OUR VIANDS
By the same Author.
ANTHROPOLOGICAL STUDIES.
BY A. W. BUCKLAND.
i vol. Crown 8vo. 6s.
' Her object has been so to popularise her subjects as to induce
her readers to pursue the study for themselves, and if a pleasing
literary style, and an admirable faculty of clear and lucid descrip-
tion are the essentials of success in that object, she may be assured
that she will achieve it.' Athenceum.
OUR VIANDS
WHENCE THEY COME AND
HOW THEY ARE COOKED
WITH A BUNDLE OF OLD
RECIPES FROM COOKERY BOOKS
OF THE LAST CENTURY
BY ANNE WALBANK BUCKLAND
MEMBER OF THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL INSTITUTE. AUTHOR OF
'ANTHROPOLOGICAL STUDIES.' 'THE WORLD BEYOND
THE ESTERELLES,' ETC.
Tell me "what thou eatest and I will tell thee who thou art. '
OLD PROVERB.
' Viands of various kinds allure the taste
Of choicest sort and savour; rich repast' POPE.
LONDON
WARD & DOWNEY
12 YORK STREET COVENT GARDEN W.C
1893
CONTENTS
PART I
HAP. PAGE
Introduction, ..... 7
I. Bread, ...... 19
II. Maize and Millet, . . ,34
III. Various Bread-stuffs, . 44
IV. Cakes and Puddings, . . . 52
PART II
V. Christmas Fare The Roast Beef of Old England
and the Boar's Head, . 69
VI. Sundry Meats, ..... 79
VII. Game and Poultry, ..... 94
VIII. Eggs, ...... 108
IX. Dairy Produce, . . . . .119
X. Fish, .... .130
XI. Unappreciated Trifles, . . . .144
XII. Condiments, . . . . .157
vi CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
XIII. Nuts and Apples, .... 171
XIV. Grapes, Figs, and Oranges, ... 183
XV. Stone fruits and Berries, . . . 193
XVI. On the Borderland 'twixt Fruit and Vegetable, . 206
XVII. Roots, . . . . . .215
XVIII. Pulse and Cabbage, . . . 228
XIX. Salads and Seasonings, .... 240
Recipes Old and New, .... 249
Index, ... .... 297
INTRODUCTION
THE art of cookery is no new thing, yet the tastes of
mankind are so diverse, that the proverb, 'One man's
meat is another man's poison,' becomes a truism. There
still exist savages who prefer raw meat to cooked, as did
the Fuegians who were lately exhibited in London, but
even they had acquired a taste for hard boiled eggs, which
they devoured with great relish.
There may also be found in the heart of savage Africa, in
Australia, and in some of the South Sea Islands, tribes who
prefer human flesh to any other, but these all like their meat,
whatever it may be, cooked ; and following the custom of
the most ancient of men, will sit round a fire broiling their
bones, cutting off bits by degrees just scorched, and repeat-
ing the process till nothing but the bare bone remains. But
even then the feast is not ended, for all the bones are broken,
and the marrow, which is highly esteemed, is sucked out as
a concluding bonne bouche.
In this mode of cooking and eating, the modern savage
closely follows the ancient cave-dwellers, amongst whom
marrow seems to have been always esteemed a prime
delicacy.
This we know, because many of the bones found in the
kitchen middens of these early people are partly charred, and
8 OUR VIANDS
all the marrow-bones are broken. But these troglodytes
were not extravagant cooks, nothing was thrown away which
might prove useful. Having split the bones and devoured
the marrow, they proceeded to make spear and arrow heads
from the splinters, for the capture of fresh game to furnish
future feasts, and it is more than probable that they crushed
and ate the smaller bones, for this is still the custom among
savages. Mr. Borcherds, an early South African traveller,
describes a feast among some Bushmen to whom a sheep
had been given : he says, ' Each bone was separated from
the flesh as cleanly as possible, the bones were crushed, and
together with the raw kidneys, distributed amongst the
children, who seemed to enjoy the delicacy as much as ours
do cakes. The meat was laid on the fire, and when half
cooked devoured.' Mr. Lumholtz, in his travels 'Among
Cannibals' in Australia, describes a feast of snakes, in
which the bones were also crushed and eaten ; and in that
singularly interesting legend, denominated ' The Mountain
Chant,' given in the Smithsonian Reports^ the hero is repre-
sented as killing two rabbits, and pounding them up bones
and all with seeds, for food. So that here we have from
three parts of the world evidence of the use of crushed
bones, and may reasonably infer that the custom was
universal, especially in times of scarcity.
Sitting at our well-appointed tables, we smile at the
primitive devices adopted by savages, yet some of them
have hit upon a mode of cooking which may fairly be
termed scientific, so well is it calculated to retain the juices
of the meat ; as for instance, in Australia, the snakes which
furnished the feast described by Lumholtz, were coiled up,
tied together, and baked in an oven scooped out of the
INTRODUCTION 9
earth, in which a large fire was made, serving to heat several
stones. Some of these were removed, and upon the others
a large quantity of green leaves or grass was laid, and upon
this the snakes, which were covered with more green leaves
and more hot stones, and then the earth was pressed down
tight over the whole, no steam being allowed to escape.
When done, the meat, tender and juicy, was taken out in
the leaves which served as a dish. Mr. Lumholtz extols
this method of cooking for salt beef and pork, especially
when ginger leaves are used,* but the natives reserve it for
snakes and human flesh, cooking other things by throwing
them on the hot embers like the Bushmen, and eating them
half raw. The New Zealanders cook their potatoes in the
same kind of earth-oven, which, probably, in cannibal times
also served for the long pig in which they delighted.
The art of baking in ovens is of great antiquity; the ovens
of ancient Egypt are frequently represented in contemporary
paintings; and the African savage will scoop out the
adhesive earth of ants' nests, or the clay of river courses, to
form an oven wherein to bake bread, stopping up the open-
ing with wood and clay or cow dung, just as our cottagers
used to do with the earth-ovens made at the end of most
cottages, at a time when it was the wholesome custom
among farm-labourers to make and bake their own bread.
Boiling is another primitive mode of cooking, and the
method which is still employed in some uncivilised countries,
is to take the hide of the slaughtered animal, tie it up so as
* Years ago it was the custom in some parts of England to take
bread rolls wrapped up in cabbage leaves. This imparted a peculiar
and, to many palates, agreeable flavour to the bread. In a description
of a recent Chinese dinner, we find among the delicacies, a knife fish,
rolled in banana leaves, and baked between hot stones.
io OUR VIANDS
to form a bag, place the meat in this bag with some water,
and then drop in stones, heated in the fire to a white heat,
until the meat is cooked. It must be a very tedious process,
and not particularly appetising, but the only one available
where pottery and metal are alike unknown. The alternative
method of placing the meat on hot stones and covering it
with the ashes was doubtless that most generally practised,
and is still adopted by hunters and by the gipsies in our
own country; one of the dainties of the latter being a hedge-
hog thus roasted, whilst the hunter in Africa will regale
himself with the foot of the elephant, or a porcupine cooked
in the same manner. Then of course there is the tripod of
sticks, upon which the meat is hung over the flame, and it
is doubtful whether meat thus cooked is not of finer flavour
than that which we dry up in ovens, or boil to death in
ordinary saucepans.
In very hot countries the sun turns cook, and the hunter
has only to place his steak on heated stones exposed to
the mid-day sun, and it will soon be sufficiently cooked,
or he may cut his game in slices and hang the pieces on
a thorn-bush to be thoroughly dried in the sun, and then
carry it away with him as biltong in South Africa, or jerked
beef (charki] in America.
We have heard of nests of eggs cooked by the heat of
the sun in South Africa, whilst in Iceland and some other
countries it is possible to cook by means of the boiling springs.
We are apt to experience a feeling of disgust in reading
of the Eskimo crowded in their snow houses, regaling
themselves with great pieces of seal-blubber, and washing
down the feast with train oil, but we do not consider the
disadvantages under which these poor people labour in
IN TROD UCTION 1 1
a country where it would be impossible to indulge in
gastronomic luxuries, not only on account of the scarcity
of food, but also because of the scarcity of fuel, their
only cooking apparatus consisting of that simple oil lamp,
which serves the treble purpose of fire, candle, and cooking-
stove. Yet French and Italian cooks achieve most of their
culinary triumphs by the aid of a cooking-stove only once re-
moved from that of the Eskimo, being heated by charcoal only.
Luxury has now taken such hold upon us that we
wonder how it could ever have been possible to eat
comfortably without silver forks, yet our grandmothers
knew them not, but used forks of steel, at first with only
two tines or prongs, which they managed as deftly as the
Chinese do their chop-sticks, although they did not scruple
to put the knife in the mouth on occasion, and, in fact,
the knives were made rounded at the end for that purpose.
Forks, indeed, are but a late invention, and our Saxon
ancestors cut their meat from the spit with their hunting
knives, not only when engaged in the chase, but when seated
at table in their great banqueting halls, as witness a curious
old drawing in the Cotton Manuscript, in which two serving-
men or cooks are represented kneeling holding a spit in one
hand and a platter in the other, whilst three guests seated
at a table covered with a heavy cloth, upon which are
various dishes, and cakes of bread marked with a cross cut
from the spit presented to them such meat as they please,
apparently letting it fall into the platter held to receive it.
Yet we are told that the Anglo-Saxons possessed forks,
some having been found with coins of Caenwulf, King of
Mercia and Athelstan,* but these are supposed to have
* See Chambers's 'Book of Days.'
