The Virginia Housewife by Mary Randolph
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Mary Randolph >> The Virginia Housewife
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11 THE VIRGINIA HOUSEWIFE
Or, Methodical Cook
By
MRS. MARY RANDOLPH
1860
Method Is the Soul of Management
PREFACE
The difficulties I encountered when I first entered on the duties of a
housekeeping life, from the want of books sufficiently clear and concise
to impart knowledge to a Tyro, compelled me to study the subject, and by
actual experiment to reduce every thing in the culinary line, to proper
weights and measures. This method I found not only to diminish the
necessary attention and labour, but to be also economical: for, when the
ingredients employed were given in just proportions, the article made
was always equally good. The government of a family, bears a Lilliputian
resemblance to the government of a nation. The contents of the Treasury
must be known, and great care taken to keep the expenditures from being
equal to the receipts. A regular system must be introduced into each
department, which may be modified until matured, and should then pass
into an inviolable law. The grand arcanum of management lies in three
simple rules:--"Let every thing be done at a proper time, keep every
thing in its proper place, and put every thing to its proper use." If
the mistress of a family, will every morning examine minutely the
different departments of her household, she must detect errors in their
infant state, when they can be corrected with ease; but a few days'
growth gives them gigantic strength: and disorder, with all her
attendant evils, are introduced. Early rising is also essential to the
good government of a family. A late breakfast deranges the whole
business of the day, and throws a portion of it on the next, which opens
the door for confusion to enter. The greater part of the following
receipts have been written from memory, where they were impressed by
long continued practice. Should they prove serviceable to the young
inexperienced housekeeper, it will add greatly to that gratification
which an extensive circulation of the work will be likely to confer.
M. RANDOLPH. Washington, January, 1831.
INTRODUCTION.
Management is an art that may be acquired by every woman of good sense
and tolerable memory. If, unfortunately, she has been bred in a family
where domestic business is the work of chance, she will have many
difficulties to encounter; but a determined resolution to obtain this
valuable knowledge, will enable her to surmount all obstacles. She must
begin the day with an early breakfast, requiring each person to be in
readiness to take their seats when the muffins, buckwheat cakes, &c. are
placed on the table. This looks social and comfortable. When the family
breakfast by detachments, the table remains a tedious time; the servants
are kept from their morning's meal, and a complete derangement takes
place in the whole business of the day. No work can be done till
breakfast is finished. The Virginia ladies, who are proverbially good
managers, employ themselves, while their servants are eating, in washing
the cups, glasses, &c.; arranging the cruets, the mustard, salt-sellers,
pickle vases, and all the apparatus for the dinner table. This occupies
but a short time, and the lady has the satisfaction of knowing that they
are in much better order than they would be if left to the servants. It
also relieves her from the trouble of seeing the dinner table prepared,
which should be done every day with the same scrupulous regard to exact
neatness and method, as if a grand company was expected. When the
servant is required to do this daily, he soon gets into the habit of
doing it well; and his mistress having made arrangements for him in the
morning, there is no fear of bustle and confusion in running after
things that may be called for during the hour of dinner. When the
kitchen breakfast is over, and the cook has put all things in their
proper places, the mistress should go in to give her orders. Let all the
articles intended for the dinner, pass in review before her: have the
butter, sugar, flour, meal, lard, given out in proper quantities; the
catsup, spice, wine, whatever may be wanted for each dish, measured to
the cook. The mistress must tax her own memory with all this: we have no
right to expect slaves or hired servants to be more attentive to our
interest than we ourselves are: they will never recollect these little
articles until they are going to use them; the mistress must then be
called out, and thus have the horrible drudgery of keeping house all
day, when one hour devoted to it in the morning, would release her from
trouble until the next day. There is economy as well as comfort in a
regular mode of doing business. When the mistress gives out every thing,
there is no waste; but if temptation be thrown in the way of
subordinates, not many will have power to resist it; besides, it is an
immoral act to place them in a situation which we pray to be exempt from
ourselves.
