The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, Adapted to the Use of Private Families

ROLLS. Warm an ounce of butter in half a pint of milk, put to it a spoonful or more of small beer yeast, and a little salt. Mix in two pounds of flour, let it rise an hour, and knead it well. Make the paste into seven rolls, and bake them in a quick oven. If a little saffron, boiled in half a tea-cupful of milk, be added, it will be a great improvement.

ROLLED BEEF. Soak the inside of a large sirloin in a glass of port wine and a glass of vinegar mixed, for eight and forty hours: have ready a very fine stuffing, and bind it up tight. Roast it on a hanging spit, baste it with a glass of port wine, the same quantity of vinegar, and a tea-spoonful of pounded allspice. Larding it improves the flavour and appearance: serve it with a rich gravy in the dish, with currant jelly and melted butter in tureens. This article will be found very much to resemble a hare.

ROLLED BREAST OF VEAL. Bone it, take off the thick skin and gristle, and beat the meat with a rolling-pin. Season it with herbs chopped very fine, mixed with salt, pepper, and mace. Roll the meat in some thick slices of fine ham, or in two or three calves' tongues of a fine red, first boiled an hour or two and peeled. Bind the meat up tight in a cloth, and tie it round with tape. Simmer it over the fire for some hours, in a small quantity of water, till it is quite tender. Lay it on the dresser with a board and weight upon it till quite cold. Then take off the tape, and pour over it the liquor, which must be boiled up twice a week, or it will not keep. Pigs' or calves' feet boiled and taken from the bones, may be put in or round the veal. The different colours placed in layers look well when cut. Boiled yolks of eggs, beet root, grated ham, and chopped parsley, may be laid in different parts to encrease the variety, and improve the general appearance.

ROLLED LOIN OF MUTTON. Hang the joint up till tender, and then bone it. Lay on a seasoning of pepper, allspice, mace, nutmeg, and a few cloves, all in fine powder. Next day prepare a stuffing as for hare, beat the meat with a rolling-pin, cover it with the stuffing, roll it up tight and tie it. Half bake it in a slow oven, let it grow cold, take off the fat, and put the gravy into a stewpan. Flour the meat, and put it in likewise. Stew it till almost ready, and add a glass of port, an anchovy, some ketchup, and a little lemon pickle. Serve it in the gravy, and with jelly sauce. A few mushrooms are a great improvement; but if to eat like hare, these must not be added, nor the lemon pickle.

ROLLED NECK OF PORK. Bone it first, then put over the inside a forcemeat of chopped sage, a very few crumbs of bread, salt, pepper, and two or three berries of allspice. Then roll the meat up very tight, place it at a good distance from the fire, and roast it slowly.

ROLLED STEAKS. Cut a large steak from a round of beef, spread over it a forcemeat, such as is made for veal, roll it up like collared eel, and tie it up in a cloth. Boil it an hour and a half, and when done enough, cut it into slices. Prepare a rich gravy, a little thickened, and pour over the steaks.

ROMAN CEMENT. To make a mortar for outside plastering, or brick-work, or to line reservoirs, so as no water can penetrate it, mix together eighty-four pounds of drifted sand, twelve pounds of unslaked lime, and four pounds of the poorest cheese grated through an iron grater. When well mixed, add enough hot water, not boiling, to make it into a proper consistence for plastering, such a quantity of the above as is wanted. It requires very good and quick working. One hod of this mortar will go a great way, as it is to be laid on in a thin smooth coat, without the least space being left uncovered. The wall or lath work should be first covered with common hair mortar well dried. Suffolk cheese will be found to make the best cement.

ROOK PIE. Skin and draw some young rooks, cut out the backbones, and season with pepper and salt. Lay them in a dish with a little water, strew some bits of butter over them, cover the dish with a thick crust, and bake it well.

ROSE WATER. When the roses are full blown, pick off the leaves carefully, and allow a peck of them to a quart of water. Put them in a cold still over a slow fire, and distil it very gradually. Bottle the water, and cork it up in two or three days.