12 OUR VIANDS
been mere toys, for forks certainly did not come into
general use in England before the end of the seventeenth
century, although they appear to have been used in Italy
at an earlier date. They have now penetrated into the
heart of savage Africa, and Mr. A. A. Anderson * describes
an interview with Lo Bengula, in which ' a little Mashona
boy brought, on a piece of grass matting, four large pieces
of bullock's lights, that had been broiled over a fire, and
a fork; advancing on hands and knees to his dreaded
master, he placed them on the grass in front of his majesty,
who took the fork, and transfixing one after the other they
disappeared from sight in his capacious mouth.'
The table appointments of ancient Egypt are familiar
to us from the paintings. We see the guests seated at
table in gala dress, be-wigged and be-jewelled, holding the
lotus-lily in their hands by way of nosegay, whilst attendants
in the very scantiest of attire, naked except for a girdle
and a necklace to show that they are slaves, serve them
with meat and wine, evidently in too great profusion, for
that disgusting practice, which prevailed also among the
epicures and gluttons of ancient Rome, of taking emetics
when satiated f in order to be able to renew the feast, is
most realistically depicted.
That which is remarkable in these Egyptian feasts is the
* 'Twenty-five Years in a Waggon.'
t It may be of interest here to give the receipt of Apicius for
digestive salts from Soyer's ' History of Food : ' take I Ib. of common
salt pulverised, mix with 3 oz. white pepper, 2 oz. ginger, I oz. lamoni,
\\ oz. thyme, i\ oz. celery seed, 2 oz. wild marjoram, \\ oz. rocket
seed, 3 oz. black pepper, \\ oz. holy thistle, 2 oz. hyssop, 2 oz.
spikenard, 2 oz. parsley, 2 oz. aniseed. Take a small quantity after
a too plentiful dinner.
INTRODUCTION 13
preponderance of women represented. It is evident that
in those remote times ladies were not consigned to the
galleries to look on whilst their lords and masters enjoyed the
good things provided by Egyptian cooks, but were allowed
their full share both of the comestibles and of the table
talk.
The ancient Greeks were studiously simple in their habits,
and their cookery in early times appears to have partaken
of this simplicity. The famous black broth of the Spartans,
which was the national dish, and of which they were so
fond that they seldom ate anything else, appears to have
been a horrible compound of pork broth, with vinegar and
salt. Of this dish it is related, that Dionysius, the elder,
having had it carefully prepared by a Lacedaemonian slave,
just tasted it and threw it from him in disgust, demanding
of the slave whether that was the broth of which the
Spartans were so found ' No,' replied the slave, ' it lacks
one ingredient, that of violent exercise before partaking of it.'
In Attica the common people lived almost entirely upon
vegetables, but among the wealthy there was great profusion
as soon as luxuries began to be introduced from abroad. At
entertainments a king of the feast was chosen by lot, whose
duty it was to fix the quantity of wine to be drunk by the
guests, and to determine in what manner they were to pass
the evening ; this was often by music and singing patriotic
songs, although the king of the feast frequently proposed a
subject which all present were expected to discuss. The
guests at the dinner parties of the Athenians seem to have
been limited to nine, for it was an Athenian saying that a
convivial meeting should not consist of fewer than the
Graces or more than the Muses, and before sitting down
14 OUR VIANDS
they were accustomed to use the warm bath, and to anoint
themselves with oil.
The institution of ' King of the Feast ' appears to have
descended to the Romans, for this functionary is mentioned
with approbation both by Plutarch and Cato. His office
somewhat resembled that of the chairman or president of
to-day, although he would appear to have had more to do
with the general conduct of the feast, regulating the quantity
of wine to be drunk, and who should sing or tell a story, or
in any other way amuse the guests.
The Romans in Republican times were as frugal in their
diet as the Spartans, seldom tasting meat, but living chiefly
upon milk, eggs, and vegetables, and a kind of pudding
somewhat resembling our batter pudding ; but this simple
mode of life was quickly abandoned, and the luxury of the
wealthy Romans exceeded anything known in the present
day. Nero's banqueting-room was wainscotted with ivory,
and the panels were so constructed as to turn on pivots and
shower down flowers and perfumes on the guests, whilst the
circular roof imitated the movements of the spheres, repre-
senting a different season of the year as each course was
placed on the table. 'The supper-rooms of Elagabalus,'
we are told, 'were hung with cloth of gold and silver,
enriched with jewellery ; the frames of the couches were of
massive silver, with mattresses covered with the richest
embroidery ; and the tables and table services were of pure
gold ;* whilst even of private individuals Horace writes
' Where ivory couches overspread
With Tyrian carpets glowing, fed
The dazzled eye.'
* ' Sketches of Manners and Institutions of the Romans,' p. 164.
INTRODUCTION 15
The guests reposed upon elegant couches placed round
the tables, and only sat in sign of mourning; each was
provided with a special robe, generally white, by the host, a
custom alluded to in the New Testament ; whilst a bill of
fare, or, as we should say now, a menu was placed before
every guest. As for plate, Crassus is said to have possessed
some, of which the workmanship alone cost about fifty-two
shillings the ounce. Sylla had silver dishes of sixteen
hundred ounces ; and a freedman of the Emperor Claudius
had one which weighed five hundred pounds, forming the
centre dish of eight others, each weighing fifty pounds. But
in the midst of all this luxury it is amusing to read that
every guest was expected to bring his own napkin, which he
generally sent home by a slave filled with some of the
good things from the table* a custom which, perhaps,
some of us would not be sorry to see revived.
Small figures of Mercury, Hercules, and the penates were
placed on the table, and libations were poured to them at
the beginning and end of a feast; whilst the salt placed
beside them was regarded as sacred. We find, too, the
superstitions regarding the spilling of salt, and the unlucky
number thirteen, in full force among the Romans. Pliny
says the purchase of a cook cost as much as the expense of
a triumph, and no mortal was so valued as the slave who
was most expert in the art of ruining his master. Hosts
seemed to vie with each other in the costliness of feasts, and
of Apicius it is related that, after having wasted half a
million sterling on the pleasures of the table, he committed
suicide because, having only eighty thousand pounds left,
he could not continue his extravagances.
' Sketches of Manners and Institutions of the Romans,' p. 164.
i6 OUR VIANDS
And yet, during the early part of the Empire, sumptuary
laws were in force regulating the expenses to be incurred at
banquets, and even the number of dishes, and it is said that
Julius Caesar frequently sent lictors to suspected houses, and
had the dishes carried off from the tables if they exceeded
the number permitted by law ; whilst Augustus decreed that
an ordinary repast should not cost more than 200 sesterces
(about ;i, i2s. 6d.), or 300 on feasts or days of solemnity,
and 1000 at a wedding. If we compare this with the
luxury of Nero and Elagabalus and later emperors, when a
single fish cost fifty guineas, when pearls were dissolved in
vinegar and drunk, not for pleasure, but only to add to the
cost of a feast ; and when the senate was convened to con-
sult as to the best manner of dressing a turbot for the
emperor's table, we shall hardly be surprised at the decline
and fall of Rome.
Yet this excess of luxury was a great incentive to com-
merce, for merchants who scoured the seas for things rare
and costly were sure of a market on their return ; whilst
they carried with them in their wanderings to distant shores
not only many useful wares by way of barter, but also those
germs of civilisation, destined to grow up and bear fruit
when the pomp of the Roman emperors which had caused
their transplantation had withered and fallen into an un-
timely grave.
PART I
BREAD
WHEAT, BARLEY, RYE, OATS
' ftttttt fjalfr a loafe tfjan no tart/
CHAPTER I
BREAD
MAN is an omnivorous animal: nothing comes amiss to
him. When hunger impels he will eat the vilest refuse,
but in times of prosperity bread, meat, and vegetables form
the staple of his diet. 'Doctors differ' as to the original
food of mankind. It varied probably, as now, according to
climate, consisting of fruit and seeds where these grew
spontaneously and in abundance, and of animal food where
fruit, etc., could not be readily obtained ; but with the dawn
of civilisation man began to cultivate plants for food, and
particularly the several grains still used for making bread.
Of these, wheat, barley, and rye seem to have been the
earliest cultivated, oats being later, whilst it is doubtful
whether maize was known except on the American
continent.
We are so accustomed to look upon bread as the
'staff of life,' the food above all others necessary for our
sustenance, that the term, 'without bread,' has long been
in our language synonymous with ' starvation.' Hence we
find it hard to realise the fact that, if we restrict the term
bread to that which is generally so called, that is food
prepared from the farina or flour of various grains, not
only individuals, but entire nations have lived, and
19
20 OUR VIANDS
continue to live to this day without bread; nay, that we
may trace the history of mankind back to a time when
bread was utterly unknown.
