There is no doubt that in this country the present generation is far more luxurious than the one that preceded it. Living is to a great extent a question of habit. At the present moment a Russian soldier is paid at the rate of a shilling a month, and his only ration is rye-bread baked into biscuit, washed down with a draught of water. The British workman of the day requires a hot meat dinner, cooked from fresh meat expressly for him alone. Were his wife to supply him with cold meat, he would probably grumble. In the last century a labourer was content with a piece of fat pork boiled on Sunday. Possibly in the next century we shall have our soup kitchens for the poor altered into turtle soup kitchens; for it is a fact that the luxuries of one century become the necessities of the next.
It is a question worthy of consideration whether this country has not reached that pitch of luxury and self-indulgence which all history teaches us is the turning-point in a nation’s greatness. Ananius, Azarius, and Misael have told us that we thrive better on pulse and water than on the king’s meat. Let us hope as a nation that, unlike the king in question, seven times may not pass over us to cure us of our luxury and pride.
I will not enter into a description of the various uses of the more expensive luxuries now sold in tins. I refer to truffles, cocks’ combs, fina cière, ragout, foie gras, etc. Mushrooms, however, are exceptions. They seem like gifts of nature, and, like the manna of old, they require us to rise early and gather in our harvest fresh, not forgetting that, like manna, they will not properly keep till the morrow. It is, however in cases like this, when the food is of a perishable nature, that the invention of preserving in tins is so useful. There are probably few of what may be called accessories to food more useful or more delicious than mushrooms. Mushrooms are preserved in tins in two forms, by far the most common one being quite plain in water. Were I to give a list of all the various dishes in the composition of which mushrooms enter, I should require as many volumes as I am allowed columns. I would, however, remind housekeepers that small tins of mushrooms can now be obtained at sixpence each from all respectable grocers.
I will give one or two simple cases to illustrate the various uses to which mushrooms can be applied.
First, mushroom sauce.
You can have brown mushroom sauce and white mushroom sauce.
To make brown mushroom sauce from tinned mushrooms, open the tin of mushrooms and add the contents, liquid and all, to about an equal quantity of good, thick, rich, brown gravy. The mushrooms should be chopped small, and served in the gravy just as they are.
White mushroom sauce, which is so delicious with boiled fowl, can be made by adding a tin of mushrooms to some good béchamel sauce. Béchamel sauce is some very strong stock, mixed with some boiling milk, or, still better, boiling cream, thickened with a little butter and flour. When the tin of mushrooms is added to the white sauce, the whole should be rubbed through a wire sieve with a wooden spoon. This helps to thicken the sauce, and greatly adds to the flavour.
Another simple instance of the use of mushrooms is some kind of fish au gratin. Take, for instance, a sole. Dry it, flour it, and egg and breadcrumb it in the usual manner. Next take a sixpenny tin of mushrooms, strain off the liquor, and chop up the mushrooms finely with a piece of onion as big as the top of the thumb down to the bottom of the nail, a piece of lemon peel, say about the size of the thumbnail and as thick; that is, you only use the yellow part, and not the white. Add also sufficient chopped parsley to fill a teaspoon, as well as a little pepper and salt. Fry all these in a frying-pan with some butter for a few minutes, and when it is partially cooked place about half of it in a tin sufficiently long to hold the sole. Place the sole on the top of these chopped ingredients, and place the remainder on the top of the sole. Pour all the butter in the frying-pan on it, and, if necessary, add a little more butter, so as to keep the sole moist, and bake it in the oven till the sole is done. Of course the time for baking varies with the size of the sole and the fierceness of the oven. When it is finished, a little finely-grated Parmesan cheese may be shaken over the whole. Parmesan cheese can now be obtained in bottles, the price of a small bottle being about eightpence or ninepence. The Parmesan cheese is, however, not absolutely necessary. Also a few bread raspings shaken over the whole gives it a finished appearance. This dish looks a great deal better if the tin is the same shape as the sole, and the fish served in the tin in which it is baked. Long oval tins are sold on purpose.
Almost any kind of fish can be served in this way, such as lemon soles, fresh haddock, filleted brill, filleted plaice, etc. Just before the sole au gratin is sent to table many persons add about a teaspoonful of sherry to the sauce by which it is surrounded. To my mind it is a doubtful improvement.