If convenient, you may in making the stuffing, use a large proportion of chopped mushrooms that have been preserved in sweet oil, or of chopped pickled oysters. Cold ham shred fine will improve it.
You may stuff a fillet of veal entirely with sausage meat.
To accompany a fillet of veal, the usual dish is boiled ham or bacon.
A shoulder of veal may be stuffed and roasted in a similar manner.
TO STEW A BREAST OF VEAL.
Divide the breast into pieces according to the position of the bones. Put them into a stew-pan with a few slices of ham, some whole pepper, a bunch of parsley, and a large onion quartered. Add sufficient water to keep it from burning, and let it stew slowly till the meat is quite tender. Then put to it a quart or more of green peas that have boiled twenty minutes in another pot, and a piece of butter rolled in flour. Let all stew together a quarter of an hour longer. Serve it up, with the veal in the middle, the peas round it, and the ham laid on the peas.
You may stew a breast of veal with tomatas.
TO STEW A FILLET OF VEAL.
Take a fillet of veal, rub it with salt, and then with a sharp knife make deep incisions all over the surface, the bottom as well as the top and sides. Make a stuffing of grated stale bread, butter, chopped sweet marjoram, grated lemon-peel, nutmeg, pepper and salt, mixed up with beaten yolk of egg to bind and give it consistency. Fill the holes or incisions with the stuffing, pressing it down well with your fingers. Reserve some of the stuffing to rub all over the outside of the meat. Have ready some very thin slices of cold boiled ham, the fatter the better. Cover the veal with them, fastening them on with skewers. Put it into a pot, and stew it slowly in a very little water, just enough to cover it. It will take at least five hours to stew; or more, in proportion to its size. When done, take off the ham, and lay it round the veal in a dish.
You may stew with it a quart or three pints of young green peas, put in about an hour before dinner; add to them a little butter and pepper while they are stewing. Serve them up in the dish with the veal, laying the slices of ham upon them.
If you omit the ham, stew the veal entirely in lard.
TO STEW A KNUCKLE OF VEAL.
Lay four wooden skewers across the bottom of your stew-pan, and place the meat upon them; having first carefully washed it, and rubbed it with salt. Add a table-spoonful of whole pepper, the leaves from a bunch of sweet marjoram, a bunch of parsley leaves chopped, two onions peeled and sliced, and a piece of butter rolled in flour. Pour in two quarts of water. Cover it closely, and after it has come to a boil, lessen the fire, and let the meat only simmer for two hours or more. Before you serve it up, pour the liquid over it.
This dish will be greatly improved by stewing with it a few slices of ham, or the remains of a cold ham.
Veal when simply boiled is too insipid. To stew it is much better.
VEAL CUTLETS.
The best cutlets are those taken from the leg or fillet. Cut them about half an inch thick, and as large as the palm of your hand.
Season them with pepper and salt. Grate some stale bread, and rub it through a cullender, adding to it chopped sweet marjoram, grated lemon-peel, and some powdered mace or nutmeg. Spread the mixture on a large flat dish. Have ready in a pan some beaten egg.
First dip each cutlet into the egg, and then into the seasoning on the dish, seeing that a sufficient quantity adheres to both sides of the meat. Melt in your frying-pan, over a quick fire, some beef-dripping, lard, or fresh butter, and when it boils lay your cutlets in it, and fry them thoroughly; turning them on both sides, and taking care that they do not burn. Place them in a covered dish near the fire, while you finish the gravy in the pan, by first skimming it, and then shaking in a little flour and stirring it round. Pour the gravy hot round the cutlets, and garnish with little bunches of curled parsley.
You may mix with the bread crumbs a little saffron.
VEAL STEAKS.
Cut a neck of veal into thin steaks, and beat them to make them tender. For seasoning, mix together some finely chopped onion sprinkled with pepper and salt, and a little chopped parsley. Add some butter, and put it with the parsley and onion into a small sauce-pan, and set it on hot coals to stew till brown. In the mean, time, put the steaks on a hot gridiron (the bars of which have been rubbed with suet) and broil them well, over a bed of bright clear coals. When sufficiently done on one side turn them on the other. After the last turning, cover each steak with some of the seasoning from the sauce-pan, and let all broil together till thoroughly done.
Instead of the onions and parsley, you may season the veal steaks with chopped mushrooms, or with chopped oysters, browned in butter.
Have ready a gravy made of the scraps and trimmings of the veal, seasoned with pepper and salt, and boiled in a little hot water in the same sauce-pan in which the parsley and onions have been previously stewed. Strain the gravy when it has boiled long enough, and flavour it with catchup.
MINCED VEAL.
Take some cold veal, cut it into slices, and mince it very finely with a chopping-knife. Season it to your taste with pepper, salt, sweet marjoram rubbed fine, grated lemon-peel and nutmeg. Put the bones and trimmings into a sauce-pan with a little water, and simmer them over hot coals to extract the gravy from them. Then put the minced veal into a stew-pan, strain the gravy over it, add a piece of butter rolled in flour, and a little milk or cream. Let it all simmer together till thoroughly warmed, but do not allow it to boil lest the meat having been once cooked already, should become tasteless. When you serve it up, have ready some three-cornered pieces of bread toasted and buttered; place them all round the inside of the dish.
Or you may cover the mince with a thick layer of grated bread, moistened with a little butter, and browned on the top with a salamander, or a red hot shovel.
