Robert Neilson Stephens - "An Enemy To The King"

Anne Douglas Sedgwick - "A Fountain Sealed"

Maurice Leblanc - "The Extraordinary Adventures of Arsene Lupin, Gentleman Burglar"

John Burroughs - "Birds and Poets"

Annual Bibliography of Commonwealth Literature 2007
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches

E >> Eliza Leslie >> Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches




When killed and cut up, begin immediately to salt them. Rub the
outside of each ham with a tea-spoonful of powdered saltpetre, and
the inside with a tea-spoonful of cayenne pepper. Having mixed
together brown sugar and fine salt, in the proportion of a pound
and a half of brown sugar to a quart of salt, rub the pork well
with it. This quantity of sugar and salt will be sufficient for
fifty pounds of meat. Have ready some large tubs, the bottoms
sprinkled with salt, and lay the meat in the tubs with the skin
downward. Put plenty of salt between each layer of meat. After it
has lain eight days, take it out and wipe off all the salt, and
wash the tubs. Make a pickle of soft water, equal quantities of
salt and molasses, and a little saltpetre; allowing four ounces of
saltpetre to two quarts of molasses and two quarts of salt, which
is the proportion for fifty pounds of meat. The pickle must be
strong enough to bear up an egg. Boil and skim it; and when it is
cold, pour it over the meat, which must be turned every day and
basted with the pickle. The hams should remain in the pickle at
least four weeks; the shoulders and middlings of the bacon three
weeks; and the jowls two weeks. They should then be taken out and
smoked. Having washed off the pickle, before you smoke the meat,
bury it, while wet, in a tub of bran. This will form a crust over
it, and prevent evaporation of the juices. Let the smoke-house be
ready to receive the meat immediately. Take it out of the tub
after it has lain half an hour, and rub the bran evenly over it.
Then hang it up to smoke with the small end downwards. The smoke-house
should be dark and cool, and should stand alone, for the
heat occasioned by an adjoining--building may spoil the meat, or
produce insects. Keep up a good smoke all day, but have no blaze.
Hickory is the best wood for a smoke-house fire, In three or four
weeks the meat will be sufficiently smoked, and fit for use.
During the process it should be occasionally taken down, examined,
and hung up again. The best way of keeping hams is to wrap them in
paper, or, to sew them in coarse cloths (which should be white-washed)
and bury them in a barrel of hickory ashes. The ashes must
be frequently changed.

An old ham will require longer to soak, and longer to boil than a
new one.

Tongues may be cured in the above manner.


LIVER PUDDINGS.

Boil some pigs' livers. When cold, mince them, and season them
with pepper, salt, and some sage and sweet marjoram rubbed fine.
You may add some powdered cloves. Have ready some large skins
nicely cleaned, and fill them with the mixture, tying up the ends
securely. Prick them with a fork to prevent their bursting; put
them into hot water, and boil them slowly for about an hour. They
will require no farther cooking before you eat them. Keep them in
stone jars closely covered. They are eaten cold at breakfast or
supper, cut into slices an inch thick or more; or they may be cut
into large pieces, and broiled or fried.


COMMON SAUSAGE-MEAT.

Having cleared it from the skin, sinews, and gristle, take six
pounds of the lean of young fresh pork, and three pounds of the
fat, and mince it all as fine as possible. Take some dried sage,
pick off the leaves and rub them to powder, allowing three tea-spoonfuls
to each pound of meat. Having mixed the fat and lean
well together, and seasoned it with nine tea-spoonfuls of pepper,
and the same quantity of salt, strew on the powdered sage, and mix
the whole very well with your hands. Put it away in a stone jar,
packing it down hard; and keep it closely covered. Set the jar in
a cool dry place.

When you wish to use the sausage-meat, make it into flat cakes
about an inch thick and the size of a dollar; dredge them with
flour, and fry them in butter or dripping, over rather a slow
fire, till they are well browned on both sides, and thoroughly
done.

