Put four ounces of butter into a saucepan with water; and when it boils, pour it into as much flour as you choose, knead and beat it till smooth: cover it as on the other side. Raise it; and if for custard, put a paper within to keep out the sides till half done, then fill with a cold mixture of milk, egg, sugar, and a little peachwater, lemonpeel, or nutmeg. By cold is meant that the egg is not to be warmed, but the milk should be warmed by itself; not to spoil the crust.
Raised Crust for Meatpies or Fowls, &c.
Boil water with a little fine lard, and an equal quantity of fresh dripping, or of butter, but not much of either. While hot, mix this with as much flour as you will want, making the paste as stiff as you can to be smooth, which you will make it by good kneading, and beating with the rolling pin. When quite smooth, put it in a lump into a cloth, or under a pan to soak, till near cold.
Those who have not a good hand at raising crust, may do thus: roll the paste of a proper thickness, and cut out the top and bottom of the pie, then a long piece for the sides. Cement the bottom to the sides with egg, bringing the former rather further out, and pinching both together; put egg between the edges of the paste to make it adhere at the sides. Fill your pie, and put on the cover, and pinch it and the side crust together. The same mode of uniting the paste is to be observed, if the sides are pressed into a tin form, in which the paste must be baked, after it shall be filled and covered; but in the latter case the tin should be buttered, and carefully taken off when done enough; and as the form usually makes the sides of a lighter colour than is proper, the paste should be put into the oven again for a quarter of an hour. With a feather put egg over at first.
Crust for Venison Pastry.
To a quarter of a peck of fine flour use two pounds and a half of butter, and four eggs: mix into paste with warm water, and work it smooth and to a good consistence. Put a paste round the inside, but not to the bottom of the dish, and let the cover be pretty thick, to bear the long continuance in the oven.
Rice Pastry.
Boil a quarter of a pound of ground rice in the smallest quantity of water: strain from it all the moisture as well as you can. Beat it in a mortar, with half an ounce of butter, and one egg well beaten, and it will make an excellent paste for tarts, &c.
Potatoe Pastry.
Pound boiled potatoes very fine; and add, while warm, a sufficiency of butter to make the mash hold together. Or you may mix with it an egg; then before it gets cold, flour the board pretty well to prevent it from sticking, and roll it to the thickness wanted.