, as soon as they are tender--probable time a quarter of an hour--should be drained and served _quickly_. When served as a dish by themselves, after being drained off, they can be placed in a stew-pan with a little b.u.t.ter, pepper, salt, nutmeg, and lemon-juice. They can then be served with toasted or fried bread.

CABBAGE, PLAIN BOILED.--Ordinary young cabbages should be first trimmed by having the outside leaves removed, the stalks cut off, and then should be cut in halves and allowed to soak some time in salt and water. They should be thrown into plenty of boiling water; the water should be kept boiling and uncovered. As soon as they are tender they should be strained off and served immediately. Young summer cabbages will not take longer than a quarter of an hour, or even less; old cabbages take nearly double that time. It is impossible to lay down any exact rule with regard to time.

Savoys generally take about half an hour. The large white cabbages met with in the West of England take longer and require a different treatment.

When cabbage is served as a dish by itself it will be found a great improvement to add either b.u.t.ter or oil to moisten the cabbage after it is thoroughly drained off. In order to ensure the b.u.t.ter not oiling, but adhering to the cabbage, it is best after the b.u.t.ter is added, and while you mix it with the cabbage, to shake the flour-dredger two or three times over the vegetable. In Germany, many add vinegar and sugar to the cabbage.

CABBAGE, LARGE WHITE.--In the West of England cabbages grow to an immense size, owing, probably, to the moist heat, and have been exhibited in agricultural shows over twenty pounds in weight and as big as an eighteen gallon cask. These cabbages are best boiled as follows:--After being cut up and thoroughly washed, it will be found that the greater part of the cabbage resembles what in ordinary cabbage would be called stalk, and, of course, the leaves vary very considerably in thickness from the hard stalk end up to the leaf. Have plenty of boiling water ready salted, now cut off the stalk part where it is thickest and throw this in first. Wait till the water comes to the boil again and let it boil for a few minutes. Then throw in the next thickest part and again wait till the water re-boils, and so on, reserving the thin leafy part to be thrown in last of all. By this means, and this only, do we get the cabbage boiled uniformly. Had we thrown in all at once one of two things would be inevitable--either the stalk would be too hard to be eaten or the leafy part over-boiled. A large white cabbage takes about an hour to boil tender, and a piece of soda should be added to the water. When the cabbage is well drained, it can be served either plain or moistened, and made to look oily by the addition of a piece of b.u.t.ter. As the cabbage is very white, the dish is very much improved by the addition of a little chopped parsley sprinkled over the top, not for the sake of flavour but appearance.

CABBAGE AND CREAM.--Ordinary cabbages are sometimes served stewed with a little cream. They should be first parboiled, then the moisture squeezed from them, and then they must be put in a stew-pan with a little b.u.t.ter, pepper, salt and nutmeg, and a spoonful of flour should be shaken over the cabbage in order to prevent the b.u.t.ter being too oily. When the cabbage is stewed till it is perfectly tender, add a few spoonfuls of cream, stir up, and make the whole thoroughly hot, and serve with fried or toasted bread.

CABBAGE, RED.--Red cabbages are chiefly used for pickling. They are sometimes served fresh. They should be cut across so that the cabbage shreds, boiled till they are tender, the moisture thoroughly extracted, and then put into a stew-pan with a little b.u.t.ter, pepper, and salt, and a few shakes of flour from the flour-dredger. After stirring for ten minutes or a quarter of an hour, squeeze the juice of a lemon over them and serve.

CARROTS, BOILED.--When carrots are boiled and served as a course by themselves, they ought to be young. This dish is constantly met with abroad in early summer, but is rarely seen in England, except at the tables of vegetarians. The carrots should be trimmed, thoroughly washed, and, if necessary, slightly sc.r.a.ped, and the point at the end, which looks like a piece of string, should be cut off. They should be thrown into fast boiling water (salted) in order to preserve their colour. When tender they can be served with some kind of good white sauce, or sauce Allemande or Dutch sauce. Perhaps this latter sauce is best of all, as it looks like rich custard. Part of the red carrot should show uncovered by any sauce.

They are best placed in a circle and the thick sauce poured in the centre; a very little chopped blanched parsley can be sprinkled on the top of the sauce. In making Dutch sauce for carrots use lemon-juice instead of tarragon vinegar.

CARROTS, FRIED.--Fried carrots can be made from full-grown carrots. They must be first parboiled and then cut in slices; they must then be dipped in well-beaten-up egg, and then covered with fine dry bread-crumbs and fried a nice brown in smoking hot oil in a frying-basket. The slices of carrot should be peppered and salted before being dipped in the egg.