Cut the remains of cold chicken (or turkey) into pieces about an inch long and marinate them in a bowl containing one tablespoon of olive oil; one teaspoon of tarragon vinegar or lemon juice, a few drops of onion juice, salt and pepper. At the end of half an hour sprinkle with finely chopped parsley, dip them in fritter batter, and fry in boiling fat. Drain on a brown paper, and serve with or without tomato or brown sauce. In some parts of Italy this dish is made of several kinds of cold meats, poultry, brains, etc. (the greater the variety the better), served on the same platter, and in Spain all kinds of cold vegetables are fried in batter and served together.
Take a turkey, dress and truss it, then take down the breast-bone. To make Stuffing for the Breast. Take beef-suet, the liver shred fine, and bread-crumbs, a little lemon-peel, nutmeg, pepper and salt to your taste, a little shred parsley, a spoonful or two of cream, and two eggs. Put her on a spit and roast her before a slow fire; you may lard your turkey with fat bacon; if the turkey be young, an hour and a quarter will roast it. For the sauce, take a little white gravy, an onion, a few bread-crumbs, and a little whole pepper, let them boil well together, put to them a little flour and a lump of butter, which pour upon the turkey; you may lay round your turkey forc'd-meat-balls. Garnish your dish with slices of lemon.
Draw and pick four pigeons immediately after they are killed, and let them be cooked soon, as they do not keep well. Wash the inside very clean, and wipe it dry. Stuff them with a mixture of parsley parboiled and chopped, grated bread-crumbs, and butter; seasoned with pepper, salt, and nutmeg. Dredge them with flour, and roast them before a good fire, basting them with butter. They will be done in about twenty-five or thirty minutes. Serve them up with parsley-sauce. Lay the pigeons on the dish in a row. If asparagus is in season, it will be much better than parsley both for the stuffing and sauce. It must first be boiled. Chop the green heads for the stuffing, and cut them in two for the melted butter. Have cranberry-sauce on the table. Pigeons may be split and broiled, like chickens; also stewed or fricasseed. They are very good stewed with slices of cold ham and green peas, serving up all in the same dish.
Begin your preparations by making the stuffing. Take a sufficient quantity of grated stale bread, and mix it with sage and sweet marjoram rubbed fine or powdered; also some grated lemon-peel. Season it with pepper, salt, powdered nutmeg and mace; mix in butter enough to moisten it, and some beaten yolk of egg to bind it. Let the whole be very well incorporated. The pig should be newly killed, (that morning if possible,) nicely cleaned, fat, and not too large. Wash it well in cold water, and cut off the feet close to the joints, leaving some skin all round to fold over the ends. Take out the liver and heart, and reserve them, with the feet, to make the gravy. Truss back the legs. Fill the body with the stuffing (it must be quite full) and then sew it up, or tie it round with a buttered twine. Put the pig on the spit, and place it before a clear brisk fire, but not too near lest it scorch. The fire should be largest at the ends, that the middle of the pig may not be done before the extremities. If you find the heat too great in the centre, you may diminish it by placing a flat-iron before the fire. When you first put it down, wash the pig all over with salt and water; afterwards rub it frequently with a feather dipped in sweet oil, or with fresh butter tied in a rag. If you baste it with any thing else, or with its own dripping, the skin will not be crisp. Take care not to blister or burn the outside by keeping it too near the fire. A good sized pig will require at least three hours' roasting. Unless a pig is very small it is seldom sent to table whole. Take the spit from the fire, and place it across a large dish: then, having cut off the head with a sharp knife, and cut down the back, slip the spit out. Lay the two halves of the body close together in the dish, and place half the head on each side. Garnish with sliced lemon. For the gravy,--take, that from the dripping-pan and skim it well. Having boiled the heart, liver, and feet, with some minced sage in a very little water, cut the meat from the feet, and chop it. Chop also the liver and heart. Put all into a small sauce-pan, adding a little of the water that they were boiled in, and some bits of butter rolled in flour. Flavour it with a glass of Madeira, and some grated nutmeg. Give it a boil up, and send it to table in a gravy-boat. You may serve up with the pig, apple-sauce, cranberry sauce, or bread-sauce in a small tureen; or currant jelly. If you bake the pig instead of roasting it, rub it from time to time with fresh butter tied in a rag.
Cut cold chicken or turkey into very thin slices, and stand over hot water, in a dish, until heated; toast a sufficient quantity of bread, butter the slices, put on each a slice of chicken or turkey, dust lightly with salt and pepper. On top of these place a poached egg, cover with tarragon sauce, and send to the table.