The prosperity and happiness of a family depend greatly on the order and
regularity established in it. The husband, who can ask a friend to
partake of his dinner in full confidence of finding his wife unruffled
by the petty vexations attendant on the neglect of household duties--who
can usher his guest into the dining-room assured of seeing that
methodical nicety which is the essence of true elegance,--will feel
pride and exultation in the possession of a companion, who gives to his
home charms that gratify every wish of his soul, and render the haunts
of dissipation hateful to him. The sons bred in such a family will be
moral men, of steady habits; and the daughters, if the mother shall have
performed the duties of a parent in the superintendence of their
education, as faithfully as she has done those of a wife, will each be a
treasure to her husband; and being formed on the model of an exemplary
mother, will use the same means for securing the happiness of her own
family, which she has seen successfully practised under the paternal
roof.
CONTENTS.
SOUPS.
Asparagus soup
Beef soup
Gravy soup
Soup with Bouilli
Veal soup
Oyster soup
Barley soup
Dried pea soup
Green pea soup
Ochra soup
Hare or Rabbit soup
Soup of any kind of old fowl
Catfish soup
Onion soup
To dress turtle
For the soup
Mock turtle soup of calf's head
BEEF.
Directions for curing beef
To dry beef for summer use
To corn beef in hot weather
Important observations on roasting, boiling, frying, &c.
Beef a-la-mode
Brisket of beef baked
Beef olives
To stew a rump of beef
A fricando of beef
An excellent method of dressing beef
To collar a flank of beef
To make hunter's beef
A nice little dish of beef
Beef steaks
To hash beef
Beef steak pie
Beef a-la-daube
VEAL.
Directions for the pieces in the different quarters of veal
Veal cutlets from the fillet or leg
Veal chops
Veal cutlets
Knuckle of veal
Baked fillet of veal
Scotch collops of veal
Veal olives
Ragout of a breast of veal
Fricando of veal
To make a pie of sweetbreads and oysters
Mock turtle of calf's head
To grill a calf's head
To collar a calf's head
Calf's heart, a nice dish
Calf's feet fricassee
To fry calf's feet
To prepare rennet
To hash a calf's head
To bake a calf's head
To stuff and roast calf's liver
To broil calf's liver
Directions for cleaning calf's head and feet
LAMB.
To roast the fore-quarter, &c.
Baked lamb
Fried lamb
To dress lamb's head and feet
MUTTON.
Boiled leg of mutton
Roasted leg of mutton
Baked leg of mutton
Steaks of a leg of mutton
To harrico mutton
Mutton chops
Boiled breast of mutton
Breast of mutton in ragout
To grill a breast of mutton
Boiled shoulder of mutton
Shoulder of mutton with celery sauce
Roasted loin of mutton
PORK.
To cure bacon
To make souse
To roast a pig
To barbecue shote
To roast a fore-quarter of shote
To make shote cutlets
To corn shote
Shote's head
Leg of pork with pease pudding
Stewed chine
To toast a ham
To stuff a ham
Soused feet in ragout
To make sausages
To make black puddings
A sea pie
To make paste for the pie
Bologna sausages
FISH.
To cure herrings
To bake sturgeon
To make sturgeon cutlets
Sturgeon steaks
To boil sturgeon
To bake a shad
To boil a shad
To roast a shad
To broil a shad
To boil rock fish
To fry perch
To pickle oysters
To make a curry of catfish
To dress a cod's head and shoulders
To make sauce for the cod's head
To dress a salt cod
Matelote of any kind of firm fish
Chowder, a sea dish
To pickle sturgeon
To caveach fish
To dress cod fish
Cod fish pie
To dress any kind of salted fish
To fricassee cod sounds and tongues
An excellent way to dress fish
Fish a-la-daub
Fish in jelly
To make egg sauce for a salt cod
To dress cod sounds
To stew carp
To boil eels
To pitchcock eels
To broil eels
To scollop oysters
To fry oysters
To make oyster loaves
POULTRY, &c.