Sausages are seldom eaten except at breakfast.


FINE SAUSAGES.

Take some fresh pork, (the leg is best,) and clear it from the
skin, sinews, and gristle. Allow two pounds of fat to three pounds
of lean. Mince it all very fine, and season it with two ounces and
a half of salt, half an ounce of pepper, thirty cloves, and a
dozen blades of mace powdered, three grated, nutmegs, six table-spoonfuls
of powdered sage, and two tea-spoonfuls of powdered
rosemary. Mix all well together. Put it into a stone jar, and
press it down very hard. Cover it closely, and keep it in a dry
cool place.

When you use this sausage-meat, mix with it some beaten yolk of
egg, and make it into balls or cakes. Dredge them with flour, and
fry them in butter.


BOLOGNA SAUSAGES.

Take ten pounds of beef, and four pounds of pork; two-thirds of
the meat should be lean, and only one third fat. Chop it very
fine, and mix it well together. Then season it with six ounces of
fine salt, one ounce of black pepper, half an ounce of cayenne,
one table-spoonful of powdered cloves; and one clove or garlic
minced very fine.

Have ready some large skins nicely cleaned and prepared, (they
should be beef-skins,) and wash them in salt and vinegar. Fill
them with the above mixture, and secure the ends by tying them
with packthread or fine twine. Make a brine of salt and water
strong enough to bear up an egg. Put the sausages into it, and'
let them lie for three weeks, turning them daily. Then take them
out, wipe them dry, hang them up and smoke them. Before you put
them away rub them all over with, sweet oil,

Keep them in ashes. That of vine-twigs is best for them.

You may fry them or not before you eat them.


PORK CHEESE.

Take the heads, tongues, and feet of young fresh pork, or any
other pieces that are convenient. Having removed the skin, boil
them till all the meat is quite tender, and can be easily stripped
from the bones. Then chop it small, and season it with salt and
black pepper to your taste, and if you choose, some beaten cloves.
Add sage-leaves and sweet marjoram, minced fine, or rubbed to
powder. Mix the whole very well together with your hands. Put it
into deep pans, with straight sides, (the shape of a cheese,)
press it down hard and closely with a plate that will fit the pan;
putting the under side of the plate next to the meat, and placing
a heavy weight on it. In two or three days it will be fit for use,
and you may turn it out of the pan. Send it to table cut in
slices, and use mustard and vinegar with it. It is generally eaten
at supper or breakfast.


PIG'S FEET AND EARS SOUSED.

Having cleaned them properly, and removed the skin, boil them
slowly till they are quite tender, and then split the feet and put
them with the ears into salt and vinegar, flavoured with a little
mace. Cover the jar closely, and set it away. When you use them,
dry each piece well with a cloth; dip them first in beaten yolk of
egg, and then in bread-crumbs, and fry them nicely in butter or
lard. Or you may eat them cold, just out of the vinegar.

If you intend keeping them some time, you must make a fresh pickle
for them every other day.


TO IMITATE WESTPHALIA HAM.

The very finest pork must be used for these hams. Mix together an
equal quantity of powdered saltpetre and brown sugar, and rub it
well into the hams. Next day make a pickle in sufficient quantity
to cover them very well. The proportions of the ingredients are a
pound and a half of fine salt, half a pound of brown sugar, an
ounce of black pepper and an ounce of cloves pounded to powder, a
small bit of sal prunella, and a quart of stale strong beer or
porter. Boil them all together, so as to make a pickle that will
bear up an egg. Pour it boiling hot over the meat, and let it lie
in the pickle two weeks, turning it two or three times every day,
and basting or washing it with the liquid. Then take out the hams,
rub them with bran and smoke them for a fortnight. When done, keep
them in a barrel of wood ashes.

In cooking these hams simmer them slowly for seven or eight hours.

To imitate the shape of the real Westphalia hams, cut some of the
meat off the under side of the thick part, so as to give them a
flat appearance. Do this before you begin to cure them, first
loosening the skin and afterwards sewing it on again.

