La cuisine creole

by Lafcadio Hearn

ENTREES

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KIDNEY AND MUSHROOM STEW

Cut the kidneys into slices, wash and dry them carefully; pepper and salt them, roll them in flour, and fry in butter till of a delicate brown color. Pour some plain beef stock, or beef gravy, in the pan; add a chopped onion, and stew for half an hour; then put in a cupful of mushrooms, and cook for fifteen minutes. Mushroom catsup will serve as a substitute. Use one-half the quantity of catsup.

STEWED LAMB CHOPS WITH GREEN PEAS

Season the chops with pepper and salt; roll in flour and fry to a pale brown. When done, if the chops are very fat, pour some of it into the stock-pot and cover the chops with boiling water. Parboil a pint of green peas; add them to the chops, together with a large spoonful of sweet butter. Dredge in a spoonful of flour, and let all stew gently for half an hour.

IRISH STEW

Take from one to three pounds of loin of mutton, or ribs of beef; cut it into chops; add by weight as many white potatoes, sliced, as there is beef. Throw in from two to six chopped onions, according to size, some pepper and salt, and a large spoonful of butter to each pound of meat. Let all stew gently for two hours and serve with boiled rice or macaroni.

PIGEON STEW

Pick and wash the pigeons, stuff them with bread crumbs, parsley, pepper, salt and butter mixed; dust with flour, and put into a pan to brown. Add butter and a little soup-stock or gravy. Stew gently until tender. Before dishing add a glass of wine if approved, if not, a little more stock, if the gravy has become too thick.

TRIPE WITH MUSHROOMS

Clean and parboil tripe before cooking. When it is white and tender, cut it into pieces suitable to fry; pepper and salt it, and dip it in flour or rolled cracker, then drop it into hot bacon fat. When browned on both sides, take up and make a gravy of some of the fat in which it was fried, a little flour, and a wineglass of good vinegar. Pour this around the tripe and serve with mushrooms.

STEWED TRIPE, PLAIN

Cut a pound of tripe in long narrow pieces, lay it in a stew-pan and add a cup of milk, or milk and water, a piece of butter as large as a hen’s egg, a tablespoonful of flour sifted in, a bunch of parsley, and a green onion, if desired. Cook slowly for nearly two hours.

TO FRY TRIPE BROWN

It must be thoroughly boiled and tender, or no frying will make it good. Let it be perfectly cold, cut it in pieces, roll each piece in salt, pepper and flour, and fry brown in bacon grease. Frying tripe in lard makes it tasteless. When nicely brown take it up, dredge a little flour in the gravy, and put in a half cup of vinegar. Serve in a sauceboat, or pour over the tripe as preferred.

SCALLOPS OF MUTTON, WITH MUSHROOMS

“Sautez,” or fry the scallops brown, then pour off the fat, add a glass of wine, a dozen button mushrooms, three ounces of truffles cut in pieces, and a cup of broth, or the stock of plain soup without vegetables. Simmer gently, and finish by adding the juice of a lemon.

HASHED BEEF, PLAIN

Slice some beef in very thin pieces, season with pepper and salt, and shake a little flour over it. Next, chop a medium sized onion and put it (without the beef) into a stew-pan with a tablespoonful of mushroom or tomato catsup. Boil for a few minutes, then add a pint of broth stock, or gravy-soup; boil it down to half the quantity. Five minutes before serving, throw in the cold sliced beef; let it boil five minutes and serve on toasted bread.

SANDWICHES. VERY FINE

Take half a pound of nice sweet butter, three tablespoonfuls of mixed mustard, the same of sweet oil, a little salt, pepper and the yolk of an egg. Put it over the fire and stir till it thickens; set it by to cool and chop fine some tongue or boiled ham. Cut the bread thin, then spread on the dressing and over it put a layer of ham or tongue. Press the slices of bread hard together, trim the edges and garnish with curled parsley.