ROT IN SHEEP. When sheep are newly brought in, it will preserve their health to give them a table-spoonful of the juice of rue leaves, mixed with a little salt. If they are in danger of the rot, this mixture may be repeated every week or oftener, as the case requires.

ROUND OF BEEF. Cut out the bone first, then skewer and tie up the beef to make it quite round. Salt it carefully, and moisten it with the pickle for eight or ten days. It may be stuffed with parsley, if approved; in which case the holes to admit the parsley must be made with a sharp-pointed knife, and the parsley coarsely cut and stuffed in tight. When dressed it should be carefully skimmed as soon as it boils, and afterwards kept boiling very gently.

ROUT CAKES. To make rout drop-cakes, mix two pounds of flour with one pound of butter, one pound of sugar, and one pound of currants, cleaned and dried. Moisten it into a stiff paste with two eggs, a large spoonful of orange-flower water, as much rose water, sweet wine, and brandy. Drop the paste on a tin plate floured, and a short time will bake them.

ROYAL CAKES. Put into a saucepan a quarter of a pint of water, a piece of butter half the size of an egg, two ounces of fine sugar, a little grated lemon peel, and a little salt. When it has boiled about half a minute, stir in by degrees four spoonfuls of flour, keeping it constantly stirring all the time, till it becomes a smooth paste, pretty stiff, and begins to adhere to the saucepan. Then take it off the fire, and add three eggs well beaten, putting them in by degrees, and stirring the paste all the time to prevent its being lumpy. Add a little orange-flower water, and a few almonds pounded fine. Make it into little cakes, and bake them upon a sheet of tin well buttered. Half an hour will bake them in a moderate oven.

ROYAL PUNCH. Take thirty Seville oranges and thirty lemons, quite sound, and pare them very thin. Put the parings into an earthen pan, with as much rum or brandy as will cover them. Cover up the pan, and let them stand four days. Take ten gallons of water, and twelve pounds of lump sugar, and boil them. When nearly cold, put in the whites of thirty eggs well beaten, and stir it and boil it a quarter of an hour. Strain it through a hair sieve into an earthen pan, and let it stand till next day. Then put it into a cask, strain the spirit from the parings of the oranges and lemons, and add as much more to it as will make it up five gallons. Put it into the cask with five quarts of Seville orange juice and three quarts of lemon juice. Stir it all together with a cleft stick, and repeat the same once a day for three successive days: then stop it down close, and in six weeks it will be fit to drink.

RUFFS AND REEVES. These are to be trussed and skewered the same as snipes and quails. Place bars of bacon over them, roast them in about ten minutes, and serve with a good gravy in the dish.

RUMP OF BEEF. Take a rump of beef, or about eight pounds of the brisket, and stew it till it is quite tender, in as much water as will cover it. When sufficiently done, take out the bones, and skim off the fat very clean. To a pint of the liquor, add the third part of a pint of port wine, a little walnut or mushroom ketchup, and some salt. Tie up some whole white pepper and mace in a piece of muslin, and stew all together for a short time. Have ready some carrots and turnips boiled tender and cut into squares, strew them upon the beef, putting a few into the dish. Truffles and morels may be added, or artichoke bottoms.

RUMP SOUP. Two or three rumps of beef will make a stronger soup, and of a far more nourishing quality, than a larger quantity of meat without them. It may be made like gravy soup, and thickened and flavoured in any way that is most approved.

