September Dinner - Wednesday

We are halfway through our week of Regency and Georgian meals. Today Elizabeth Lea, and is in the kitchen teaching our cook many of her secrets from her recently published book Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers, by Elizabeth E. Lea.

To impress the family with her talents Ms Lea is preparing a dinner menu of:

First course: Chicken Soup

Second course: Mutton Chops, Celery Sauce, Brain Cakes, Bacon Dumplings, Water Rolls,

Third course: Peach Pie, Apple Pudding

FIRST COURSE:

CHICKEN SOUP

Cut up the chicken; cut each joint, and let it boil an hour; make dumplings of a pint of milk, an egg, a little salt and flour, stirred in till quite stiff; drop this in, a spoonful at a time, while it is boiling; stir in a little thickening, with enough pepper, salt and parsley, to season the whole; let it boil a few minutes longer, and take it up in a tureen. Chopped celery is a great improvement to chicken soup; and new corn, cut off the cob, and put in when it is half done, gives it a very nice flavor.

SECOND COURSE:

MUTTON CHOPS

Cut some pieces of mutton, either with or without bone, about an inch thick; have the gridiron hot, first rubbing it with a little suet; put on the chops, turning them frequently, and butter and season them with pepper and salt as you cook them; then dish them on a hot dish and add more butter.

CELERY SAUCE

Take a large bunch of celery, cut it fine, and boil it till soft, in a pint of water; thicken it with butter and flour, and season it with salt, pepper, and mace.

BRAIN CAKES

When the head is cloven, take out the brains and clear them of strings, beat them up with the yelks of two eggs, some crumbs of bread, pepper, salt, fine parsley, a spoonful of cream, and a spoonful of flour; when they are well mixed, drop them with a spoon into a frying-pan with a little hot butter, and fry them of a light-brown color.

BACON DUMPLINGS

Cut slices of cooked bacon, and pepper them; roll out crust as for apple dumplings; slice some potatoes very thin, and put them in the crust with the meat; close them up, and let them boil fast an hour; when done, take them out carefully with a ladle.

WATER ROLLS

Make a rising of a quart of warm water, a little salt, a tea-cup of yeast, two spoonsful of butter and flour; let this rise, and knead it with as much flour as will make a soft dough, and work it well; when it has risen again, mould it out, and bake half an hour.

A nice griddle cake may be made by rolling this out, and baking it on the griddle or dripping-pan of a stove.

THIRD COURSE:

PEACH PIE

Take mellow clingstone peaches, pare, but do not cut them; put them in a deep pie plate lined with crust, sugar them well, put in a table-spoonful of water, and sprinkle a little flour over the peaches; cover with a thick crust, in which make a cut in the centre, and bake from three-quarters to one hour.

APPLE PUDDING

Take three pints of stewed apples, well mashed, melt a pound of butter, beat ten eggs with two pounds of sugar, and mix all together with a glass of brandy and wine; pat in nutmeg to your taste, and bake in puff paste.

Tomorrow Mrs Beeton and William Kitchiner share the kitchen to whip a wonderland of food.

Sandie