KIDNEYS SAUTÉS.
Like many other articles of diet, kidneys within the last ten years have been doubled in price, and are so scarce as to be regarded as luxuries. The method of cooking them generally in use is extravagant, and renders them tasteless and indigestible. Kidneys should never be cooked rapidly, and those persons who cannot eat them slightly underdone should forego them. One kidney dressed as directed in the following recipe will go as far as two cooked in the ordinary manner—an instance, if one were needed, of the economy of well-prepared food.
Choose fine large kidneys, skin them and cut each the round way into thin slices: each kidney should yield from ten to twelve slices. Have ready a tablespoonful of flour highly seasoned with pepper and salt and well mixed together; dip each piece of kidney in it. Cut some neat thin squares of streaked bacon, fry them very slowly in a little butter; when done, put them on the dish for serving, and keep hot whilst you sauté the kidneys, which put into the fat the bacon was cooked in. In about a minute the gravy will begin to rise on the upper side, then turn the kidneys and let them finish cooking slowly; when they are done, as they will be in three to four minutes, the gravy will again begin to rise on the side which is uppermost. Put the kidneys on the dish with the bacon, and pour over them a spoonful or two of plain beef gravy, or water thickened with a little flour, boiled and mixed with the fat and gravy from the kidneys in the frying-pan. If there is too much fat in the pan, pour it away before boiling up the gravy. Serve the kidneys on a hot-water dish.
TINNED KIDNEYS WITH MUSHROOMS.
(Tomoana Brand.)
Dry a half-tin of champignons in a cloth, or, if convenient, prepare a similar quantity of fresh button mushrooms; add to these a few pieces of dried mushrooms, previously soaked for ten minutes in tepid water, put them into a stewpan with a slice of butter, and stir constantly for six minutes, then add two or three kidneys cut in small neat pieces, in the shape of dice is best, and continue stirring until the kidneys are hot through, taking care to do them slowly; at the last moment season with pepper and salt, and serve very hot. Garnish the dish with fried sippets of bread.
KIDNEYS WITH PICCALILLI SAUCE.
(Tomoana Brand.)
Take the kidneys out of the gravy, and cut them into six slices. Mix a small teaspoonful of curry powder with three teaspoonfuls of fine flour and a small pinch of salt. Dip each slice in this mixture, and when all are done put them in the frying-pan with a little butter, and let them get slowly hot through. When done, put the kidneys in the centre of a hot dish, and pour round them a sauce made as follows: Boil up the gravy of the kidneys, and stir into it sufficient minced piccalilli pickles to make it quite thick, add a teaspoonful of flour to a tablespoonful of the piccalilli vinegar, stir into the sauce, and when all has boiled up together, pour it round the kidneys.