To roast a goose
To make sauce for a goose
To boil ducks with onion sauce
To make onion sauce
To roast ducks
To boil a turkey with oyster sauce
To make sauce for a turkey
To roast a turkey
To make sauce for a turkey
To boil fowls
To make white sauce for fowls
Fricassee of small chickens
To roast large fowls
To make egg sauce
To boil young chickens
To roast young chickens
Fried chickens
To roast woodcocks or snipes
To roast wild ducks or teal
To boil pigeons
To roast pigeons
To roast partridges or any small birds
To broil rabbits
To roast rabbits
To stew wild ducks
To dress ducks with juice of oranges
To dress ducks with onions
To roast a calf's head
To make a dish of curry after the East Indian manner
Dish of rice to be served up with the curry, in a dish by itself
Ochra and tomatos
Gumbo--a West India dish
Pepper pot
Spanish method of dressing giblets
Paste for meat dumplins
To make an ollo--a Spanish dish
Ropa veija--Spanish
Chicken pudding, a favourite Virginia dish
To make polenta
Macaroni
Mock macaroni
To make croquets
To make vermicelli
Common patties
Eggs in croquets
Omelette souffle
Fondus
A nice twelve o'clock luncheon
Eggs a-la-creme
Sauce a-la-creme for the eggs
Cabbage a-la-creme
To make an omelette
Omelette--another way
Gaspacho--Spanish
Eggs and tomatos
To fricassee eggs
SAUCES.
Fish sauce to keep a year
Sauce for wild fowl
Sauce for boiled rabbits
Gravy
Forcemeat balls
Sauce for boiled ducks or rabbits
Lobster sauce
Shrimp sauce
Oyster sauce for fish
Celery sauce
Mushroom sauce
Common sauce
To melt butter
Caper sauce
Oyster catsup
Celery vinegar
VEGETABLES.
To dress salad
To boil potatos
To fry sliced potatos
Potatos mashed
Potatos mashed with onions
To roast potatos
To roast potatos under meat
Potato balls
Jerusalem artichokes
Cabbage
Savoys
Sprouts and young greens
Asparagus
Sea-kale
To scollop tomatos
To stew tomatos
Cauliflower
Red beet roots
Parsnips
Carrots
Turnips
To mash turnips
Turnip tops
French beans
Artichokes
Brocoli
Peas
Puree of turnips
Ragout of turnips
Ragout of French beans, snaps, string beans
Mazagan beans
Lima, or sugar beans
Turnip rooted cabbage
Egg plant
Potato pumpkin
Sweet potato
Sweet potatos stewed
Sweet potatos broiled
Spinach
Sorrel
Cabbage pudding
Squash or cimlin
Winter squash
Field peas
Cabbage with onions
Salsify
Stewed salsify
Stewed mushrooms
Broiled mushrooms
To boil rice
Rice journey, or johnny cake
PUDDINGS, &c.
Observations on puddings and cakes
Rice milk for a dessert
To make puff paste
To make mince-meat for pies
To make jelly from feet
A sweet-meat pudding
To make an orange pudding
An apple custard
Boiled loaf
Transparent pudding
Flummery
Burnt custard
An English plum pudding
Marrow pudding
Sippet pudding
Sweet potato pudding
An arrow root pudding
Sago pudding
Puff pudding
Rice pudding
Plum pudding
Almond pudding
Quire of paper pancakes
A curd pudding
Lemon pudding
Bread pudding
The Henrietta pudding
Tansey pudding
Cherry pudding
Apple pie
Baked apple pudding
A nice boiled pudding
An excellent and cheap dessert dish
Sliced apple pudding
Baked Indian meal pudding
Boiled Indian meal pudding
Pumpkin pudding
Fayette pudding
Maccaroni pudding
Potato paste
Compote of apples
Charlotte
Apple fritters
Bell fritters
Bread fritters
Spanish fritters
To make mush
CAKES.
