This is a particularly delightful way of cooking mutton, for it retains all the juice and flavour of the meat, and is exceedingly light and digestible.
Choose a nice solid piece of mutton, the fillet end of the leg is the best. Make a good suet crust, using beef suet and water; roll it out to about a quarter of an inch in thickness; it must not be too thin. Keep it a square shape, and make it large enough to contain the meat and completely cover it. Place the meat in the centre of the crust, which neatly fold over it, pinching the opening well together after damping, and sprinkle flour over it. Then thickly grease a paper bag large enough to hold it easily, and gently slide it in. If the meat weighs about four pounds it will take about an hour and a half to cook, the oven being very hot at first, and the heat reduced by half after ten minutes. This dish is extremely nice, the meat particularly juicy and tender, and the crust superior in flavour to that cooked in any other way.
THE HOMELY IRISH STEW
is admirable cooked in a paper bag. Buy two pounds of small neck of mutton chops, trim nicely and take away excess of bone and fat. Cut two or three small onions into rather thin slices, and two pounds of potatoes into thick slices, sprinkle meat, onions, and potatoes with herbs finely rubbed to powder, salt and pepper to taste, add a large breakfastcupful of water. Fasten the bag very securely, and cook in a hot oven for one hour. Turn into a very hot dish.
HARICOT STEAK.
Take a pound and a half of good steak, with no gristle or sinew in it. Cut into neat pieces about two inches square. Chop an onion finely, cut several tomatoes in slices and add these, also some green peas, and young carrots and turnips cut in dice. Rub a teaspoonful of “Bisto” smooth with a little water, and add it to a breakfastcupful of water. If any sour milk is at hand, a tablespoonful of this will be a great improvement. Tie together a bay leaf, a few sprigs of parsley and thyme, and put this in also. Put all the materials into a good-sized paper bag, which has been well greased, fasten very carefully, and cook in a hot oven for forty-five minutes.
STEAKS.
It has been said that a steak grilled over an open fire is the perfection of steak, but that is merely because steak cooked in a paper bag has not yet become known. Well grease a paper bag, put in a pound of rump steak cut in a thick slice, and put on the grid in a hot oven for about fifteen minutes.
CHOPS
are daintier and more savoury done in a paper bag than in any other way. Choose loin chops, trim them very nicely, and lay side by side in a well greased bag. Put in a hot oven and cook for about fifteen minutes.