VEAL PATTIES.
Mince very fine a pound of the lean of cold roast veal, and half a pound of cold boiled ham, (fat and lean equally mixed.) Put it into a stew-pan with three ounces of butter divided into bits and rolled in flour, a jill of cream, and a jill of veal gravy. Season it to your taste with cayenne pepper and nutmeg, grated lemon-peel, and lemon-juice. Set the pan on hot coals, and let the ingredients simmer till well warmed, stirring them well to prevent their burning.
Have ready baked some small shells of puff-paste. Fill them with the mixture, and eat the patties either warm or cold.
VEAL PIE.
Take two pounds of veal cut from the loin, fillet, or the best end of the neck. Remove the bone, fat, and skin, and put them into a sauce-pan with half a pint of water to stew for the gravy. Make a good paste, allowing a pound of butter to two pounds of flour.
Divide it into two pieces, roll it out rather thick and cover with one piece the sides and bottom of a deep dish. Put in a layer of veal, seasoned with pepper and salt, then a layer of cold ham sliced thin, then more veal, more ham, and so on till the dish is full; interspersing the meat with yolks of eggs boiled hard. If you can procure some small button mushrooms they will be found an improvement. Pour in, at the last, the gravy you have drawn from the trimmings, and put on the lid of the pie, notching the edge handsomely, and ornamenting the centre with a flower made of paste. Bake the pie at least two hours and a half.
You may make a very plain veal pie simply of veal chops, sliced onions, and potatoes pared and quartered. Season with pepper and salt, and fill up the dish with water.
CALF'S HEAD DREST PLAIN
Wash the head in warm water. Then lay it in clean hot water and let it soak awhile. This will blanch it. Take out the brains and the black part of the eyes. Tie the head in a cloth, and put it into a large fish-kettle, with plenty of cold water, and add some salt to throw up the scum, which must be taken off as it rises.
Let the head boil gently about three hours.
Put eight or ten sage leaves, and as much parsley, into a small sauce-pan with a little water, and boil them half an hour. Then chop them fine, and set them ready on a plate. Wash the brains well in two warm waters, and then soak them for an hour in a basin of cold water with a little salt in it. Remove the skin and strings, and then put the brains into a stew-pan with plenty of cold water, and let them boil gently for a quarter of an hour, skimming them well. Take them out, chop them, and mix them with the sage and parsley leaves, two table-spoonfuls of melted butter, and the yolks of four hard-boiled eggs, and pepper and salt to your taste. Then put the mixture into a sauce-pan and set it on coals to warm.
Take up the head when it is sufficiently boiled, score it in diamonds, brush it all over with beaten egg, and strew it with a mixture of grated bread-crumbs, and chopped sage and parsley.
Stick a few bits of butter over it, and set it in a Dutch oven to brown. Serve it up with the brains laid round it. Or you may send to table the brains and the tongue in a small separate dish, having first trimmed the tongue and cut off the roots. Have also parsley-sauce in a boat. You may garnish with very thin small slices of broiled ham, curled up.
If you get a calf's head with the hair on, sprinkle it all over with pounded rosin, and dip it into boiling water. This will make the hairs scrape off easily.
CALF'S HEAD HASHED.
Take a calf's head and a set of feet, and boil them until tender, having first removed the brains. Then cut the flesh off the head and feet in slices from the bone, and put both meat and bones into a stew-pan with a bunch of sweet herbs, some sliced onions, and pepper and salt to your taste; also a large piece of butter rolled in flour, and a little water. After it has stewed awhile slowly till the flavour is well extracted from the herbs and onions, take out the meat, season it a little with cayenne pepper, and lay it in a dish. Strain the gravy in which it was stewed, and stir into it two glasses of madeira, and the juice and grated peel of a lemon. Having poured some of the gravy over the meat, lay a piece of butter on the top, set it in an oven and bake it brown.
In the mean time, having cleaned and washed the brains (skinning them and removing the strings) parboil them in a sauce-pan, and then make them into balls with chopped sweet herbs, grated bread-crumbs, grated lemon-peel, nutmeg, and beaten yolk of egg. Fry them in lard and butter mixed; and send them to table laid round the meat (which should have the tongue placed on the top) and garnish with sliced lemon. Warm the remaining gravy in a small sauce-pan on hot coals, and stir into it the beaten yolk of an egg a minute before you take it from the fire. Send it to table in a boat.
CHITTERLINGS OR CALF'S TRIPE.
See that the chitterlings are very nice and white. Wash them, cut them into pieces, and put them into a stew-pan with pepper and salt to your taste, and about two quarts of water. Boil them two hours or more. In the mean time, peel eight or ten white onions, and throw them whole into a sauce-pan with plenty of water. Boil them slowly till quite soft; then drain them in a cullender, and mash them. Wipe out your sauce-pan, and put in the mashed onions with a piece of butter, two table-spoonfuls of cream or rich milk, some nutmeg, and a very little salt. Sprinkle in a little flour, set the pan on hot coals (keeping it well covered) and give it one boil up.
When the chitterlings are quite tender all through, take them up and drain them. Place in the bottom of a dish a slice or two of buttered toast with all the crust cut off. Lay the chitterlings on the toast, and send them to table with the stewed onions in a sauce-boat. When you take the chitterlings on your plate season them with pepper and vinegar.