Jumbals
Macaroone
To make drop biscuit
Tavern biscuit
Rusk
Ginger bread
Plebeian ginger bread
Sugar ginger bread
Dough nuts--a yankee cake
Risen cake
Pound cake
Savoy, or spunge cake
A rich fruit cake
Naples biscuit
Shrewsbury cakes
Little plum cakes
Soda cakes
To make bread
To make nice biscuit
Rice bread
Mixed bread
Patent yeast
To prepare the cakes
Another method for making yeast
Nice, buns
Muffins
French rolls
Crumpets
Apoquiniminc cakes
Batter cakes
Batter bread
Cream cakes
Soufle biscuits
Corn meal bread
Sweet potato buns
Rice woffles
Velvet cakes
Chocolate cakes
Wafers
Buckwheat cakes
Observations on ice creams
Ice creams
Vanilla cream
Raspberry cream
Strawberry cream
Cocoa nut cream
Chocolate cream
Oyster cream
Iced jelly
Peach cream
Coffee cream
Quince cream
Citron cream
Almond cream
Lemon cream
Lemonade iced
To make custard
To make a trifle
Rice blanc mange
Floating island
Syllabub
COLD CREAMS
Lemon cream
Orange cream
Raspberry cream
Tea cream
Sago cream
Barley cream
Gooseberry fool
To make slip
Curds and cream
Blanc mange
To make a hen's nest
Pheasants a-la-daub
Partridges a-la-daub
Chickens a-la-daub
To make savoury jelly
Turkey a-la-daub
Salmagundi
An excellent relish after dinner
To stew perch
PRESERVES
Directions for making preserves
To preserve cling-stone peaches
Cling-stones sliced
Soft peaches
Peach marmalade
Peach chips
Pears
Pear marmalade
Quinces
Currant jelly
Quince jelly
Quince marmalade
Cherries
Morello cherries
To dry cherries
Raspberry jam
To preserve strawberries
Strawberry jam
Gooseberries
Apricots in brandy
Peaches in brandy
Cherries in brandy
Magnum bonum plums in brandy
PICKLING.
Lemon pickle
Tomato catsup
Tomato marmalade
Tomato sweet marmalade
Tomato soy
Pepper vinegar
Mushroom catsup
Tarragon or astragon vinegar
Curry powder
To pickle cucumbers
Oil mangos
To make the stuffing for forty melons
To make yellow pickle
To make green pickles
To prepare vinegar for green or yellow pickle
To pickle onions
To pickle nastertiums
To pickle radish pods
To pickle English walnuts
To pickle peppers
To make walnut catsup
To pickle green nectarines, or apricots
To pickle asparagus
Observations on pickling
CORDIALS, &c
Ginger wine
Orgeat
Cherry shrub
Currant wine
To make cherry brandy
Rose brandy
Peach cordial
Raspberry cordial
Raspberry vinegar
Mint cordial
Hydromel, or mead
To make a substitute for arrack
Lemon cordial
Ginger beer
Spruce beer
Molasses beer
To keep lemon juice
Sugar vinegar
Honey vinegar
Syrup of vinegar
Aromatic vinegar
Vinegar of the four thieves
Lavender water
Hungarian water
To prepare cosmetic soap for washing the hands
Cologne water
Soft pomatum
To make soap
To make starch
To dry herbs
To clean silver utensils
To make blacking
To clean knives and forks
SOUPS
ASPARAGUS SOUP.
Take four large bunches of asparagus, scrape it nicely, cut off one inch
of the tops, and lay them in water, chop the stalks and put them on the
fire with a piece of bacon, a large onion cut up, and pepper and salt;
add two quarts of water, boil them till the stalks are quite soft, then
pulp them through a sieve, and strain the water to it, which must be put
back in the pot; put into it a chicken cut up, with the tops of
asparagus which had been laid by, boil it until these last articles are
sufficiently done, thicken with flour, butter and milk, and serve it up.