RUMP STEAKS. The best steaks are those cut from the middle of a rump of beef, that has been killed at least four days in moderate weather, and much longer in cold weather, when they can be cut about six inches long, four inches wide, and half an inch thick. Do not beat them, unless you suspect they will not be tender. Take care to have a very clear brisk fire, throw on it a little salt, make the gridiron hot, and set it slanting, to prevent the fat from dropping into the fire, and making a smoke. It requires more practice and care than is generally supposed to do steaks to a nicety; and for want of these little attentions, this very common dish, which every body is supposed capable of dressing, seldom comes to table in perfection. It may be underdone or thoroughly done, as happens to be preferred. It is usual to put a table-spoonful of ketchup into a dish before the fire, with a little minced shalot. In broiling, turn the steak with a pair of meat tongs, and it will be done in about ten or fifteen minutes. Rub a bit of butter over it, and send it up quite hot, garnished with pickles, and scraped horseradish. – If onion gravy is to be added, prepare it in the following manner. Peel and slice two large onions, put them into a stewpan with two table-spoonfuls of water, cover the stewpan close, and set it on a slow fire till the water has boiled away, and the onions have got a little browned. Then add half a pint of good broth, or water with a large spoonful of ketchup, and boil the onions till they are quite tender. Strain off the liquor, and chop them very fine. Thicken the broth with butter rolled in flour, and season it with mushroom ketchup, pepper and salt. Put the onion into it, let it boil gently for five minutes, and pour it over the broiled steak. Good beef gravy, instead of broth, will make the sauce superlative. – If a cold rump steak is to be warmed up, lay it in a stewpan, with a large onion cut in quarters, six berries of allspice, and six of black pepper. Cover the steak with boiling water, let it stew gently for an hour, thicken the liquor with butter rolled in flour, shake it well over the fire for five minutes, and it is ready. Lay the steaks and onion on a dish, and pour the gravy over them through a sieve.

RUSKS. Beat seven eggs well, and mix them with half a pint of new milk, in which four ounces of butter have been previously melted. Add a quarter of a pint of yeast, and three ounces of sugar, and put them by degrees into as much flour as will make a very light paste, rather like a batter, and let it rise before the fire half an hour. Then add some more flour, to make it a little stiffer, but not much. Work it well, and divide it into small loaves, or cakes, about five or six inches wide, and flatten them. When baked and cold, slice them the thickness of rusks, and put them into the oven to brown a little. The cakes when first baked, eat deliciously buttered for tea; or made with carraways, they eat well cold.

RUSSIAN SAUCE. To four spoonfuls of grated horseradish, put two tea-spoonfuls of patent mustard, a little salt, one tea-spoonful of sugar, and a sufficient quantity of vinegar to cover the ingredients. This sauce is used for cold meat, but makes a good fish sauce, with the addition of melted butter.

RUST. To prevent iron and steel from rusting, mix with fat oil varnish, at least half, or at most four fifths of its quantity of highly rectified spirits of turpentine. This varnish must be lightly and evenly applied with a sponge; after which the article is left to dry in some situation not exposed to dust. Articles thus varnished retain their metallic lustre, and do not contract any spots of rust. This varnish may also be applied to copper, of which it preserves the polish and heightens the colour.

S

Sack Cream. Boil a pint of raw cream, the yolk of an egg well beaten, two or three spoonfuls of white wine, sugar, and lemon peel. Stir it over a gentle fire till it be as thick as rich cream, and afterwards till it becomes cold. Then serve it in glasses, with long pieces of dry toast.

SACK DUMPLINS. Grate the crumb of two penny rolls, add three quarters of a pound of suet cut small, three quarters of a pound of currants washed clean, a grated nutmeg, a little sugar, the yolks of eight eggs, and two wine glasses of sack. Make the paste into dumplins of a moderate size, tie them in cloths, and boil them two hours. Melted butter for sauce, with white wine and sugar.

SACK MEAD. To every gallon of water put four pounds of honey, and boil it three quarters of an hour, taking care to skim it. To every gallon add an ounce of hops; then boil it half an hour, and let it stand till the next day. Put it into a cask, and to thirteen gallons of the liquor add a quart of brandy. Stop it lightly till the fermentation is over, and then bung it up close. A large cask should be suffered to stand a year.