The early men who hunted the mammoth, the rhinoceros,
and the bear through the forests which now lie beneath the
waves of Torbay and Cromer, and sheltered themselves in
Brixham caverns, Kent's Hole, and the Victoria and Welsh
caves, knew nothing of bread ; they may indeed, and prob-
ably did, as savages do now, eat such roots and fruits as
came in their way, but it is abundantly evident that they did
not cultivate the soil, nor prepare grain for food. They
have left us their rude stone tools, and later the bone har-
poons with which they caught their fish, the needles with
which they sewed their skin garments, and the shell, bone,
and stone ornaments in which they delighted, but they
evidently lived like the hyenas, their contemporaries, upon
flesh and marrow, and it is doubtful whether they even
knew how to light a fire, or to cook in any way the game
they fed upon. There is, at all events among the older
relics, no trace of fire, no implements for grinding corn,
and no calcined grains, such as are so abundant in those
singularly interesting deposits of much later date, the Swiss
Lake dwellings, where corn and fruits of different kinds,
calcined and thus rendered indestructible, have been found
beneath the mud of lakes where they have lain for at least
two thousand years, so little injured by time that even the
seeds of the raspberry can be identified. We can prove
that these ancient lake-dwellers were advanced agriculturists,
because we can distinguish among these remains cereals of
various kinds, two or three sorts of wheats, one being that
kind denominated Egyptian, two or three barleys, millets,
BREAD 21
and peas, also apples, pears, raspberries, blackberries, hazel
nuts, and beech nuts, but no trace of any agricultural imple-
ment has been found, and we do not know how they turned
over the soil, planted their seed, and gathered their harvest.
Probably their chief agricultural implements were pointed
sticks, such as are still used by many semi-civilised peoples,
and they ground or crushed their corn by means of such
mullers or hand-mills as are found so frequently among
remains of the later Stone (Neolithic) age ; certain it is that
they made bread, or at least unleavened cakes of the imper-
fectly ground corn ; they also stored the crushed corn in
coarse earthenware pots, and ate it either roasted, boiled, or
moistened, as it still is sometimes in Germany and Switzer-
land. Many of these relics are of a people wholly un-
acquainted with the use of metal, yet they knew how to
weave linen, to make nets for fishing, and pottery similar to
that often discovered in tumuli in Great Britain. It is not,
however, till we come to the Bronze age that oats are found
among the cereals in use, thus indicating progress, not only
in the art of tool-making, but also in that of agriculture.
Between the age of the earliest cave-dwellers and the earliest
of the Swiss Lake dwellers archaeologists place the well-
known 'kitchen-middens' of Denmark, upon which Sir
Charles Lyell based so strong an argument in favour of the
antiquity of man, but although these relics show a decided
advancement upon those of the primitive cave-men here and
elsewhere, no trace can be found in them of even the
rudiments of agricultural knowledge. It may indeed be
said by some, that difference of climate may account for
this want of agricultural knowledge in the Danish savages,
who have left their refuse heaps to show us what they ate
22 OUR VIANDS
and what were their occupations, and that whilst these
kitchen-middens were accumulating in Denmark, and the
stalagmite slowly sealing down the records of early man in
Kent's Cavern and elsewhere, that in other more favoured
spots men were tilling the soil, gathering in their harvests of
wheat and barley, grinding their corn, and making their
bread; and undoubtedly this may have been the case,
because the beginning of agriculture cannot be traced, and
the first glimpses we get of the art in the Swiss Lake dwell-
ings show it already in an advanced stage; and since it
seems certain that man did not originate either in England
or Denmark, but made his way thither by slow degrees, at a
period when the conformation of land and sea differed
widely from that with which we are now so familiar ; there-
fore during this slow advance of mankind from his primeval
home to the utmost bounds of the universe, those remaining
in the original cradle of the race would have had time to
progress in civilisation, and to attain skill in those arts
which can only be successfully practised in settled com-
munities; nevertheless, the extreme antiquity of the art
even in Britain, is testified by traces of furrows found
beneath peat-bogs in Scotland where now corn will not
grow, and may be seen in Cornwall also, among those heaps
of metallic waste which are now looked upon as hopelessly
barren ; but who these early agriculturists were, and at what
time they lived, is an unsolved problem.
If, however, we turn to Eastern lands, to the records of
the earliest of historians, we shall find agriculture in a
state of great advancement. Before the days of Moses,
not only was wheaten bread in common use, but the art of
leavening it was also well known. At that period Egypt
BREAD 23
was the storehouse of the world, and had been so, at least,
from the days of Abraham ; for, although we know from
the monuments that corn was grown abundantly in Assyria,
yet it was to Egypt that the patriarchs always resorted
during those times of famine, which would appear to have
been as frequent then in Mesopotamia as they have
unfortunately been of late years in India, and it is worthy
of remark that Egypt owed her comparative immunity
from these terrible visitations, not only to the fertility
caused by the annual overflow of the Nile, but to the
wisdom of her rulers in instituting vast irrigation works,
whereby that overflow was regulated and equalised by
means of great reservoirs, wherein surplus water was stored,
in order that it might be distributed over the land, through
a network of canals when the rise of the Nile was deficient.
The first direct mention of meal and bread in the Bible is
in Genesis xviii. 5, 6, where Abraham invites the angel
to take a morsel of bread, and tells Sarah to ' make ready
quickly three measures of fine meal, knead it, and make
cakes upon the hearth.' This, it may be observed, was
subsequent to the time when famine had driven them into
Egypt, and although we are told that Adam was sent
forth from Paradise to till the ground from whence he
was taken, and also find it recorded that Cain was a
tiller of the soil, yet it is abundantly evident that the
patriarchs were pastoral nomads like the Arabs of the
present day, and in no sense of the word agriculturists,
and that if we wish to trace the early history of cereals
we must look rather to archaeological than to Biblical
records.
We know what the bread of ancient Egypt was like,
24 OUR VIANDS
for it has been found in tombs, and may be seen in the
British Museum. The authorities say it was chiefly barley
cakes, but we learn from the Bible, as well as from the
records of the tombs, that wheat was largely grown, and
also that leaven was used in the making of bread, for the
children of Israel, when they departed out of Egypt, took
their 'kneading troughs with the dough before it was
leavened.' This was the origin of the Jewish feast of
unleavened bread. The leaven employed was doubtless
a piece of stale dough, ' hidden in the meal till the whole
was leavened,' and this is still used in some countries,
but it causes an unpleasant sourness, very unpalatable to
those unaccustomed to it. The Jews, however, evidently
made cakes upon the hearth, of meal mixed with oil, but
it does not seem quite clear whether the meal was of
wheat or barley.
We know, also by actual specimens, what sort of bread
was used by the old Swiss Lake dwellers, who built their
pile houses out into the lakes, but who cultivated wheat,
barley, and rye on the mainland, and, as time went on,
oats also. When their houses were burnt by some enemy
to the water's edge, the food they had stored in them was
burnt also, and, with a lot of articles of domestic use, sank
down to the bottom of the lake, where it lay unheeded and
unknown for many centuries, until discovered by accident
only a few years ago.
Another specimen of bread comes down to us after
having been buried for centuries this time by the ashes
of a volcano; for among the relics of Pompeii we find
loaves of bread, as put into the oven on the day when the
rain of fiery ashes fell and caused the baker to fly for
BREAD 25
his life, leaving his loaves to await customers until this
nineteenth century, when they have been withdrawn from
the oven to prove to admiring antiquaries that Pompeian
bakers knew how to set up a batch of bread almost in the
same form as those of London ; but bread was often baked
in moulds, which have been found in Herculaneum, and
these loaves were all divided into portions by a cross, like
scones at the present day. Doubtless, all these ancient
breads were what we should now call of whole meal, for
there were no millers in those early days to sift away the
most nutritious portion of the meal. The corn was mostly
crushed on a hollow stone by means of another stone,
as we know by the many specimens of these primitive
mills which have been found; or it was passed between
two stones fastened together to form what is called a quern,
with two sticks to serve as handles, which two women
sitting passed round to each other from hand to hand,
thus grinding the corn as it was poured in through a hole
in the centre, as in a coffee-mill. References to this kind
of hand-mill are frequent in the Bible. Even now hand-
mills are in use in India and in many Eastern countries ;
whilst the primitive form of winnowing the grain in which
a woman stands in a doorway and pours the grain down
from a vessel held as high as she can, the wind carrying
away the chaff, the heavier corn falling to the ground is
still retained in some parts of Europe, as, for example,
among the dwellers in Alpine valleys; but water-mills are
said to have been invented in the reign of Augustus, and,
long after that, in Rome, mills were turned by asses and
sometimes freemen, who worked thus for a living, whilst
slaves were sometimes punished by being sent to work
26 OUR VIANDS
in the mills, being afterwards known as asinus. The poor
donkeys enjoyed a holiday during the summer festival,
being then turned loose and adorned with garlands.
The variety of bread at present in use is astonishing,
every country has some peculiarity, but I only purpose
here to mention a few of the whcaten breads of Europe,
leaving others to be treated of later.
The bread of Great Britain and Ireland is too well known
to need description, but in Scotland the white bread is too
white and deficient in crust to please our palate, whilst the
brown is superior to anything we get in London. The
bread of Devonshire and Cornwall calls also for a passing
notice, being baked in an iron pot, which makes it rather
close and of a peculiar shape. It is, however, very sweet
and good. When we cross over to France, we find wheaten
bread of various qualities and forms, but characterised
chiefly by length, so that to buy bread by the yard is not a
merefa$0n de parler. The finer French rolls are well known,
but the waiter in a restaurant frequented by the poorer classes
does not present such luxuries to his customers. With two
or three yards of coarse bread under his arm, he slices off
thick rounds to serve with each plate of bouilli. Journeying
on to Spain, we find the bread excellent, and used alike by
rich and poor. It is very white, and fashioned something
like a door-knocker thick in the centre, and tapering off so
as to be fastened together with a kind of knob. In Italy
the native bread is not good, although it looks tempting.