* * * * *
BEEF SOUP.
Take the hind shin of beef, cut off all the flesh off the leg-bone,
which must be taken away entirely, or the soup will be greasy. Wash the
meat clean and lay it in a pot, sprinkle over it one small
table-spoonful of pounded black pepper, and two of salt; three onions
the size of a hen's egg, cut small, six small carrots scraped and cut
up, two small turnips pared and cut into dice; pour on three quarts of
water, cover the pot close, and keep it gently and steadily boiling five
hours, which will leave about three pints of clear soup; do not let the
pot boil over, but take off the scum carefully, as it rises. When it has
boiled four hours, put in a small bundle of thyme and parsley, and a
pint of celery cut small, or a tea-spoonful of celery seed pounded.
These latter ingredients would lose their delicate flavour if boiled too
much. Just before you take it up, brown it in the following manner: put
a small table-spoonful of nice brown sugar into an iron skillet, set it
on the fire and stir it till it melts and looks very dark, pour into it
a ladle full of the soup, a little at a time; stirring it all the while.
Strain this browning and mix it well with the soup; take out the bundle
of thyme and parsley, put the nicest pieces of meat in your tureen, and
pour on the soup and vegetables; put in some toasted bread cut in dice,
and serve it up.
* * * * *
GRAVY SOUP.
Get eight pounds of coarse lean beef--wash it clean and lay it in your
pot, put in the same ingredients as for the shin soup, with the same
quantity of water, and follow the process directed for that. Strain the
soup through a sieve, and serve it up clear, with nothing more than
toasted bread in it; two table-spoonsful of mushroom catsup will add a
fine flavour to the soup.
* * * * *
SOUP WITH BOUILLI.
Take the nicest part of the thick brisket of beef, about eight pounds,
put it into a pot with every thing directed for the other soup; make it
exactly in the same way, only put it on an hour sooner, that you may
have time to prepare the bouilli; after it has boiled five hours, take
out the beef, cover up the soup and set it near the fire that it may
keep hot. Take the skin off the beef, have the yelk of an egg well
beaten, dip a feather in it and wash the top of your beef, sprinkle over
it the crumb of stale bread finely grated, put it in a Dutch oven
previously heated, put the top on with coals enough to brown, but not
burn the beef; let it stand nearly an hour, and prepare your gravy
thus:--Take a sufficient quantity of soup and the vegetables boiled in
it; add to it a table-spoonful of red wine, and two of mushroom catsup,
thicken with a little bit of butter and a little brown flour; make it
very hot, pour it in your dish, and put the beef on it. Garnish it with
green pickle, cut in thin slices, serve up the soup in a tureen with
bits of toasted bread.
* * * * *
VEAL SOUP.
Put into a pot three quarts of water, three onions cut small, one
spoonful of black pepper pounded, and two of salt, with two or three
slices of lean ham; let it boil steadily two hours; skim it
occasionally, then put into it a shin of veal, let it boil two hours
longer; take out the slices of ham, and skim off the grease if any
should rise, take a gill of good cream, mix with it two table-spoonsful
of flour very nicely, and the yelks of two eggs beaten well, strain this
mixture, and add some chopped parsley; pour some soup on by degrees,
stir it well, and pour it into the pot, continuing to stir until it has
boiled two or three minutes to take off the raw taste of the eggs. If
the cream be not perfectly sweet, and the eggs quite new, the thickening
will curdle in the soup. For a change you may put a dozen ripe tomatos
in, first taking off their skins, by letting them stand a few minutes in
hot water, when they may be easily peeled. When made in this way you
must thicken it with the flour only. Any part of the veal may be used,
but the shin or knuckle is the nicest.
* * * * *
OYSTER SOUP.