The ashes in which you keep them must be changed frequently,
wiping the hams when you take them out.


TO GLAZE A COLD HAM.

With a brush or quill feather go all over the ham with beaten yolk
of egg. Then cover it thickly with pounded cracker, made as fine
as flour, or with grated crumbs of stale bread. Lastly go over it
with thick cream. Put it to brown in the oven of a stove, or brown
it on the spit of a tin roaster, set before the fire and turned
frequently.

This glazing will be found delicious.




VENISON, &c.


TO ROAST A SADDLE OR HAUNCH OF VENISON.

Wipe it all over with a sponge dipped in warm water Then rub the
skin with lard or nice dripping. Cover the fat with sheets of
paper two double, buttered, and tied on with packthread that has
been soaked to keep it from burning. Or, what is still better, you
may cover the first sheets of paper with a coarse paste of flour
and water rolled out half an inch thick, and then cover the paste
with the second sheets of paper, securing the whole well with the
string to prevent its falling off. Place the venison on the spit
before a strong clear fire, such as you would have for a sirloin
of beef, and let the fire be well kept up all the time. Put some
claret and butter into the dripping-pan and baste the meat with it
frequently. If wrapped in paste, it will not be done in less than
five hours. Half an hour before you take it up, remove the
coverings carefully, place the meat nearer to the fire, baste it
with fresh butter and dredge it very lightly with flour. Send it
to table with fringed white paper wrapped round the bone, and its
own gravy well skimmed. Have currant jelly to eat with it. As
venison chills immediately, the plates should be kept on heaters.

You may make another gravy with a pound and a half of scraps and
trimmings or inferior pieces of venison, put into a sauce-pan with
three pints of water, a few cloves, a few blades of mace, half a
nutmeg; and salt and cayenne to your taste. Boil it down slowly to
a pint. Then skim off the fat, and strain the gravy into a clean
sauce-pan. Add to it half a pint of currant jelly, half a pint of
claret, and near a quarter of a pound of butter divided into bits
and rolled in flour. Send it to table in two small tureens or
sauce-boats. This gravy will be found very fine.

Venison should never be roasted unless very fat. The shoulder is a
roasting piece, and may be done without the paper or paste.

Venison is best when quite fresh; but if it is expedient to keep
it a week before you cook it, wash it well with milk and water,
and then dry it perfectly with cloths till there is not the least
damp remaining on it. Then mix together powdered ginger and
pepper, and rub it well over every part of the meat. Do not,
however, attempt to keep it unless the weather is quite cold.


TO HASH COLD VENISON.

Cut the meat in nice small slices, and put the trimmings and bones
into a sauce-pan with barely water enough to cover them. Let them
stew for an hour. Then strain the liquid into a stew-pan; add to
it some bits of butter rolled in flour, and whatever gravy was
left of the venison the day before. Stir in some currant jelly,
and give it a boil up. Then put in the meat, and keep it over the
fire just long enough to warm it through; but do not allow it to
boil, as it has been once cooked already.


VENISON STEAKS.

Cut them from the neck or haunch. Season them with pepper and
salt. When the gridiron has been well heated over a bed of bright
coals, grease the bars, and lay the steaks upon it. Broil them
well, turning them once, and taking care to save as much of the
gravy as possible. Serve them up with some currant jelly laid on
each steak. Have your plates set on heaters.


VENISON PASTY.

The neck, breast, and shoulder are the parts used for a venison
pie or pasty. Cut the meat into pieces (fat and lean together) and
put the bones and trimmings into a stew-pan with pepper and salt,
and water or veal broth enough to cover it. Simmer it till you
have drawn out a good gravy. Then strain it.