Made in the shape of a ball, and covered with crusty knobs,
it is as the apples of Sodom, so dry and sour that none but
natives can eat it with relish. There is, however, a bread
peculiar to North Italy which is palatable enough, but too
BREAD 27
fanciful for everyday use. This bread is called grizzinf, and
is made in long tubes a little larger than macaroni, and
baked quite brown. When placed before you it resembles
a bundle of sticks, and when fresh and crisp is very good,
although not very satisfying. The best is made in Turin
and Genoa. It is not known in South Italy, where macaroni
may be said almost to take the place of bread, especially
among the lower orders, who beg for money to eat macaroni
instead of asking for bread. Macaroni is a stiff paste of
flour and eggs, forced through holes so as to form long
pipes; it is then hung across strings in the porches or
windows of the houses to dry. In Naples it is eaten boiled
in oil, and always with grated Parmesan cheese.
In Germany the best white bread is everywhere made in
small rolls of different shapes, very delicious when quite
new, but the Germans have an almost superstitious belief in
the medicinal virtues of aniseed, and all the ordinary house-
hold bread is plentifully sprinkled with these seeds, the
flavour of which is far from pleasant to an English palate.
The Germans, also, eat rye bread, but of that anon. All
through Europe at the present day the finest wheaten bread
chiefly in the form of rolls is consumed by the upper
classes, whilst the poorer people eat rye or barley bread.
Probably little wheaten rolls were early in use in England
when the ordinary household bread was of rye or barley.
Shakespeare alludes to these delicate wheaten cakes when,
in his song of the fairies, he says :
A grain o' the finest wheat
Is manchet that we eat.
But we must not enter into fairy lore, lest our subject should
drift into something too ethereal for mortal appetite.
28 OUR VIANDS
The bread of ancient Greece is said to have been of
dazzling whiteness and exquisite taste, but they soon began
to mix ingredients with the paste which altered its character,
and seventy-two kinds of bread were introduced. Some of
these, according to Soyer's ' History of Food,' were made
with milk, honey, oil, cheese, and wine, mixed with best
flour, and all were known as artos bread. Women sold this
bread in an open market, as also azumos, a kind of biscuit
made without leaven ; artologanos, in which wine, pepper,
oil, and milk were introduced ; and escarites, made of light
paste with raw sweet wine and honey. The poorer people
had dolyres, made of rye and barley ; whilst ladies of fashion
ate puff-cakes called placites or melitutes, and the workmen
bought tyrontes, a bread mixed with cheese.
Amongst the Romans, porridge appears to have been the
national dish until wheaten bread was introduced from
Greece; they had also a very coarse bread made of bran
and a little coarse flour, which was made expressly for dogs
and slaves. Their leaven, according to Pliny, was made
from millet or wheat-bran, soaked in wine and dried in the
sun, or of a dish of barley paste placed on red-hot coals
till it boiled, and then put into vessels till it became
sour.
Barley bread is now so entirely discarded, that it is hard
to realise that even up to the beginning of the present
century, it was the common food of the English peasantry,
even as it was in ancient times the bread of Egypt, and of
the Jews in the days of Christ, as we learn from the miracle
wrought upon the lad's five barley loaves. We remember
once talking to an old man, who grumbled at the hardness
of the times and the difficulty of getting a living. * But,' we
BREAD 29
said, ' you get a great deal more wages now than when you
were young.' 'Oh, ay,' he said, 'but it don't seem to go
so fur.' ' That's because you live better, perhaps ? ' said we.
' For instance, you didn't get white bread and butter every
day then.' 'Noa, noa,' said he, 'that we didn't; barley
bread as black as my hat and a bit of thin cheese was what
we did get mostly, and a slice of fat bacon and cabbage
now and then that's what we did live upon when I were
young.' ' Well,' we answered, ' if you would eat the same
now, you'd soon be quite rich.' But he only shook his
head, repeating, ' Barley bread as black as my hat noa,
noa, couldn't eat it now: teeth baint so good as they wer.'
In truth, it must have been hard, dry stuff, and we are
not surprised that it should have been superseded by
wheaten bread as soon as wheat became sufficiently cheap
to be used in common. In like manner oat cake is now
discarded, even in Scotland, ' the land of cakes,' except in
some few districts, and it is more difficult to get oat cake in
Edinburgh than in London, in which latter city it is con-
sumed as a luxury by the rich, instead of forming the staple
food of the working classes. Yet it is good wholesome fare,
and might be eaten advantageously, especially by children,
instead of the much-adulterated and unsatisfying white
bread now so largely, and, indeed, exclusively eaten by the
English poor, for they will not eat whole-meal bread if it is
offered them, partly, perhaps, owing to the price, which is
always higher than that of white bread, but chiefly because
of its traditional use by poor people, so that white bread has
come to be regarded as a luxury by the poor, and therefore
preferred.
When, however, we come to rye bread, we find that,
30 OUR VIANDS
although it is now unknown in this country, it still forms
the principal food of the peasantry of the greater part of
Europe. Often have I seen the German peasant toiling
along the dusty road by the side of his horse, cutting huge
slices from what resembled a great black ham tucked under
his arm, and feeding therewith himself and his horse alter-
nately. This black bread does not look very appetising,
but if you buy a sandwich of it, with German sausage, at
the railway stations, as you can do, you will find it far from
despicable. The Russian peasants also eat rye bread only,
and a slice is always served at the tables of the wealthy, and,
when eaten hot and quite new, is very good and nutritious.
But the most peculiar, and we should imagine the least
palatable, of these rye breads, is that consumed in Norway
under the name of Fladbrod, which is made only twice a
year, in a hut constructed for the purpose. The rye-meal
paste is spread as thin as possible on a large flat round
gridiron, the size of a small table, turned very deftly by
means of a wooden stick, and when sufficiently baked is
stored for use in heaps 8 feet high ; but it is coarse and
indigestible.
It is hardly to be supposed that any of my readers will be
tempted to return to this food of our ancestors, especially as,
according to our old friend quoted above, ' Teeth baint as
good as they wer ' a fact which many of the wise attribute
in no small degree to the consumption of fine wheaten
bread instead of the whole-meal bread, or the barley, oaten,
and rye bread formerly in common use.
We have lately seen rye bread exposed for sale in a few
London shops, so, probably, there is a limited sale for it,
although chiefly among the Germans ; but in early times the
BREAD 31
bread consumed by men in our own country must have
been as unpalatable as the rye bread of Germany or the
Fladbrod of Norway, for in seasons of scarcity it was some-
times made of acorns steeped in water to destroy the bitter-
ness; and even as late as 1546 Du Bellay, Bishop of
Mans, in representing to Francis I. the misery existing in
the provinces, assured him that in many localities the people
had nothing to eat but bread made of acorns.*
There was also a sort of bread sold known as horse bread,
in which beans and peas were the chief ingredients, never-
theless, even in the fourteenth century there would appear
to have been different kinds of wheaten bread made and
sold by bakers, the finest being the simnel bread before
mentioned; the next quality was known as wastel, then
came French bread called also puffe or cocket ; after that
came tourte, which must have resembled our whole-meal
bread, and which was in use by the common people and in
monasteries. Of this there was also an inferior sort known
as trete, from which some of the fine flour had been sifted ;
and lastly there was black bread made of barley and rye.f
Some of us are old enough to remember when every
* In Tyndale's ' Sardinia,' p. 191, we read: ' The acorn-bread, which
forms the general food of the people of Cagliari, is thus prepared. The
acorns when shelled are put into a large seething-pot with water which
has been strained through the ashes of burnt vegetable matter and clay.
This lye extracts the bitterness of the acorn, and gives a consistency to
the mixture, which is boiled down till it assumes a reddish-brown colour,
when it is taken out, dried in the sun, and cut into cakes. '
t The ordinary food of the Russian peasant consists of black rye
bread and cabbage broth thickened with oatmeal, but the famine has
lately deprived them of even this meagre fare, and they have been
compelled to eat bread largely composed of bark of trees, unwholesome
herbs, earth, and sometimes a handful of rye.
32 OUR VIANDS
household, at least in the country, made its own bread ; very
delicious bread it was, too, sweet and wholesome, brown,
without a lot of indigestible bran, and leavened with barm
from home-made beer, sometimes rather difficult to procure,
so that the family baking had to be put off till the yeast was
forthcoming, and then it was necessary to borrow loaves of
the neighbours, or to make unleavened cakes upon the
hearth, using soda and tartaric acid or buttermilk by way of
rising. Then, too, there was a friendly interchange among
neighbours of newly-baked loaves, and not only so but of
the use of the oven, Mrs. M. heating her oven one week and
Mrs. N. the next ; or sometimes the dough would be sent to
a bakehouse, the tidy servant carrying it wrapped up in a
blanket and sundry cloths, and making it up at the baker's,
putting her mistress's name on it, according to the old
nursery rhyme
' Prick it, and dawk it, and mark it with D,
And pop it in the oven for baby and me,'
and paying a small sum for the accommodation. The
baker's toll was regulated by law in the days of King John,
and according to the ' Book of Days ' was to be * for his
own labour, three pence and such bran as might be sifted
from the meal,' whilst he was allowed to add 'to the
prime cost of the wheat for fuel and wear of the oven
the price of two loaves ; for the services of three men, he
was to add to the price of the bread three halfpence;
and for two boys, one farthing ; for the expenses attending
the seal, one halfpenny; for yeast, one halfpenny; for
candle, one halfpenny ; for wood, threepence ; and for wear
and tear of the bolting-sieve, one halfpenny.' *
* See Chambers's 'Book of Days,' p. 119, etc.