SACKS OF CORN. Seeds, and various kinds of grain, are liable to damage when kept in sacks or bins, from the want of being sufficiently aired. Make a small wooden tube nearly the length of the sack, closed and pointed at one end, and perforated with holes about an inch asunder, nearly two thirds of its length from the point end. Then at the other end fasten a leather tube, and thrust it into the corn to the bottom of the sack. Put the pipe of a pair of bellows into the leather tube, and blow into it, so that the air may be diffused among the corn throughout the holes of the wooden tube. If corn be thus treated every other day after it is first put into sacks, it will prevent the damp sweats which would otherwise injure it, and it will afterwards keep sweet with very little airing.

SADDLE OF MUTTON. When it has been well kept, raise the skin, and then skewer it on again. Take it off a quarter of an hour before serving, sprinkle on some salt, baste and dredge it well with flour. The rump should be split, and skewered back on each side. The joint may be cut large or small, according to the company: the latter is the most elegant. Being broad, it requires a high and strong fire.

SAFFRON CAKE. Take a quarter of a peck of fine flour, a pound and a half of fresh butter, a quarter of an ounce of mace and cinnamon together, beat fine, and mix the spice in the flour. Set on a quart of milk to boil, break the butter in, and stir it till the milk boils; take off all the butter, and a little of the milk; mix with the flour a pound of sugar beat fine, a penny-worth of saffron made into a tincture; take a pint of yeast that is not bitter, and stir it well into the remainder of the milk; beat up six eggs very well, and put to the yeast and milk, strain it to the flour, with some rose-water, and the tincture of saffron; beat up all together with your hands lightly, and put it into a hoop or pan well buttered. It will take an hour and a half in a quick oven. You may make the tincture of saffron with the rose-water.

SAGE is raised from seed, or from slips. To have it at hand for winter it is necessary to dry it; and it ought to be cut for this purpose before it comes out into bloom, as indeed is the case with all other herbs.

SAGE CHEESE. To make this kind of cheese, bruise the tops of young red sage in a mortar, with some leaves of spinach, and squeeze out the juice. Mix it with the rennet in the milk, more or less, according as the taste and colour may be preferred. When the curd is come, break it gently, and put it in with the skimmer, till it is pressed two inches above one vat. Press it eight or ten hours, salt and turn it every day.

SAGO. To prevent the earthy taste, soak it an hour in cold water; pour off the water, and wash it well. Then add more, and simmer it gently till the berries are clear, with lemon peel and spice, if approved. Add wine and sugar, and boil all up together. – If intended for the sick, or those whom disease has left very feeble, boil a teacupful of washed, sago in a quart of water, and a taste of lemon peel. When thickened, grate in some ginger, and add half a pint of raisin wine, some brown sugar, and two spoonfuls of Geneva: boil all up together.

SAGO MILK. Cleanse the sago as in the former article, and boil it slowly in new milk. It swells so much, that a small quantity will be sufficient for a quart; and when done, it will be diminished to about a pint. It requires no sugar or flavouring.

SAGO PUDDING. Boil a pint and a half of new milk, with four spoonfuls of sago nicely washed and picked; then add lemon peel, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Sweeten the pudding, mix in four eggs, put a paste round the dish, and bake it slowly.

SAIL CLOTH. The old mode of painting canvas was to wet it, and prime it with Spanish brown. Then to give it a second coat of a chocolate colour, made by mixing Spanish brown and black paint; and lastly, to finish it with black. This was found to harden to such a degree as to crack, and eventually to break, the canvas, and so to render it unserviceable in a short time. The new method, which is greatly superior, is to grind ninety-six pounds of English ochre with boiled oil, and to add sixteen pounds of black paint, which mixture forms an indifferent black. A pound of yellow soap, dissolved in six pints of water over the fire, is mixed while hot, with the paint. This composition is then laid upon the canvas, without being wetted as formerly, and as stiff as can conveniently be done with a brush, so as to form a smooth surface. Two days afterwards, a second coat of ochre and black is laid on, with a very small portion of soap; and allowing this coat an intermediate day for drying, the canvas is then finished with black paint as usual. Three days being then allowed for it to dry and harden, it does not stick together when taken down, and folded in cloths of sixty or seventy yards each.

