Ingredients.—2 quarts of milk, 1 saltspoonful of salt, 1 teaspoonful of powdered cinnamon, 3 teaspoonfuls of pounded sugar, or more if liked, 4 thin slices of bread, the yolks of 6 eggs. Mode.—Boil the milk with the salt, cinnamon, and sugar; lay the bread in a deep dish, pour over it a little of the milk, and keep it hot over a stove, without burning. Beat up the yolks of the eggs, add them to the milk, and stir it over the fire till it thickens. Do not let it curdle. Pour it upon the bread, and serve. Time.—¾ of an hour. Average cost, 8d. per quart. Seasonable all the year. Sufficient for 10 children.
MINCE PIES.
Ingredients.—Good puff-paste, mincemeat. Mode.—Make some good puff-paste by recipe; roll it out to the thickness of about ¼ inch, and line some good-sized patty-pans with it; fill them with mincemeat, cover with the paste, and cut it off all round close to the edge of the tin. Put the pies into a brisk oven, to draw the paste up, and bake for 25 minutes, or longer, should the pies be very large; brush them over with the white of an egg, beaten with the blade of a knife to a stiff froth; sprinkle over pounded sugar, and put them into the oven for a minute or two, to dry the egg; dish the pies on a white d’oyley, and serve hot. They may be merely sprinkled with pounded sugar instead of being glazed, when that mode is preferred. To re-warm them, put the pies on the patty-pans, and let them remain in the oven for 10 minutes or ¼ hour, and they will be almost as good as if freshly made. Time.—25 to 30 minutes; 10 minutes to re-warm them. Average cost, 4d. each. Sufficient—½ lb. of paste for 4 pies. Seasonable at Christmas time.
MINCE PIES.
MINCEMEAT.
Ingredients.—2 lbs. of raisins, 3 lbs. of currants, 1½ lb. of lean beef, 3 lbs. of beef suet, 2 lbs. of moist sugar, 2 oz. of citron, 2 oz. of candied lemon-peel, 2 oz. of candied orange-peel, 1 large nutmeg, 1 pottle of apples, the rind of 2 lemons, the juice of 1, ½ pint of brandy. Mode.—Stone and cut the raisins once or twice across, but do not chop them; wash, dry, and pick the currants free from stalks and grit, and mince the beef and suet, taking care that the latter is chopped very fine; slice the citron and candied peel, grate the nutmeg, and pare, core, and mince the apples; mince the lemon-peel, strain the juice, and when all the ingredients are thus prepared, mix them well together, adding the brandy when the other things are well blended; press the whole into a jar, carefully exclude the air, and the mincemeat will be ready for use in a fortnight. If an additional quantity of spice be preferred, add ½ teaspoonful of pounded mace, and the same of pounded allspice. We, however, prefer the mincemeat without the latter ingredients, and can vouch for its excellence. Average cost for this quantity, 8s. Seasonable.—Make this about the beginning of December.
MINCEMEAT, Excellent.
Ingredients.—3 large lemons, 3 large apples, 1 lb. of stoned raisins, 1 lb. of currants, 1 lb. of suet, 2 lbs. of moist sugar, 1 oz. of sliced candied citron, 1 oz. of sliced candied orange-peel, and the same quantity of lemon-peel, 1 teacupful of brandy, 2 tablespoonfuls of orange marmalade. Mode.—Grate the rinds of the lemons; squeeze out the juice, strain it, and boil the remainder of the lemons until tender enough to pulp or chop very finely. Then add to this pulp the apples, which should be baked, and their skins and cores removed; put in the remaining ingredients one by one, and, as they are added, mix everything very thoroughly together. Put the mincemeat into a stone jar with a closely-fitting lid, and in a fortnight it will be ready for use. Seasonable.—This should be made the first or second week in December.