SANDWICHES OF VARIOUS KINDS, FOR PIC-NICS

Home-made bread cuts better for sandwiches than baker’s bread, so if you wish the sandwiches very nice, it is better to make a loaf at home. For bread and butter sandwiches, cut the bread very thin, spread it evenly with sweet butter, and lay the buttered sides together. Lay them in circles on a plate and put parsley on top of them. Sandwiches may be made with cheese sliced and placed between the buttered bread, or with hard-boiled eggs sliced or chopped, and put between. The best are made with boiled smoked tongue or ham, with French mustard spread over the butter.

TO MAKE FRENCH MUSTARD

Put on a plate an ounce of the best mustard, add to it salt, a clove of garlic or a few tarragon leaves. Mince the garlic, stir it in, and pour on vinegar till it is of the proper thickness for use.

VEAL HASH FOR BREAKFAST. VERY NICE

Take a pint cup of cold veal cut small, dredge it with a spoonful of flour, and add a piece of butter the size of a hen’s egg. Put all in a stew-pan with half a pint of water; cover up and put it on the stove; let it simmer for an hour at least, stir it occasionally and add to it some parsley and sweet herbs. Just before serving add a teacup of milk, and serve on toasted bread.

PLAIN VEAL AND HAM PIE. EASILY MADE

Cut a pound of veal and a pound of ham into slices, salt them slightly; chop a cupful of mushrooms, a bunch of parsley, some eschalots, and fry them lightly; add to them a pint of soup stock, boil it together for five minutes and pour it into the piepan where you have placed your ham and veal. Put a dozen hard-boiled yolks of eggs in among the contents of the pie, cover it with a nice paste and bake it one hour and a half.

FRICANDELLONS OF COLD VEAL OR MUTTON

Mince the meat very fine, soak a thick slice of bread in boiling milk, mash it, and mix it with the cold meat; add a beaten egg (or two if you have more than a quarter of a pound of meat), some chopped parsley and thyme, a little grated lemon peel, pepper and salt; make this into cakes, and fry in butter or lard. Serve them dry on a serviette, accompanied with a gravy made from the bones of the minced meat which must be cooked with an onion, a little butter and flour, and milk; when brown it is ready.

VEAL AND HAM RAISED PIE, OR TIMBALE

Lard two pounds of lean veal well with strips of fat bacon, and add two pounds of ham. Line a deep pan or mould with rich paste; lay in the bottom of this a layer of liver forcemeat, then the veal and ham, and so on in alternate layers, till the dish is full. Season between each layer with thyme, bay leaf, marjoram, or any dried and pounded sweet herbs; fill up the hollow places, and cover the pan with paste. Decorate the top of the pie with cut dough leaves; make a hole in the top to pour in the gravy, and let out the steam. Egg the top of the pie and bake it for three hours; withdraw it from the oven, and place the point of a funnel in the hole in the top, and pour in about a pint of good gravy or veal consommé. This should be eaten cold. It will be jellied all through if cooked enough.

VEAL SALAD FOR LUNCH

To a pint of minced veal add three heads of celery. Pour over this a dressing made of the yolks of four hard-boiled eggs, a tablespoonful of dry mustard, and a large spoonful of olive oil. When this dressing is well beaten and perfectly smooth, add to it slowly (to keep from curdling) four tablespoonfuls of good wine vinegar, a little cayenne and salt. Garnish the dish with parsley and celery leaves.

VEAL SWEETBREADS, WITH TOMATOES

Set over the fire two quarts of ripe tomatoes; stew slowly, and strain through a coarse sieve. Add to them four or five sweetbreads, well trimmed and soaked in warm water; season with salt and cayenne pepper. Thicken with three spoonfuls of flour and a quarter of a pound of butter, mixed; cook slowly till done, and just before serving stir in the beaten yolks of three eggs.

VEAL LOAF FOR LUNCH OR TEA

Mince cold roast veal as fine as possible; add a fourth part as much fat ham, a cup of grated bread, or cracker crumbs, and two well-beaten eggs to bind the crumbs together; season with salt, and pepper (black and red), mix and form it into a loaf. Glaze the outside with yolk of egg, and sprinkle over it fine cracker crumbs. Bake half an hour, and serve with gravy made from the bones, etc., of the veal. Serve the gravy hot.