SALAD MIXTURE. Salad herbs should be gathered in the morning, as fresh as possible, or they must be put into cold spring water for an hour. Carefully wash and pick them, trim off all the dry or cankered leaves, put them into a cullender to drain, and swing them dry in a coarse clean napkin. Then pound together the yolks of two hard eggs, an ounce of scraped horseradish, half an ounce of salt, a table-spoonful of made mustard, four drams of minced shalots, one dram of celery seed, one dram of cress seed, and half a dram of cayenne. Add by degrees a wine glass of salad oil, three glasses of burnet, and three of tarragon vinegar. When thoroughly incorporated, set it over a very gentle fire, and stir it with a wooden spoon till it has simmered to the consistence of cream. Then pass it through a tammis or fine sieve, and add it to the salad.

SALAD SAUCE. Mix two yolks of eggs boiled hard, as much grated Parmesan cheese as will fill a dessert-spoon, a little patent mustard, a small spoonful of tarragon vinegar, and a large one of ketchup. Stir them well together, then put in four spoonfuls of salad oil, and one spoonful of elder vinegar, and beat them up very smooth.

SALADS. Cold salads are proper to be eaten at all seasons of the year, but are particularly to be recommended from the beginning of February to the end of June. They are in greater perfection, and consequently more powerful, during this period, than at any other, in opening obstructions, sweetening and purifying the blood. The habit of eating salad herbs tends considerably to prevent that pernicious and almost general disease the scurvy, and all windy humours which offend the stomach. Also from the middle of September till December, and during the winter, if the weather be mild and open, all green herbs are wholesome, and highly beneficial. It is true that they have not so much vigour in the winter season, nor are they so medicinal as in the spring of the year; yet those which continue fresh and green, will retain a considerable portion of their natural qualities; and being eaten as salads, with proper seasoning, they will operate much in the same way as at other periods of the year. It is a necessary consequence of cold weather, that the heat of the body is driven more inward than in warm weather, as the cold of the atmosphere repels it from the surface. Hence arises an appetite for strong and solid food, and strong drinks, which for want of temperance and care, lays the foundation for diseases that commonly make their appearance in the summer following. Eating freely of salads and other vegetables in the winter, will prevent in a great treasure these ill effects; and if properly seasoned and prepared, they will warm the stomach, and be found exhilarating. The effect produced is in unison with all the operations of the human constitution, while the use of strong stimulants excites to unnatural action, which is soon succeeded by a cold and chilling languor. Green herbs in winter are much more beneficial than is generally imagined; they are particularly salutary to aged persons, and such as are subject to stoppages, or shortness of breath. In this case, instead of an onion, a clove of garlic may be put into the salad, which is a preferable way of eating it. This will open and warm the stomach, and give a general glow to the whole system. – The following are the principal herbs used as salads. Basil, balm, borage, burnet, celery, chervil, colewort, coriander, corn-salad, cresses, endive, French fennel, lettuce, mint, mustard, nasturtiums, nettle-tops, parsley, pennyroyal, radishes, rape, sage, sorrel, spinage, tarragon, and water-cresses. Onions, both young and full grown, shalots, garlic, and chives, are all used as seasoning to salads. Red beet-root, boiled and cold, is often sliced into them. Several of these herbs are very little in use as salads, but there are none of them that may not be recommended as good for the purpose. The usual salads are too much limited to what is specifically called small salading, lettuce, celery, and endive. These are all excellent in their kind, but to prefer them to the exclusion of every thing else, is a mere prejudice. With a wish therefore to counteract it, and to provide a larger assortment of wholesome salads, the following particulars are given, with directions for preparing several different dishes of this description. In general it may be proper to observe, that salads of all kinds should be very fresh; or if not immediately