BREAD . 33
There would seem to have been a great many regulations
as to the making and selling of bread, and adulteration
was common then as now, for sometimes the bakers
would put fine bread on the outside and coarse inside,
till an enactment was made forbidding the practice, and
also the sale of bran loaves or of flour mixed with bran,
whilst the bakers of brown bread were forbidden to sell
white, and every loaf had to be sealed so as to certify
to the buyer its quality.
CHAPTER II
MAIZE AND MILLET
IT has fallen to my lot more than once to be told by
Americans ' You have no corn in England.' At first I felt
somewhat insulted by this assertion especially as we
were at the time journeying by rail through a part of
the country where the yellow corn, in the ear and in the
sheaf, gladdened the eye and made one rejoice in a plentiful
harvest. But, of course, according to American notions, we
have no corn in England, for they confine the term corn to
the one cereal maize, which is believed to have been indi-
genous in America, and unknown to Europe before the time
of Columbus. The Americans are, undoubtedly, wrong in
limiting the term corn to maize, because long before the
discovery of America corn was the generic term for wheat,
barley, oats, and rye, and maize received its name of Indian
corn from the first European settlers in America, who found
it growing there, and in use by the natives as the only
bread-stuff. We all know Longfellow's charming description
of the birth of this beautiful plant in 'The Song of Hiawatha.'
After the hero had buried Mondamin, who was the maize
personified
Day by day did Hiawatha
Go to wait and watch beside it,
34
MAIZE AND MILLET 3$
Kept the dark mould soft above it,
Kept it clean from weeds and insects
Drove away with scoffs and shoutings,
Kahgahgee, the king of ravens ;
Till at length a small green feather
From the earth shot slowly upward.
Then another and another,
And before the summer ended
Stood the maize in all its beauty,
With its shining robes about it,
And its long, soft, yellow tresses.
And in rapture Hiawatha
Cried aloud, ' It is Mondamin !
Yes, the friend of man, Mondamin ! '
Then he called to old Nokomis,
And lagoo the great boaster ;
Showed them where the maize was growing ;
Told them of his wondrous vision,
Of his wrestling and his triumph,
Of this new gift to the nations,
Which should be their food for ever.
Well may this plant be called 'the friend of man,' for
since its first introduction it has spread more rapidly than
could have been supposed possible, being cultivated in
every land where the climate will allow it to ripen ; but
when we find savages in the heart of Africa, who apparently
have never met with a white man, cultivating this plant, we
become somewhat sceptical as to its introduction by white
men since the days of Columbus.
It is undoubted that agriculture was known very early in
some parts of America, and that maize was the chief cereal
grown, although millet and beans were also cultivated.
Now, although maize was found by Darwin in a raised
beach on the coast of Peru, 85 feet above sea-level, and
must therefore have been of vast antiquity in America, yet
36 OUR VIANDS
all the American legends relating to it tell of its introduc-
tion or cultivation by foreigners, coming from the sea.
Quetzalcoatl in Mexico, Manco Capac in Peru, Hiawatha
among the wild Indian tribes of North America, are some
of these legendary introducers of this great boon to man.
The existence of these legends with regard to maize is
curious, because no similar legends, except in China, exist in
the Old World with regard to the first cultivation of wheat,
barley, and rye ; and the American legends have not found
their way to those remote parts of Asia and Africa where
maize has certainly been grown for centuries, although
legends are generally caught up eagerly and passed from
mouth to mouth among savages, who are ever ready to
invest that which is new with some marvellous attribute.
Botanists all assign an American origin to maize, and
believe its native home to be Paraguay, or some region of
Central America, and therefore it is assumed that it was
unknown in the Eastern Hemisphere before the days of
Columbus, who is said to have introduced it into Spain in
1520. But it is reported to have been found growing at
the Cape at the time of its first discovery by the Portuguese
in 1493, and we are told it is figured in an old Chinese
book of botany in the national library of Paris ; and grains
of maize are said to have been found in ancient houses in
Athens, as well as in the wrappings of Egyptian mummies,
whilst some have supposed that this was the ' corn of Egypt.'
This, however, is hardly possible, seeing that it has never
yet been found figured on the monuments of Egypt, whilst
wheat is frequently represented.
The first notice of this corn is found in ' The Nieue Her-
ball,' published in London in 1578, where it is described as
MAIZE AND MILLET 37
Frnmentum Turcicum or Frumentum Asiaticum, in French,
Ble de Turquie or Bit Sarazin ; in English, Turkey corn
or Indian wheat ; and the author says of it, 'This grayne
groweth in Turkic wher as it is used in time of dearth,'
adding, c There is as yet no certain experience of the natural
vertues of this corne. The bread that is made thereof is
drie and harde, having very small fatnesse or moysture,
wherefore men may easily judge that it nourisheth little,
and is evill of digestion.'
One thing is certain, whatever may have been the origin
of maize, and the date of its first cultivation in America and
in the Old World, it is now grown very extensively in all
parts of the world in which the climate is suitable, even in
the heart of savage Africa and in Madagascar, forming every-
where one of the staple foods of man. It does not ripen
always with us, but might, I believe, be grown advantageously
to supply the market with that delicious vegetable so highly
esteemed in America and South Africa (green corn\ which
we now only get in tins from America. Tinned green corn
and succotash, which is a mixture of green corn and beans,
have of late years found their way into English households,
and very good they are, but the corn on the cob, as eaten
in America, is better, as all who have tasted it will testify.
Although maize appears to have been early known in
China, it is not named among the five sorts of corn culti-
vated by the Chinese in the days of Chin-Nong, their second
emperor, or the head of the second dynasty some historians
placing seventeen emperors between him and Fohi, who,
according to the Chinese annals, reigned over a people
differing little from brutes. Fohi taught the people to fish,
and to domesticate animals for food, and Chin-Nong
38 OUR VIANDS
instructed them in agriculture, inventing the necessary im-
plements of husbandry, and teaching the people to sow five
sorts of grain, hence his name, which signifies Heavenly
Husbandman. On the fifteenth day after the sun enters
Aquarius, which is the commencement of Spring, a feast is
held in honour of husbandry and celebrated husbandmen,
numerous figures in connection with this art are carried in
procession, and among them a huge cow of clay, so large
that forty men can with difficulty carry it Behind this cow,
whose horns are gilt, is a young child with one foot naked
and one covered, representing the genius of labour and
diligence. The child strikes the earthen cow without
ceasing with a rod, as if to drive her forwards. She is
followed by all the husbandmen with musical instruments,
and by companies of masquers. At the governor's palace
this cow is broken in pieces, and the fragments, with a
number of small cows taken from the larger one, are .dis-
tributed to the multitude, whilst the governor makes a
discourse in praise of agriculture.
The Chinese, who have always been diligent agriculturists,
attach great importance to the influence of the moon upon
vegetation, and have a table of those plants which invariably
flower in the night, and their great religious agricultural
festival, at which the emperor ploughs a furrow with his
own hand and sows the five kinds of grain, is always
regulated by the moon. The five kinds of grain sown by
the emperor are those introduced by Chin-Nong, and con-
sist of wheat, rice, millet, beans, and caoleang, probably
Holcus sorghum, which is widely cultivated in Asia and
Africa, and was formerly well known in Greece and Rome,
and which is now called Guinea corn or Caffre corn, although
MAIZE AND MILLET 39
it may possibly have been maize, which, as I have pointed
out, was known early in China. A festival very similar to
that of China took place in ancient Egypt and in Peru, in
both of which countries the monarch held the plough and
sowed the grain, which, of course, in Peru consisted of
maize, and at the close of the maize harvest some of the
corn was made into an image called a ' Pirva,' which was
held in great veneration.
A writer in the Monthly Packet (November 1877) has
pointed out the great resemblance between this ancient
Peruvian festival and some harvest customs which still exist
in Great Britain. Thus in Northumberland it was formerly
the custom to dress an image, crowned with flowers and
holding a sheaf of corn and a sickle, and to fix it to a pole
in the fields, whence it was brought home on the last day of
harvest by the reapers with music and dancing ; in some
villages a kern or corn baby is still kept. Devonshire
farmers make a kind of image of the last ears of corn twisted
together, which is brought in with great rejoicings at every
harvest home, and called a knack, which it is very unlucky
to part with till the next harvest. In Scotland the last
handful of corn reaped used to be called the Maiden, and
was formed into a cross and carefully kept, the supper
following being called the Maiden Feast.
It will be observed that not only is maize absent from the
five kinds of grain sown by Chin-Nong, but also barley and
oats, so that we may conclude that all three were alike
unknown in China at that early period, although barley was
certainly very anciently known and cultivated in Egypt.
Maize is hardly used for the making of bread in the sense
in which we use the term, although in America it was
40 OUR VIANDS
doubtless from time immemorial ground and made into cakes
resembling oat cake. The Mexican, Peruvian, and Central
American graves of very ancient date contain numbers of
grinding stones, made something like a stool with short legs,
the top sloping and somewhat hollowed out. These are
always accompanied by large stones resembling short rolling-
pins, with which the Indian women crushed the maize and
made it fit to boil into porridge or make into cakes. The
Kaffirs generally take maize I do not know the Kaffir
name, but the Colonists call it mealies (a term, by the way,
which the generality of English people take to mean potatoes)
and put a quantity into a jar or pot of water, pile burning
fuel round it, and let it stew all day: it thus swells and
becomes tender, and is eaten in this form as their staple
food. Sometimes the women stamp it in a wooden mortar
with one, or sometimes two, long pestles to get off the outer
husk, and occasionally they grind it on stones in the same
manner as the ancient American Indian did, and make cakes
of the flour.