When you wish to serve apple sauce with meat prepare it in this way: Cook the apples until they are very tender, then stir them thoroughly so there will be no lumps at all; add the sugar and a little gelatine dissolved in warm water, a tablespoonful in a pint of sauce; pour the sauce into bowls, and when cold it will be stiff like jelly, and can be turned out on a plate. Cranberry sauce can be treated in the same way. Many prefer this to plain stewing. Apples cooked in the following way look very pretty on a tea-table, and are appreciated by the palate. Select firm, round greenings; pare neatly and cut in halves; place in a shallow stewpan with sufficient boiling water to cover them, and a cupful of sugar to every six apples. Each half should cook on the bottom of the pan, and be removed from the others so as not to injure its shape. Stew slowly until the pieces are very tender; remove to a dish carefully; boil the syrup half an hour longer; pour it over the apples and eat cold. A few pieces of lemon boiled in the syrup adds to the flavor. These sauces are a fine accompaniment to roast pork or roast goose.
Take a young turkey and bone her, only leave in the thigh bones and short pinions; take a large fowl and bone it, a little shred mace, nutmeg, pepper and salt, and season the turkey and fowl in the inside; lay the fowl in the inside of the low part of the turkey, and stuff the breast with a little white stuffing, (the same white stuffing as you made for the boiled turkey,) take a deep dish, lay a paste over it, and leave no paste in the bottom; lay in the turkey, and lay round it a few forc'd-meat-balls, put in half a pound of butter, and a jill of water, then close up the pie, an hour and a half will bake it; when it comes from the oven take off the lid, put in a pint of stew'd oysters, and the yolks of six or eight eggs, lay them at an equal distance round the turkey; you must not stew your oysters in gravy but in water, and pour them upon your turkey's breast; lay round six or eight artichoke-bottoms fry'd, so serve it up without the lid; you must take the fat out of the pie before you put in the oysters.
Make a force-meat of grated bread-crumbs, minced suet, sweet marjoram, grated lemon-peel, nutmeg, pepper, salt, and beaten yolk of egg. You may add some grated cold ham. Light some writing paper, and singe the hairs from the skin of the turkey. Reserve the neck, liver, and gizzard for the gravy. Stuff the craw of the turkey with the force-meat, of which there should be enough made to form into balls for frying, laying them round the turkey when it is dished. Dredge it with flour, and roast it before a clear brisk fire, basting it with cold lard. Towards the last, set the turkey nearer to the fire, dredge it again very lightly with flour, and baste it with butter. It will require, according to its size, from two to three hours roasting. Make the gravy of the giblets cut in pieces, seasoned, and stewed for two hours in a very little water; thicken it with a spoonful of browned flour, and stir into it the gravy from the dripping-pan, having first skimmed off the fat. A turkey should be accompanied by ham or tongue. Serve up with it mushroom-sauce. Have stewed cranberries on the table to eat with it. Do not help any one to the legs, or drum-sticks as they are called. Turkeys are sometimes stuffed entirely with sausage-meat. Small cakes of this meat should then be fried, and laid round it. To bone a turkey, you must begin with a very sharp knife at the top of the wings, and scrape the flesh loose from the bone without dividing or cutting it to pieces. If done carefully and dexterously, the whole mass of flesh may be separated from the bone, so that you can take hold of the head and draw out the entire skeleton at once. A large quantity of force-meat having been prepared, stuff it hard into the turkey, restoring it by doing so to its natural form, filling out the body, breast, wings and legs, so as to resemble their original shape when the bones were in. Roast or bake it; pouring a glass of port wine into the gravy. A boned turkey is frequently served up cold, covered with lumps of currant jelly; slices of which are laid round the dish. Any sort of poultry or game may be boned and stuffed in the same manner, A cold turkey that has not been boned is sometimes sent to table larded all over the breast with slips of fat bacon, drawn through the flesh with a larding needle, and arranged in regular form.
Pieces of cold turkey or chicken may be warmed up with a little butter in a frying pan; place it on a warm platter, surround it with pieces of small thick slices of bread or biscuit halved, first dipping them in hot salted water; then place the platter in a warm oven with the door open. Have already made the following gravy to pour over all:-- Into the frying pan put a large spoonful of butter, one or two cupfuls of milk, and any gravy that may be left over. Bring it to a boil; then add sufficient flour, wet in a little cold milk or water, to make it the consistency of cream. Season with salt, pepper and add a little of the dark meat chopped very fine. Let the sauce cook a few moments, then pour over the biscuit and fowl. This will be found a really nice dish.
Take fine, sound, ripe cranberries and with a sharp knife split each one until you have a heaping coffeecupful; put them in a vegetable dish or basin; put over them one cupful of white sugar, half a cup of water, a tablespoon full of sifted flour; stir it all together and put into your crust. Cover with an upper crust and bake slowly in a moderate oven. You will find this the true way of making a cranberry pie. Newport Style.