In the mean time make a good rich paste, and roll it rather thick.
Cover the bottom and sides of a deep dish with one sheet of it,
and put in your meat, having seasoned it with pepper, salt,
nutmeg, and mace. Pour in the gravy which you have prepared from
the trimmings, and two glasses of port or claret, and lay on the
top some hits of butter rolled in flour. Cover the pie with a
thick lid of paste, and ornament it handsomely with leaves and
flowers formed with a tin cutter. Bake it two hours or more,
according to its size.


VENISON HAMS.

Venison for hams must be newly killed, and in every respect as
good as possible. Mix together equal quantities of salt and brown
sugar, and rub it well into the hams. Put them into a tub, and let
them lie seven days; turning them and rubbing them daily with the
mixture of salt and sugar. Next mix together saltpetre and common
salt, in the proportion of two ounces of saltpetre to a handful of
salt. Rub it well into your hams, and let them lie a week longer.
Then wipe them, rub them with bran, and smoke them a fortnight
over hickory wood. Pack them in wood ashes.

Venison ham must not be cooked before it is eaten. It is used for
the tea-table, chipped or shred like dried beef, to which it is
considered very superior.

It will not keep as long as other smoked meat.


TO ROAST A KID.

A kid should be cooked the day it is killed, or the day after at
farthest. They are best from three to four months old, and are
only eaten while they live on milk.

Wash the kid well, wipe it dry, and truss it. Stuff the body with
a force-meat of grated bread, butter or suet, sweet herbs, pepper,
salt, nutmeg, grated lemon-peel, and beaten egg; and sew it up to
keep the stuffing in its place. Put it on the spit and rub it over
with lard, or sweet oil. Put a little salt and water into the
dripping-pan, and baste the kid first with that, and afterwards
with its own gravy. Or you may make it very nice by basting it
with cream. It should roast about three hours. At the last,
transfer the gravy to a small sauce-pan; thicken it with a little
butter rolled in flour, give it a boil up, and send it to table in
a boat. Garnish the kid with lumps of currant jelly laid round the
edge of the dish.

A fawn (which should never be kept more than one day) may be
roasted in the same manner; also, a hare, or a couple of rabbits.

You may send to table, to eat with the kid, a dish of chestnuts
boiled or roasted, and divested of the shells.


TO ROAST A HARE.

If a hare is old do not roast it, but make soup of it. Wash and
soak it in water for an hour, and change the water several times,
having made a little slit in the neck to let out the blood. Take
out the heart and liver, and scald them. Drain, dry, and truss the
hare. Make a force-meat richer and more moist than usual, and add
to it the heart and liver minced fine. Soak the bread-crumbs in a
little claret before you mix them with the other ingredients.
Stuff the body of the hare with this force-meat, and sew it up.
Put it on the spit, rub it with butter, and roast it before a
brisk fire. For the first half hour baste it with butter; and
afterwards with cream, or with milk thickened with beaten yolk of
egg. At the last, dredge it lightly with flour. The hare will
require about two hours roasting.

For sauce, take the drippings of the hare mixed with cream or with
claret, and a little lemon-juice, a bit of butter, and some bread-crumbs.
Give it a boil up, and send it to table in a boat. Garnish
the hare with slices of currant jelly laid round it in the dish.


FRICASSEED RABBITS.

The best way of cooking rabbits is to fricassee them. Take a
couple of fine ones, and cut them up, or disjoint them. Put them
into a stew-pan; season them with cayenne pepper and salt, some
chopped parsley, and some powdered mace. Pour in a pint of warm
water (or of veal broth, if you have it) and stew it over a slow
fire till the rabbits are quite tender; adding (when they are
about half done) some bits of butter rolled in flour. Just before
you take it from the fire, enrich the gravy with a jill or more of
thick cream with some nutmeg grated into it. Stir the gravy well,
but take care not to let it boil after the cream is in, lest it
curdle.

Put the pieces of rabbit on a hot dish, and pour the gravy over
them.


TO STEW RABBITS.

