Put on the ingredients mentioned in [No. 218], in three quarts of water; boil gently for two hours, then put in the pork, and boil very gently till it is done enough to eat; this will take about an hour and a half, or two hours longer, according to its thickness; when done, wash the pork clean in hot water, send it up in a dish, or cut it into mouthfuls, and put it into the soup in the tureen, with the accompaniments ordered in [No. 218].
Obs. The meat being boiled no longer than to be done enough to be eaten, you get excellent soup, without any expense of meat destroyed.
“In Canada, the inhabitants live three-fourths of the year on pease soup, prepared with salt pork, which is boiled till the fat is entirely dissolved among the soup, giving it a rich flavour.”—The Hon. J. Cochrane’s Seaman’s Guide, 8vo. 1797, p. 31.
Plain Pease Soup.—(No. 221.)
To a quart of split pease, and two heads of celery, (and most cooks would put a large onion,) put three quarts of broth or soft water; let them simmer gently on a trivet over a slow fire for three hours, stirring up every quarter of an hour to prevent the pease burning at the bottom of the soup-kettle (if the water boils away, and the soup gets too thick, add some boiling water to it); when they are well softened, work them through a coarse sieve, and then through a fine sieve or a tamis; wash out your stew-pan, and then return the soup into it, and give it a boil up; take off any scum that comes up, and it is ready. Prepare fried bread, and dried mint, as directed in [No. 218], and send them up with it on two side dishes.
Obs. This is an excellent family soup, produced with very little trouble or expense.
Most of the receipts for pease soup are crowded with ingredients which entirely overpower the flavour of the pease. See [No. 555].
Asparagus Soup.—(No. 222.)
This is made with the points of asparagus, in the same manner as the green pease soup ([No. 216] or [17]) is with pease: let half the asparagus be rubbed through a sieve, and the other cut in pieces about an inch long, and boiled till done enough, and sent up in the soup: to make two quarts, there must be a pint of heads to thicken it, and half a pint cut in; take care to preserve these green and a little crisp. This soup is sometimes made by adding the asparagus heads to common pease soup.
Obs. Some cooks fry half an ounce of onion in a little butter, and rub it through a sieve, and add it with the other ingredients; the haut goût of the onion will entirely overcome the delicate flavour of the asparagus, and we protest against all such combinations.