DIFFERENT KINDS OF DRESSINGS
There are two big classes of dressings, brown and white. The brown dressings are usually made with meat juices or extracts known as "stock," or by first browning the flour which is used to thicken them. The white or cream dressings are made with white stock, the water in which vegetables, onion, celery, rice, chicken or mutton have been cooked, milk or cream as the liquid ingredient, and thickened with white flour. The brown dressings are more frequently served with meats, poultry and game, the white or cream dressings with fish and vegetables.
Dressings are also named by the main ingredient from which they gain their flavor, as Mushroom Dressing, Tomato Dressing, Mint Dressing, Cheese Dressing.
Other dressings are classified by the ingredient with which they are thickened, as Flour and Butter Dressings, Cornstarch Dressings, Egg Dressings and Drawn Butter Dressings.
HOW AND WHEN TO SEASON DRESSINGS WITH LEA & PERRINS' SAUCE
To procure the full zest, piquancy and flavor of Lea & Perrins' Sauce in seasoning any dressing or gravy, you must add the Lea & Perrins' Sauce just before removing the dressing from the fire. If the dressing must stand for any length of time, do not add Lea & Perrins' Sauce until just before serving time.
The proportion of Lea & Perrins' Sauce to add to meat dressings and gravies is, for an average taste, about two teaspoonfuls of Lea & Perrins' to every cupful of dressing. To delicate white stock dressings and vegetable sauces, in which the flavor of the vegetable should dominate, use one-half of a teaspoonful of Lea & Perrins' Sauce to every cupful of dressing.
When such vegetables as onion, bay leaf, carrots or other highly seasoned vegetables are used in a sauce, they should be cooked in the butter or fat with which the sauce is made before the liquid is added. But if the vegetable which is used in the dressing is to be retained in the sauce, it is frequently added after the dressing has been completed. This is the case when chopped olives, asparagus tips, mushrooms and other vegetables are used.