Having trussed the rabbits, lay them in a pan of warm water for
about fifteen minutes. Then put them into a pot with plenty of
water and a little salt, and stew them slowly for about an hour,
or till they are quite tender. In the mean time, peel and boil in
a sauce-pan a dozen onions. When they are quite tender all
through, take them out, and drain and slice them. Have ready some
drawn, butter, prepared by taking six ounces of butter, (cut into
bits and rolled in about three tea-spoonfuls of flour,) and
melting it in a jill of milk. After shaking it round-over hot
coals till it simmers, add to it the onions, and give it one boil
up.

When the rabbits are done stewing lay them on a large dish (having
first cut off their heads, which should not he sent to table) and
cover them all over with the onion-sauce, to which you may add
some grated nutmeg.


TO FRY RABBITS,

Having washed the rabbits well, put them into a pan of cold water,
and let them lie in it two or three hours. Then cut them into
joints, dry them in a cloth, dredge them with flour, strew them
with chopped parsley, and fry them in butter. After you take them
out of the frying-pan, stir a wine-glass of cream into the gravy,
or the beaten yolk of an egg. Do not let it boil, but pour it at
once into the dish with the rabbits.

Rabbits are very good baked in a pie. A boiled or pot-pie may be
made of them.

They may he stuffed with force-meat and roasted, basting them with
butter. Cut off their heads before you send them to table.




POULTRY, GAME, &c.


GENERAL REMARKS

In buying poultry choose those that are fresh and fat. Half-grown
poultry is comparatively insipid; it is best when full-grown but
not old. Old poultry is tough and hard. An old goose is so tough
as to be frequently uneatable. When poultry is young the skin is
thin and tender, and can be easily tipped by trying it with a pin;
the legs are smooth; the feet moist and limber; and the eyes full
and bright. The body should be thick and the breast fat. The bill
and feet of a young goose are yellow, and have but few hairs on
them; when old they are red and hairy.

Poultry is best when killed overnight, as if cooked too soon
after-killing, it is hard and does not taste well. It is not the
custom in America, as in some parts of Europe, to keep game, or
indeed any sort of eatable, till it begins to taint; all food when
inclining to decomposition being regarded by us with disgust.

When poultry or game is frozen, it should be brought into the
kitchen early in the morning of the day on which it is to be
cooked. It may be thawed by laying it several hours in cold water.
If it is not thawed it will require double the time to cook, and
will be tough and tasteless when done. In drawing poultry be very
careful not to break the gall, lest its disagreeable bitterness
should be communicated to the liver.

Poultry should be always scalded in hot water to make the feathers
come out easily. Before they are cooked they should be held for a
moment over the blaze of the fire to singe off the hairs that are
about the skin. The head, neck, and feet should be cut off, and
the ends of the legs skewered in the bodies. A string should be
tied tightly round.


TO BOIL A PAIR OF FOWLS.

Make a force-meat in the usual manner, of grated, bread-crumbs,
chopped sweet herbs, butter, pepper, salt, and yolk of egg. Fill
the bodies of the fowls with the stuffing, and tie a string firmly
round them. Skewer the livers and gizzards to the sides, under the
wings. Dredge them with flour, and put them into a pot with just
enough of water to cook them; cover it closely, and put it over a
moderate fire. As soon as the scum rises, take off the pot and
skim it. Then cover it again, and boil it slowly half an hour.
Afterwards diminish the fire, and let them stew slowly till quite
tender. An hour altogether is generally sufficient to boil a pair
of fowls, unless they are quite old. By doing them slowly (rather
stewing than boiling) the skin will not break, and they will be
whiter and more tender than if boiled fast.

Serve them up with egg-sauce in a boat.

Young chickens are better for being soaked two hours in skim milk,
previous to boiling. You need not stuff them. Boil or stew them,
slowly in the same manner as large fowls. Three quarters of an
hour will cook them.

Serve them up with parsley-sauce, and garnish with parsley.

Boiled fowls should be accompanied by ham or smoked tongue.