procured in this state, they may be refreshed by being put into cold spring water. They should be very carefully washed and picked, and drained quite dry in a clean cloth. In dressing lettuce, or small herbs, it is best to arrange them, properly picked and cut, in the salad dish; then to mix the sauce in something else, and pour it to the salad down the side of the dish, so as to let it run to the bottom, and not to stir it up till used at table. This preserves the crispness of the salad, which is one of its principal delicacies. With celery and endive the sauce should be poured upon them, and the whole well stirred together to mix it equally. Lettuce, endive, and celery, may be eaten with salt only; and if well chewed, as all salads ought to be, they often agree better than when mixed with seasonings. If mustard in salad sauces occasion sickness, or otherwise disagrees, cayenne pepper will often prove an excellent substitute. – The following salads are remarkably wholesome, and have a cooling and salutary effect upon the bowels. 1. Take spinage, parsley, sorrel, lettuce, and a few onions. Then add oil, vinegar, and salt, to give it a high taste and relish, but let the salt rather predominate above the other ingredients. The wholesomest way of eating salads is with bread only, in preference to bread and butter, bread and cheese, or meat and bread; though any of these may be eaten with it, when the salad is seasoned only with salt and vinegar. It is not advisable to eat butter, cheese, or meat with salads, or any thing in which there is a mixture of oil. All fat substances are heavy of digestion, and to mix such as disagree in their nature, is to encrease this evil to a degree that the stomach can hardly overcome. 2. Prepare some lettuce, spinage tops, pennyroyal, sorrel, a few onions, and some parsley. Then season them with oil, vinegar, and salt. 3. Another salad may be made of lettuce, sorrel, spinage, tops of mint, and onions, seasoned as before. 4. Take spinage, lettuce, tarragon, and parsley, with some leaves of balm. Or sorrel, tarragon, spinage, lettuce, onions, and parsley. Or tops of pennyroyal, mint, lettuce, spinage, sorrel, and parsley. Or lettuce, spinage, onions, pennyroyal, balm, and sorrel. Or sage, lettuce, spinage, sorrel, onions, and parsley; seasoned with salt, oil, and vinegar. 5. Make a salad of pennyroyal, sage, mint, balm, a little lettuce, and sorrel; seasoned with oil, vinegar, and salt. This is an excellent warming salad, though the above are all of an exhilarating tendency. 6. Mix some lettuce, sorrel, endive, celery, spinage, and onions, seasoned as above. 7. Take the fresh tender leaves of cole wort, or cabbage plants, with lettuce, sorrel, parsley, tarragon, nettle tops, mint, and pennyroyal; and season them with salt, oil, and vinegar. If highly seasoned, this is a very warm and relishing salad. 8. For winter salad, take some tender plants of colewort, sorrel, lettuce, endive, celery, parsley, and sliced onions; and season them as before. 9. Another winter salad may be made of lettuce, spinage, endive, celery, and half a clove of garlic. Season it well with oil, vinegar, and salt. This salad is very warming and wholesome. All these aromatic herbs are particularly proper for phlegmatic and weakly persons, as they have the property of warming the stomach, and improving the blood. To supply the want of oil in salads, make some thick melted butter, and use it in the same proportion as oil. Some sweet thick cream is a still better substitute, and will do as well as oil, especially as some persons have an aversion to oil. Cream also looks well in salads. A good salad sauce may be made of two yolks of eggs boiled hard, mixed with a spoonful of Parmesan cheese grated, a little patent mustard, a spoonful of tarragon vinegar, and a larger one of ketchup. When stirred well together, add four spoonfuls of salad oil, and one of elder vinegar, and beat them up very smooth. It is very common in France, amongst all classes of people, to dress cauliflowers and French beans to eat cold, as salads, with a sauce of oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper. In some parts of France, raw salads, composed entirely of herbs growing wild in the fields, are in frequent use; and for distinction sake, are called rural salads. The English, who are not so fond of pungent flavours, are in the habit of substituting sugar instead of pepper and salt, where oil is not used, in order to soften the asperity of the vinegar.