It is only of late that our English cooks have deigned to
make use of this foreign bread-stuff. When first introduced,
it was deemed only fit to feed pigs and poultry : we are
so exceedingly conservative, especially with regard to food,
that it requires at least half a century to acclimatise a new
comestible, but at last we have accepted maize in its various
forms as passably good food for John Bull and his family.
Brown & Poison's corn flour is perhaps the best known and
most extensively used of all, and this is not a flour ground
in a mill, but a precipitated starch. Maizena, hominy,
Oswego, and other preparations of Indian corn are also now
in common use, and doubtless enter into the composition
MAIZE AND MILLET 41
of sundry cakes, biscuits, etc., which formerly were
compounded solely of wheat flour, and are extensively
used for thickening soups, gravies, blancmanges, and
custards, instead of the far more expensive isinglass,
eggs, etc., which are recommended in cookery books.
But we have not yet attained to the full knowledge
of the capabilities of this useful cereal, and cannot com-
pound the endless variety of corn cakes and crackers in
use in America. Doubtless, in time we shall come to
appreciate all these foreign delicacies, but at present we
are content to make wheat our staple cereal, and to use
maize merely as an adjunct, except as cattle and poultry
food, for which it has come into general use, being cheap
and abundant, although I am still conservative enough
to believe that poultry fed by the old method that is,
upon barley-meal and potatoes are far better than those
fattened upon Indian corn, which, if used exclusively,
is apt to make more yellow fat than that firm, white meat
so much appreciated by the cook and housekeeper.
There are innumerable varieties of this useful cereal,
some being almost black, some quite white, others red,
and the commonest variety yellow. The size of the grain
also varies greatly from large kernels, pressed tightly
together on the cob so as to form a compact mass difficult
to separate, to very small grains of opal-like lustre scarcely
larger than a good grain of wheat, and so arranged on the
little cob as to retain a rounded egg-like form, pointed at
the extremity. This is the kind which is grown especially
for eating as green corn, being peculiarly tender and
delicate. Parched Indian corn is much eaten by the natives,
and it is said that an Indian will subsist a long time on
42 OUR VIANDS
six or eight ounces per day of parched corn mixed with
water. The dried leaves also form an excellent forage for
horses and cattle, and in Mexico the green stalks are cut
and eaten as a sweetmeat, there being a large amount
of sugar in them.
The tortillas of Mexico, so often mentioned in books
of travel, are made, according to Captain Lyon, of crushed
maize formed with water into unleavened cakes, baked on
the hearth, and eaten with a sauce compounded of chilies.
' In the houses of respectable people a woman, called from
her office, Tortillera, is kept for the express purpose of
making these cakes; and it sounds very oddly to the ear
of a stranger, during meal-times to hear the rapid patting
and clapping which goes forward in the cooking-place until
all demands are satisfied.'
It may be observed that among the cereals regarded
by the Chinese as of the first importance, the two millets
are almost unknown among ourselves. They never figure
among the grains in common use, and, although frequently
used on the Continent as a thickening for soups, and
sometimes in England for making milk-puddings, they are
seldom found in English kitchens. Yet under the name
of Dourah one of the millets forms the chief food of the
Egyptians; and Guinea or Kaffir corn is almost as much
used as maize or wheat all over the African continent,
where three harvests of it may be reaped yearly. It is
also largely consumed in Arabia, Syria, and in the West
Indies among the negroes. It was doubtless much more
used anciently than at present, being especially suited to
countries where little rain falls, and the soil is too poor and
sandy for the cultivation of wheat or maize.
MAIZE AND MILLET 43
Buck-wheat, which is much grown on the Continent as
food for cattle and poultry, is not used for human food,
except among the very poor, who sometimes mix it with
a little flour and make of it a black bitterish bread, not
at all appetising or nourishing ; but all kinds of birds and
animals are very fond of it, and it is grown for feeding
pheasants in England, and also for bees, who collect much
honey from the blossoms. Pigs are said to become in-
toxicated by eating buck-wheat, and are quickly fattened
upon it, whilst it causes cows fed upon it to yield a larger
quantity of rich milk.
CHAPTER III
VARIOUS BREAD-STUFFS
WE have passed in review the bread-stuffs used in Europe
and America, but there remains a very important class
of bread-making material very little known to us, but
affording nourishment to many thousands in some of our
Colonies.
Those who visited the West Indian court of the Colonial
and Indian Exhibition and especially that part devoted to
British Guiana must have noticed a number of flat white
cakes hung up in nets and labelled Cassava Bread^ but the
greater number of those who saw probably went away as wise
as before. They might also have seen, in this same court,
glass jars rilled with a white substance, cut in thin slices, and
labelled sweet and bitter cassava, and, at the entrance, they
might probably have been attracted by the figure of an
Indian woman, with a child on her back, sitting on a piece
of wood attached to a very curiously-shaped long basket, but,
unless they had lived in the West Indies, it would never have
occurred to them to connect this basket and the woman with
bread-making in any form ; yet this basket forms an important
adjunct to the art of bread-making in the West Indies, for
the cassava is the root of a plant known as Jatropha manihot,
or, shortly, manioc, which when fresh is a deadly poison, but
44
VARIOUS BREAD-STUFFS 45
when properly prepared is an excellent and very nourishing
food. The mode of preparation is to take the root and rasp
it on tin or wooden graters : the raspings are then placed in
the long plaited basket, which is hung to a tree, and drawn
down by means of a weight attached to a pole at the bottom.
Sometimes, as represented at the Exhibition, a woman sits
on the pole to drag the basket out to its full extent, thus
squeezing all the juice from the rasped root, which, when
sufficiently squeezed, is emptied out on raw hides and dried
in the sun. It is then baked on smooth plates made of clay.
The coarse flour is spread out quite dry on the hot plates,
and made into very thin, flat, round cakes by the women,
who turn it very dexterously by means of two pieces of split
cane. When baked it will keep any length of time. The
starch precipitated from the poisonous juice of the manioc
forms that excellent and nutritious food known as tapioca,
and the dried root itself is also eaten, and is very excellent
food, so that in nothing is the old adage that ' one man's
meat is another man's poison' better exemplified than in
this plant Jatropha manihot^ for whilst it supplies good and
wholesome food for thousands, the extracted juice is so
poisonous that it was used by the Indians to poison their
enemies the Spaniards, and it is said to cause death in a few
minutes. Nevertheless, not only is the prepared root eaten
with impunity and used in making several fermented liquors,
but the leaves also are boiled and eaten.
Cassava or manioc, prepared in the same way that is, by
extracting the poisonous juice is used as food not only in
the West Indies, but in West Africa, Madagascar, and many
of the South Sea Islands, but it is being gradually superseded
by maize and wheat, although it seems a pity that it should
46 OUR VIANDS
be thus superseded, for we are told that an acre planted with
Jatropha manihot will yield nourishment to more people
than six acres planted with wheat.
It is a curious fact that not only manioc, but other roots
of a poisonous nature, have been used for food by uncivilised
peoples from time immemorial, and it must have required a
considerable amount of thought and observation to enable
men in such a low state of culture to convert such plants
into wholesome food. The root of the Arum lily is one of
the plants thus utilised, and we must not forget that the
potato, now so universally eaten and esteemed, belongs to
the most poisonous order of plants, being cousin-german to
the deadly nightshade.
Maize may be regarded as the connecting link between
cereals used for bread-making, and roots like the arum and
manioc, since like these it becomes more palatable by being
steeped in water to precipitate the starch, and using this for
baking or boiling, instead of simply pounding or grinding
the grain and mixing the flour with water, as is done with
wheat, barley, oats, and rye.
The Italians use maize in large quantities to make that
which seems the chief food of the poor, and is known as
polenda, being a kind of porridge of ground Indian corn,
and you can scarcely enter a cottage without seeing the
padrona stirring the rich yellow mess destined for the family
meal, which is always slowly simmering in a huge brass
vessel hung over the charcoal fire in the common apartment.
Sometimes this porridge is made of chestnuts, and is then
known as polenda dolce.
There was a grain formerly much cultivated in Cornwall
which is said to have made excellent porridge, and with
VARIOUS BREAD-STUFFS 47
potatoes a splendid food for pigs and poultry ; this is a kind
of oat (avena nuda) known locally as pilez or pellas, which
grows readily in black moorland moist soils, and which
might probably be grown advantageously in Ireland, for it is
said that a gallon of ground pilez, mixed with twenty gallons
of potatoes, makes an excellent fattening food for pigs and
poultry ; whilst the straw, which is very fine, is capital fodder
for cattle and horses.
Rice, which may be reckoned as one of the most important
of the cereals, is not used for making bread, although the
grain boiled, or ground and mixed with other materials,
forms an excellent food.
It is the fashion of the present day to ignore or deny the
value of rice as an article of food, and it is, perhaps, true
that its nutritive properties are less than those of other
cereals; nevertheless, it affords support to untold millions
of Asiatics, forming the principal food of the natives of
India, China, Japan, and many other countries; whilst in
Europe, Africa, and America in fact, in the whole civilised
world no store closet would be complete without a bag of
rice for use in curries, puddings, cakes, and a variety of
dishes too numerous to mention. In fact, this cereal not-
withstanding the dictum of doctors and analytical chemists
seems to enter more largely into our cookery books than
any of the others, with the exception of wheat, which, in the
form of flour, is now a prime necessary of civilised life.