TO ROAST A PAIR. OF FOWLS.

Leave out the livers, gizzards and hearts, to be chopped and put
into the gravy.--Fill the crops and bodies of the fowls with a
force-meat, put them before a clear fire and roast them an hour,
basting them with butter or with clarified dripping.

Having stewed the necks, gizzards, livers, and hearts in a very
little water, strain it and mix it hot with the gravy that has
dripped from the fowls, and which must be first skimmed. Thicken
it with a little browned flour, add to it the livers, hearts, and
gizzards chopped small. Send the fowls to table with the gravy in
a boat, and have cranberry-sauce to eat with them.


BROILED CHICKENS.

Split a pair of chickens down the back, and beat them flat, Wipe
the inside, season them with pepper and salt, and let them, lie
while you prepare some beaten yolk of egg and grated bread-crumbs.
Wash the outside of the chickens all over with the egg, and then
strew on the bread-crumbs. Have ready a hot gridiron over a bed of
bright coals. Lay the chickens on it with the inside downwards, or
next the fire. Broil them about three quarters of an hour, keeping
them covered with a plate. Just before you take them up, lay some
small pieces of butter on them.

In preparing chickens for broiling, you may parboil them about ten
minutes, to ensure their being sufficiently cooked; as it is
difficult to broil the thick parts thoroughly without burning the
rest.


FRICASSEED CHICKENS.

Having cut up your chickens, lay them in cold water till all the
blood is drawn out. Then wipe the pieces, season them with pepper
and salt, and dredge them with flour. Fry them in lard or butter;
they should be of a fine brown on both sides. When they are quite
done, take them, out of the frying-pan, cover them up, and set
them by the fire to keep warm. Skim the gravy in the frying-pan
and pour into it half a pint of cream; season it with a little
nutmeg, pepper and salt, and thicken it with, a small bit of
butter rolled in flour. Give it a boil, and then pour it round the
chickens, which must he kept hot. Put some lard into the pan, and
fry some parsley in It to lay on the pieces of chicken; it must be
done green and crisp.

To make a white fricassee of chickens, skin them, cut them in
pieces, and having soaked out the blood, season them with salt,
pepper, nutmeg and mace, and strew over them some sweet marjoram
shred fine. Put them into a stew-pan, and pour over them half a
pint of cream, or rich unskimmed milk. Add some butter rolled in
Hour, and (if you choose) some small force-meat balls. Set the
stew-pan over hot coals. Keep it closely covered, and stew or
simmer it gently till the chicken is quite tender, but do not
allow it to boil.

You may improve it by a few small slices of cold ham.


CHICKEN CROQUETS AND RISSOLES.

Take some cold chicken, and having; cut the flesh from the bones,
mince it small with a little suet and parsley; adding sweet
marjoram and grated lemon-peel. Season it with pepper, salt and
nutmeg, and having mixed the whole very well pound it to a paste
in a marble mortar, putting in a little at a time, and moistening
it frequently with yolk of egg that has been previously beaten.
Then divide it into equal portions and having floured your hands,
make it up in the shape of pears, sticking the head of a clove
into the bottom of each to represent the blossom end, and the
stalk of a clove into the top to look like the stem. Dip them into
beaten yolk of egg, and then into bread-crumbs grated finely and
sifted. Fry them in butter, and when you take them out of the pan,
fry some parsley in it. Having drained the parsley, cover the
bottom of a dish with it, and lay the croquets upon it. Send it to
table as a side dish.

Croquets maybe made of cold sweet-breads, or of cold veal mixed
with ham or tongue.

Rissoles are made of the same ingredients, well mixed, and beaten
smooth in a mortar. Make a fine paste, roll it out, and cut it
into round cakes. Then lay some of the mixture on one half of the
cake, and fold over the other upon it, in the shape of a half-moon.
Close and crimp the edges nicely, and fry the rissoles in
butter. They should be of a light brown on both sides. Drain them
and send them to table dry.

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