Wash and drain two quarts of oysters, put them on with three quarts of
water, three onions chopped up, two or three slices of lean ham, pepper
and salt; boil it till reduced one-half, strain it through a sieve,
return the liquid into the pot, put in one quart of fresh oysters, boil
it till they are sufficiently done, and thicken the soup with four
spoonsful of flour, two gills of rich cream, and the yelks of six new
laid eggs beaten well; boil it a few minutes after the thickening is put
in. Take care that it does not curdle, and that the flour is not in
lumps; serve it up with the last oysters that were put in. If the
flavour of thyme be agreeable, you may put in a little, but take care
that it does not boil in it long enough to discolour the soup.
* * * * *
BARLEY SOUP.
Put on three gills of barley, three quarts of water, few onions cut up,
six carrots scraped and cut into dice, an equal quantity of turnips cut
small; boil it gently two hours, then put in four or five pounds of the
rack or neck of mutton, a few slices of lean ham, with pepper and salt;
boil it slowly two hours longer and serve it up. Tomatos are an
excellent addition to this soup.
* * * * *
DRIED PEA SOUP.
Take one quart of split peas, or Lima beans, which are better; put them
in three quarts of very soft water with three onions chopped up, pepper
and salt; boil them two hours; mash them well and pass them through a
sieve; return the liquid into the pot, thicken it with a large piece of
butter and flour, put in some slices of nice salt pork, and a large
tea-spoonful of celery seed pounded; boil it till the pork is done, and
serve it up; have some toasted bread cut into dice and fried in butter,
which must be put in the tureen before you pour in the soup.
* * * * *
GREEN PEA SOUP.
Make it exactly as you do the dried pea soup, only in place of the
celery seed, put a handful of mint chopped small, and a pint of young
peas, which must be boiled in the soup till tender; thicken it with a
quarter of a pound of butter, and two spoonsful of flour.
* * * * *
OCHRA SOUP.
Get two double handsful of young ochra, wash and slice it thin, add two
onions chopped fine, put it into a gallon of water at a very early hour
in an earthen pipkin, or very nice iron pot; it must be kept steadily
simmering, but not boiling: put in pepper and salt. At 12 o'clock, put
in a handful of Lima beans; at half-past one o'clock, add three young
cimlins cleaned and cut in small pieces, a fowl, or knuckle of veal, a
bit of bacon or pork that has been boiled, and six tomatos, with the
skin taken off; when nearly done, thicken with a spoonful of butter,
mixed with one of flour. Have rice boiled to eat with it.
* * * * *
HARE OR RABBIT SOUP.
Cut up two hares, put them into a pot with a piece of bacon, two onions
chopped, a bundle of thyme and parsley, which must be taken out before
the soup is thickened, add pepper, salt, pounded cloves, and mace, put
in a sufficient quantity of water, stew it gently three hours, thicken
with a large spoonful of butter, and one of brown flour, with a glass of
red wine; boil it a few minutes longer, and serve it up with the nicest
parts of the hares. Squirrels make soup equally good, done the same way.
* * * * *
SOUP OF ANY KIND OF OLD FOWL.
_The, only way in which they are eatable._ Put the fowls in a coop and
feed them moderately for a fortnight; kill one and cleanse it, cut off
the legs and wings, and separate the breast from the ribs, which,
together with the whole back, must be thrown away, being too gross and
strong for use. Take the skin and fat from the parts cut off which are
also gross. Wash the pieces nicely, and put them on the fire with abort
a pound of bacon, a large onion chopped small, some pepper and salt, a
few blades of mace, a handful of parsley, cut up very fine, and two
quarts of water, if it be a common fowl or duck--a turkey will require
more water. Boil it gently for three hours, tie up a small bunch of
thyme, and let it boil in it half an hour, then take it out. Thicken
your soup with a large spoonful of butter rubbed into two of flour, the
yelks of two eggs, and half a pint of milk. Be careful not to let it
curdle in the soup.
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