Science in the Kitchen / A Scientific Treatise On Food Substances and Their Dietetic Properties, Together with a Practical Explanation of the Principles of Healthful Cookery, and a Large Number of Original, Palatable, and Wholesome Recipes

by E. E. Kellogg

Stewed Mutton Chop.—Wipe, trim off the fat, and remove the bone from two or three pounds of chops. Put into the inner dish of a double boiler with just enough hot water to cover; add a minced stalk of celery, a carrot, and a white turnip cut in dice; cover, and cook until the chops are tender. Sliced potato may be added if liked, when the meat is nearly done. Remove the grease and thicken the liquor with a little browned flour braided with thin cream.

Stewed Mutton Chop No. 2.—Prepare the chops as in the preceding. Place a layer of meat in a deep baking dish, and then a layer of sliced potato, sprinkled with a little minced celery. Add two or more layers of meat, alternating with layers of potatoes. Cover with boiling water and bake closely covered in a very moderate oven two and a half hours.

Veal and Lamb.—Both veal and lamb should be thoroughly cooked; otherwise they are not wholesome. They may be prepared for the tale in the same way as beef or mutton, but will require longer time for cooking.

POULTRY AND GAME.

Poultry and game differ from other animal foods in the relative quantity of fat and the quality of their juices. The fat of birds is laid up underneath the skin and in various internal parts of the body, while but a small proportion is mingled with the fibers or the juices of the flesh. The flesh of the chicken, turkey, and guinea-fowl is more delicately flavored, more tender and easy to digest, than that of geese and ducks. Chickens broiled require three hours for digestion; when boiled or roasted, four hours are needed.

The flesh of poultry is less stimulating than beef, and is thus considered better adapted for invalids. The flesh of wild fowl contains less fat than that of poultry; it is also tender and easy of digestion. Different birds and different parts of the same bird, vary considerably in color and taste. The breed, food, and method of fattening, influence the quality of this class of foods. Fowls poorly fed and allowed wide range are far from cleanly in their habits of eating; in fact, they are largely scavengers, and through the food they pick up, often become infested with internal parasites, and affected with tuberculosis and other diseases which are liable to be communicated to those who eat their flesh.

Suggestions for the Selection of Poultry and Game.—The first care in the selection of poultry should be its freedom from disease. Birds deprived of exercise, shut up in close cages, and regularly stuffed with as much corn or soft food as they can swallow, may possess the requisite fatness, but it is of a most unwholesome character. When any living creature ceases to exercise, its excretory organs cease to perform their functions thoroughly, and its body becomes saturated with retained excretions.

A stall-fed fowl may be recognized by the color of its fat, which is pale white, and lies in thick folds beneath the skin along the lower half of the backbone. The entire surface of the body presents a more greasy, uninviting appearance than that of fowls permitted to live under natural conditions.

Never purchase fowls which have been sent to the market undrawn. All animals intended for use as food should be dressed as quickly as possible after killing. Putrefactive changes begin very soon after death, and the liver and other viscera, owing to their soft texture and to the quantity of venous blood they retain, advance rapidly in decomposition. When a fowl or animal is killed, even if the large arteries at the throat are cut, a large quantity of blood remains in and around the intestines, owing to the fact that only through the capillaries of the liver can the blood in the portal system find its way into the large vessels which convey it to the heart, and which at death are cut off from the general circulation at both ends by a capillary system. This leaves the blood-vessels belonging to the portal circulation distended with venous blood, which putrefies very quickly, forming a virulent poison. The contents of the intestines of all creatures are always in a more or less advanced state of putrescence, ready to undergo rapid decomposition as soon as the preservative action of the intestinal fluids ceases. It will readily be seen, then, that the flesh of an undrawn fowl must be to a greater or less degree permeated with the poisonous gases and other products of putrefaction, and is certainly quite unfit for food.

Young fowls have soft, yellow feet, a smooth, moist skin, easily torn with a pin, wings which will spring easily, and a breastbone which will yield to pressure. Pinfeathers are an indication of a young bird; older fowls are apt to have sharp scales, long hairs, long, thin necks, and flesh with a purplish tinge.