It is somewhat singular that rice, so highly esteemed by
the poor in Asia, is used chiefly by the rich in other parts of
the world. Even in times of famine, our poor would think
themselves very badly used if charity doled out to them the
rations which the mild Hindoo or John Chinaman would
48 OUR VIANDS
think all sufficient. Even as food for pigs and poultry, rice
is despised among us, and it is a singular fact that fowls fed
on rice for a week only, will grow very fat, but if the diet is
continued longer they will lose flesh instead of gaining it.
Rice would seem to be indigenous in Asia, although in
modern times it has spread widely through the tropical
regions of America, where, indeed, it has also been found in
a wild state. It is never likely to be grown extensively in
Europe, as it requires a combination of heat and moisture;
and it seems strange that it should have become such a
favourite and almost universal crop in India seeing its
necessity for water. In China, we are told, a variety is
grown which is not so dependent upon moisture, and which
is called imperial rice, because it was discovered by one of
the emperors, who, in walking through a rice field, noticed
one stalk much taller and finer than the rest; this he
marked, and when it was ripe it was taken and planted in
the imperial gardens, cultivated with care, and became a
new species. It would seem advisable to cultivate this
imperial or mountain rice in such countries as India, but
probably there are disadvantages attending its cultivation
not noted by the historian.
According to Pliny, linseed meal was used fried and
mixed with honey for bread among Asiatics, and also by
the Lombards and Piedmontese, and hempseed was also
fried and served for dessert. Gruel, which with us is
reckoned as food for invalids only, was a national dish
among the Romans. Two of the favourite invalid foods
of the present day must be mentioned here, for although
in very general use few people know their origin. Sago,
so much in favour among the sick, and in the nursery,
VARIOUS BREAD-STUFFS 49
is the pith of the sago palm, growing in marshy land
in the East Indies. One tree will produce from 500
to 600 Ibs. of sago, but the tree takes fifteen years to
come to maturity. Arrowroot, on the contrary, is, properly
speaking, a product of the West Indies, the best coming
from Bermuda, but, strange to say, very little is known
of the plant which produces it, and probably it is extracted
from several roots, in the same manner as cassava from
the Jatropha manihot, by rasping and soaking in water
till the starch is precipitated, which forms a white powder
when dried in the sun. The Maranta arundinacea is the
chief plant thus employed, but a spurious kind of arrowroot
has been made from the root of the Cuckoo Pint.
But of all foods in ordinary use among uncivilised
peoples, the bread-fruit of South Sea Islands deserves
especial notice ; this is the fruit of Artocarpus incisa,
' That tree which in unfailing stores
The staff of life spontaneous pours,
And to those southern islands yields
The produce of our labour 'd fields.'
The mode of cooking the bread-fruit is thus described
in Murray's * Encyclopaedia of Geography : ' ' Sometimes
the natives of a district assemble to prepare it in a .large
and common oven, when it is called opio. This is done
by digging a large pit, 20 or 30 feet round, and filling it
with firewood and large stones, till the heat almost brings
the latter to a state of liquefaction, when the covering
is removed, and many hundreds of ripe bread-fruit are
thrown in, with a few leaves laid over them ; the remaining
hot stones are placed above them, and the whole covered
D
So OUR VIANDS
with leaves and earth.* It remains in this state a day or
two, when the parties to whom the fruit belongs dig a
hole and take out what they want. Bread-fruit baked
in this way will keep good for several weeks after the
oven is opened.' In the Sandwich Islands the bread-fruit
is eaten raw, or cooked by throwing it on the fire till
the outer rind becomes charred and the inner opens out
like a smoking loaf of bread ; the taste is said to resemble
hard-boiled egg. There is another way of preparing bread-
fruit, by throwing it in a heap and allowing it to ferment,
it is then beaten into a kind of paste called mahi, and will
keep for months, but is sour and indigestible.
The South Sea Islanders also make a kind of bread
of the root of the Pia ( Tacea pinnatifida), which is beaten
to a pulp and subjected to repeated washings, when it
forms a sort of arrowroot.
Taro, of which we often read in books of travel in the
South Seas, is the root of Arum escuhntum, which, like
the manioc, requires steeping and boiling or baking to
make it wholesome. It is cooked in the same way as
the bread-fruit, and then beaten into a paste-like dough
called Poe, which is eaten by being scooped out with
the forefinger of the right hand and placed in the
mouth, a practice which has caused that finger to be
named the Poe finger.
In West Africa Pea-nut bread is eaten. This is made
by roasting and crushing the nuts and pressing the paste
into the skin of a banana.
In Abyssinia TefT-bread, made from Poa Abyssinica^ is
* This is precisely the process adopted by the Australians for
cooking snakes, as described later.
VARIOUS BREAD-STUFFS 51
commonly eaten. This is made by placing the pounded
grain mixed to a paste with water in a jar, and placing
it at some distance from the fire until it begins to ferment,
it is then made into large circular cakes and baked. The
taste although sour is not disagreeable, and it is used at
their banquets of raw meat, the meat being cut up small,
seasoned with salt and cayenne pepper, and wrapped in
the bread which is soft and spongy, and is often used
as a table napkin, for Bruce says every man wipes his
fingers on a piece of this Teff-bread, and leaves it for the
next comer, which, he says truly, is a disgusting custom.
The native Australians have no bread, but they crush
and eat the seed of the nardu plant, so well known as
having formed the sole food of the explorers Burke and
Wills until they died of starvation, the seeds being
inadequate to support life.
The Chinese make a bread, eaten by all from the
emperor to the meanest peasant, of a paste of kidney
beans made into great flat cakes like cheeses, it is very
white, and is eaten raw or boiled with fish and herbs, and
sometimes fried in oil, or dried and smoked and mixed
with carraway seeds.*
* See 'Empire of China,' 'Navarette' Pinkerton's Travels, vol. i.
CHAPTER IV
CAKES AND PUDDINGS
WE have never met with an explanation of the reason
why all the principal events in human life should require
to be celebrated by different kinds of cakes. We have
cakes for christenings, weddings, birthdays, schooldays, and
funerals. Almost all the festive seasons have their special
cakes such as Twelfth Day, Easter, Mid-Lent, etc. and
even such solemn seasons as Good Friday and the Jewish
Passover have their appropriate cakes; but perhaps the
most singular of all these cakes are those sold in Northern
Italy on All Souls' Day (November 2), and known as Pane
dei morte that is, ' bread of the dead.' These are made
chiefly at Brescia, and resemble in form parts of the human
body. Rough pieces of flesh are represented by a reddish
compound something like toffee, but highly flavoured with
cinnamon and other spices, whilst the bones are simulated
by a lighter-coloured compound, or by almonds. Thus you
may purchase a jaw, in which the teeth are formed of
almonds, etc. The most singular part of this All Souls'
custom is that the superstitious appear to fancy some real
connection between these cakes and the parts of the dead
which they resemble. We do not know the origin of these
cakes, but they would seem to be a survival from the days
52
CAKES AND PUDDINGS 53
of cannibalism, when, as among some savages even now, it
was considered respectful to partake of the dead bodies of
relations. At all events, whatever may be their origin, they
are very delicious and highly appreciated.
In many parts of England there is an approach to the
Italian Pane dei morte in the distribution of funeral cakes,
which sometimes are served only at the house of the
deceased, but in some counties they are sent round to the
neighbours after the funeral. The following lines refer to
this custom in Yorkshire :
' Roundlegs to Wadsley went,
Wi' burying cakes he was sent,
He knocked at our alehouse door
" Does any dead folk live here ? " '
These ' burying cakes ' do not appear to have any especial
form, but they are generally slightly bitter.
One of the most celebrated of English cakes, and which
would seem to have originally had some religious significance,
is that known as the ' Simnel.' This is a cake resembling a
rich plum-pudding enclosed in a crust, like a raised pie, and
its great peculiarity is that it is boiled first and baked after-
wards. The season appropriate to it is Mid-Lent Sunday,
known as ' Mothering Sunday,' because on that day it was
formerly the custom of families to assemble and to join in a
little feast. The popular story as to the origin of this cake
is that an old couple, named Simon and Nellie, in preparing
the Mid-Lent feast for their children, found a remnant of
Christmas plum-pudding and a piece of unleavened Lenten
dough, which they resolved to convert into a cake, but a
violent quarrel ensued as to whether it should be baked or
boiled. At last, after much altercation, ending in blows, a
54 OUR VIANDS
compromise was arrived at, by which the cake was first boiled
and then baked, and this turned out so very satisfactorily
that cakes thus prepared became famous under the name of
' Simnels,' from the first syllables of the names of the old
couple. The tradition has been embodied in the following
poem :
'THE CAKE OF SIMONELLIE.'*
' Where Girlith village looks adown
To birlie Morecambe Bay,
Old gammer Nell did blythelie dwell
With Simon Halliday ;
And the good God keepit them both from bale,
As the worthie paire did pray.
' Three sonnes had they, lustie, strong ;
The elder at the sea,
The mid one for a prentis bond,
Youngest at mother's knee,
" Too young is he to earn his bredde,
And I wonna spare all three,"
Quoth she.
' The Christmasse-tyde goes by apace,
And Lenten time is here ;
Bob-crabbes are forbidden taste,
The jollie boule goes drere.
" Cheere thee, good gaffer," then sayd Nell ;
"It is but once a year :
* " A sennight and sen days are past,
Another sennight in
And now draws on the rorie feste
Ycleped Motherin,
When the bairn draws nere to the mother deare,
And when festing is no sin,"
Quoth she.
