The potatoes were well sprinkled with salt and the pan set in the oven. Molly had only intended having the lamb, and cut-up peaches and cream for dessert, yet, seeing she had time, for it was just a quarter to five now, and only the cloth for Marta to lay, and the cabbage to cook, she thought she would give Harry some of his beloved macaroni as a course. She therefore broke a few pipes of macaroni into pieces about six inches long, taking a dozen of them, and set them on to boil in water and a little salt till tender. While this was in process, she had sent Marta for some tomatoes from the vine, and when they came, showed her how to scald them, and herself squeezed the pulp from two large ones through a strainer, and set it in a small thick saucepan with a table-spoonful of butter, a salt-spoonful of salt, and a little pepper, and put it on the stove where it would slowly cook.
Marta had scalded half a dozen tomatoes and dropped them, as she skinned them, on some cracked ice. Molly took them when they were cold and firm, and with a sharp knife cut them into slices and set them in the ice-box.
“Now, Marta, come with me to set the dinner-table. I will show you, to-night, and expect you to remember afterwards. You first remove the cover and fold it, but leave on this white baize.”
Molly watched to see if the girl had remembered her instructions at lunch, but found she had not retained one idea.
“No, Marta, the middle fold, lengthwise, and exactly in the centre; now the flowers, now a plate to each person, the napkin to the left with a piece of bread in it, a large and a small knife, two forks and a spoon to each person; above these the glasses and a butter-plate.[1] Now put this carving-napkin in front of Mr. Bishop, lay the large table-mat there, and when you bring in the meat set the dish upon it. Now count the dishes and set a mat for each, one salt-cellar and pepper-caster at each right-hand corner, two table-spoons at the same place. Now that is all, and you can come and peel peaches.”
Molly heard the meat in the oven sputtering and hissing, and found it browning nicely. She basted it, turning the potatoes over, and closed the oven. It was twenty minutes past five.
“Marta, I want you to pay attention to everything I do, because the next time we have this dinner I shall expect you to cook it alone, and when you have learnt to roast one piece of meat properly, you will be able to roast any other. Remember the rules,—your oven must be quite hot when the meat goes in; if, after a while, you find danger of its burning, cool it, but meat can’t get brown too quickly to retain the juices. You must put no water in the pan, for that steams it. If your meat is so very lean that it will be dry, it is of such poor quality that you should not try to roast it (and that sort of meat you will not have to cook for me), or it is a part unsuitable for roasting, and should be cooked some other way. Baste often, and when meat is half done,—that is, brown and crisp on top,—turn it over, as I shall do that lamb in a few minutes. Above all things, meat must be brown if roasted.”
Marta had peeled the eight peaches Molly had given her, and the latter now told her to three parts fill a gallon saucepan with water from the kettle, which she had taken care to see full when she set the oven to heat, and which was now boiling.
“Put it in the hottest spot, Marta; we want it to boil quickly. Now that cabbage: it is only a small head, so you can cut it in four, and remove the outer leaves,—also cut away the core; wash it thoroughly in two waters; now hold the colander in your left hand, and as you wash the cabbage through the second water lay it in it; then pour the water out of the pan and set the colander in it, so that all water may run off the cabbage; the thing we want is to check the boiling water as little as possible, which the cabbage, filled with cold water, would do. Now I am going to turn the meat over, so that the under side will brown, while you pour the water off that macaroni; it is just tender but not breaking.”
The lamb was brown and crisp on the top when Molly turned the under side up, so that it might become equally so. Marta brought the macaroni back to the stove, and Molly poured over it the tomato juice she had put to reduce. There was enough to moisten the macaroni and yet leave a little in the saucepan. She put it at the back of the stove, where it would keep about boiling-point, but not burn.