MINCED VEAL AND POACHED EGGS

One pound of cold veal chopped very fine. Boil half a pint of sauce till it begins to thicken or glaze; then add a cup of cream and the minced veal; season with pepper and salt. When dished put six poached eggs around it, alternately with slices of red tongue or ham. This is a nice breakfast dish, and uses to advantage the cold meats from the day previous.

CALF OR PIG BRAINS FRIED

Wash the brains in salt water, and wipe dry and dip in wheat flour or in beaten egg and then in bread crumbs. Fry in butter or lard, and season with pepper, salt and lemon sliced.

CALVES’ AND PIGS’ FEET FRIED IN BATTER

Wash and cook the feet tender, the day before using. When wanted, wash and roll them in a little flour to dry. Set them by, and make a batter of flour, eggs, milk, and a little salt and pepper (one egg is sufficient to two feet); take out the largest bones and roll the feet in batter, or lay them in a pan with hot lard, and pour the batter over them. Fry a delicate brown and serve on toast.

CALF’S HEAD BOILED OR BAKED

Have a head nicely cleaned, and soak it in salt and water to make it look white. Remove the eyes. Take out the tongue and salt it. Of the brains make a separate dish. To boil the head put it in a pot of lukewarm water and boil till very tender. Serve with sauce made of butter, flour and water, some lemon juice and tomatoes. If to bake, dredge flour over it, put on bits of butter, season with pepper, salt, and sweet herbs, set in a hot oven and baste with the water in which it was boiled.

POTTED CALF’S HEAD

Boil a calf’s head or half a beef’s head with a cow-heel until very tender. When done, pick out all the bones and chop the meat and tendons very fine; strain the liquor they were boiled in, and set it away to cool; skim off the fat and pour the jelly over the meat. Season with a teaspoonful of black pepper, salt, and thyme, powdered; boil all together for a few minutes, and pour into bowls or jelly moulds. Serve with parsley. Add a little garlic if the flavor is liked.

COLLARED CALF’S HEAD WITH BRAINS. COLD DISH

Boil half, or the whole calf’s head, as you require. Cover it with water and let it simmer for two hours; take it up, remove the bones, and put them back into the broth; let it continue to stew, adding to it sage leaves, and an onion. Cut the meat of head and brains into a stew-pan, adding to it some slices of ham, pepper and salt, the chopped tongue and an eschalot; let these cook two hours. The brains should be beaten up with two eggs, before putting them in, which should be the last thing. Then pour all in a mould and fill up with the liquor from the head, which should be boiled to a jelly.

CURRY OF COLD ROAST FOWL

Take two large onions, two apples, two ounces of butter, a dessertspoonful of curry powder or paste, half pint of gravy or soup-stock, one spoonful of lemon juice and two tomatoes.

Fry the fowl and the onions in butter to a light brown color; stew the apples, or fry them also. Put all, onions, apples, gravy and fowl, with the tomatoes and lemon juice into a stewing pan and let it stew thirty minutes; then serve with boiled rice. If curry paste is used instead of curry powder, no lemon is required.

WELSH RAREBIT

Cut a pound of cheese in slices a quarter of an inch thick, fry them together five minutes in butter, then add two well-beaten eggs, a little mustard and pepper; stir it up and send it to table hot, on slices of buttered bread.

HAM TOAST FOR LUNCHEON

Beat the yolk of an egg with a tablespoonful of sweet milk; set it on the fire to warm, and thicken it with grated or finely chopped ham; let it simmer a few moments and pour it on buttered toast. This is for one person.

WINTER DISH OF BAKED BEANS AND PORK

This is a very heavy dish, but nourishing, and it is well to know how to cook it, as it is economical.

Pick the beans, wash them, and put them to soak over night in plenty of water. In the morning pour this water off and put the beans in a kettle of cold water; place them on the fire and let them simmer till quite tender. Take them up and drain them; when thoroughly drained, put them in a baking pan with a large piece of salt pork; score the pork and lay it deep in among the beans, not upon them. Pour boiling water over them and bake till brown. If in a range, leave them in all night. This constant change of water improves the beans very much, and makes them less flatulent.