* Walcott(Bodl.), No. 173.
CAKES AND PUDDINGS 55
" Full long for the Mid-Lent time, I ween,
Hath thy stomach, Simon, cryde.
Our good ladye will bless the feste
We shall hold upon this tyde ;
With our sailor ladde, and our prentis eke,
And the bairnie by my syde.
" The rorie pastie, and baken pie,
The flytche of bacon broil,
And the lustie boule with the roasten crabbe
Shall glad the bairnies' oyle ;
For my laddies' sake a callant callant cake
On the weeke's end will I boil,"
Quoth she.
" Ye be daft, good woman, your boarde to spoil :
What faerie doth ye take ?
Your flytche ye may broil, but your cake not boil
A clout for a boilen cake !
A brawer good wife am I than ye,
In the ovenne let it bake,"
Quoth he.
1 " A braw good wife ! now, by Lordie's life ."
"Now, by Lordie's death," quoth he,
1 ' Ye shall bake your cake, or no cake I take,
When the ladde comes home from sea. "
They wrangled so that the gossips gaped
To see what thing might be.
' Then uppe and spake the youngest ladde,
That stood by his mother's knee,
" Nay, father, were it awell that strife
The good God here shoulde see.
When Motherin Sunday draws anear
Each home at peace shoulde be.
' " The mother dear the cake shall boil,
And the father bake it dree ;
And not Simon's cake be the baken cleped,
Nor the boilen Nellie's be,
56 OUR VIANDS
But the virtues twain of the boil and bake
In the cake of Simonellie,"
Quoth he.
' Then ho, ho, ho, for the rarie showe,
When gaffer and gammer agree ;
And boil and bake the Motherin cake
The cake of Simonellie.'
It would, however, appear that this is a modern tradition
to account for a very ancient name, which is found in
French as well as in English, and in mediaeval Latin, and
which is supposed to be derived from simila, fine flour ; and
we find the name given to the finest white bread in mediaeval
times.* Herrick the poet, writing early in the seventeenth
century, speaks of the custom of young people in Gloucester
carrying simnels to their parents on Mid-Lent or Mothering
Sunday
' I'll to thee a simnel bring
'Gainst thou go a-mothering ;
So that when she blesses thee,
Half that blessing thou'lt give me.'
These simnels were usually marked with the figure of
Christ or the Virgin Mary, showing that they had some
religious significance. The poem quoted above places the
origin of the simnel legend at Girlith, on Morecambe Bay ;
but Shrewsbury has long been famous for the cakes, although
until lately they were hardly known except in the western
counties, now, however, they can be bought in London,
and not only at Mid-Lent but at Christmas.t
* See Chambers's 'Book of Days,' p. 336.
t At the Congress of the Folk Lore Society, held in October last at
Burlington House, a great number of local feasten cakes were exhibited,
and among them simnels, differing greatly in form, from Lancashire,
Gloucestershire, Shropshire, Norfolk, and Yorkshire.
CAKES AND PUDDINGS 57
Probably the best known cake of religious significance is
the hot cross bun, sold everywhere in England on Good
Friday. The number of these cakes consumed yearly must
be reckoned by many millions. It has also been a custom
in Scottish towns for the last forty years.
' One a penny, two a penny, hot cross buns,' is the one
street cry on Good Friday, and whilst all other shops are
closed, the bakers and confectioners drive a thriving trade.
The cross marked upon these buns has now, of course, a
reference to the solemn event commemorated on the day ;
but the cake itself has a very ancient history, and is
supposed to be the lineal descendant of those cakes offered
in worship to the queen of heaven, as denounced by the
prophet Jeremiah : ' The children gather wood, and the
fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough
to make cakes to the queen of heaven,' which cakes,
according to antiquaries, were also marked with a cross. In
the Museo Borbonico at Rome there is a sculpture repre-
senting the miracle of the five barley loaves in which the
loaves are marked by a cross.
Consecrated cakes, probably all similarly marked, were
offered to the gods on different occasions in many countries,
as in China, Egypt, and Mexico; and the Saxons, before
they were converted to Christianity, ate them in honour of
the goddess Eastre. In Egypt these cakes were made in
the shape of horns in honour of Isis, and their name bons
or boun is supposed to be the origin of our word bun.
A curious survival of these offerings to heathen gods
existed not many years ago in the Isle of Man, when a
herdsman, representing a Druid, on May-Day took a piece
of bread, covered with a custard of eggs, milk, and butter,
58 OUR VIANDS
and breaking it, threw pieces over his shoulder, exclaiming,
1 This I give to thee, O Fox, and this to thee, O Eagle, spare
thou my lambs,' etc., etc. A similar ceremony existed, I
believe, in Sicily, whilst in Sardinia a quantity of raisin-
bread, Pane di zappa, is hidden in three cart-loads of wood,
which are drawn round the village by oxen specially
fattened, after which the wood is piled up and burnt before
the churches.
Honey-cakes were offered in Rome to the serpent represent-
ing the god Esculapius, and the shew-bread of the Jews, con-
sisting of unleavened cakes composed of fine flour and oil, was
an offering to the Deity, afterwards consumed by the priests.
We read of a Roman Catholic ceremony on Good Friday
in Pre-Reformation days, in which the figure of Christ being
deposited in a tomb the people came to worship and present
gifts of corn or eggs, after which there was a ceremonial
burial of the image, and with it the ' singing-bread,' but
what this singing-bread was is not specified ; it was, however,
probably a cake marked with a cross apropos of which
must be recorded the old superstition that bread baked on
Good Friday would never get mouldy, and formerly a piece
of Good Friday bread was kept in every house, and a little
of it grated was supposed to be a sovereign remedy for many
ailments, but especially for diarrhoea.
In modern times the bun appears to have become an
almost exclusively English cake, and in the last century
there were special houses to which the elite resorted to con-
sume this delicacy. Two of these are historically famous,
the Chelsea bun-house and its rival the Royal.
At Easter cakes of a different kind appear; they are
generally very thin and sweet, and have a certain affinity
CAKES AND PUDDINGS 59
with the unleavened Passover cakes of the Jews, but they
vary considerably in different counties. In Dorsetshire the
Easter cakes contain currants and spices, and are sprinkled
with white sugar. These were formerly carried round by
the clerk of the parish, who expected for them a small
Easter offering. In Durham at one time the clergy and
laity used to play ball in the churches at Easter for tansy
cakes, which are still esteemed in some parts.
In many places endowments exist for the distribution of
cakes at Easter. There is one of these at Biddenden, in
Kent, consisting of twenty acres of land, to provide cakes
for all attending the parish church on Easter Sunday, the
parishioners each receiving, in addition, a loaf of bread and
a pound and a half of cheese. All the boys of the Blue-
Coat School receive a bun and a new shilling from a fund of
this kind, and probably endowments of a similar character
exist also on the Continent, for in some churches on certain
days huge baskets of small cakes are carried round and
distributed to the congregation.
To turn from cakes of a semi-consecrated character to
those of festal use, the first place must be given to the
twelfth cake, formerly everywhere seen, of gigantic size and
elaborate decoration on every festal board on Twelfth Day,
and which was used as a sort of lottery or medium of divina-
tion, a bean being concealed in it. The one to whom this
fell was ' King of the Bean,' and was considered especially
lucky, and sometimes we read that this ' King of the Bean '
was lifted up, in order that he might mark crosses on the
rafters to preserve the house from evil spirits. This custom
of choosing a ' King of the Bean ' seems to have descended
to us from pagan times, and is not peculiar to England, for
60 OUR VIANDS
in France the proverb exists for a peculiarly lucky fellow
// a trouve la j eve au gateau.
Twelfth-Day cakes and Twelfth-Day observances have,
however, faded almost into oblivion in these utilitarian days,
when even children begin to say, * What is the use of this
and that ? ' but in Ireland many of the old customs are still
kept up, and a thimble, a crooked sixpence, and a wedding
ring are baked in cakes, the first for the old maid, the second
for wealth, and the ring, of course, for a wedding; but, if
memory serves aright, these fortune-telling cakes are eaten
on Halloween instead of Twelfth Day, and I do not know
whether the Twelfth-Day ' King of the Bean ' is still elected.
We read that in 1613 the gentlemen in Gray's Inn were
permitted by Lord Bacon to perform a Twelfth-Day masque
at Whitehall, in which a character called Baby Cake was
attended by an usher bearing a great cake with a bean and a
pease.*
The ' King of the Bean ' is supposed to have been derived
from the Roman Saturnalia, in which lots were drawn with
beans as to who should be king.
There is, however, one cake that seems to grow in favour
year by year, and that is the bridecake, upon which all
the confectioner's art is lavished, until it seems almost
a sin to cut it and destroy its beauty. In fact, some
of the more elaborate specimens are so made that the
cake may be abstracted without injuring the external case.
The monster cake presented to the Queen on her Jubilee
was thus made, so that the exterior was on view intact
among the other presents, although the kernel was gone.
Lawn-tennis has created a new cake, which is highly
* Chambers's ' Book of Days,' vol. i., p. 63.
CAKES AND PUDDINGS 61
appreciated. We believe this originated in Bath, famous
for many confectioners' chefs d'ceuvres, which can hardly
be met with elsewhere, such as the Sally Lunn, which is
quite a different thing there to the cake known under
that name elsewhere, and the Bath bun, which can only
be eaten in perfection in Bath. The lawn-tennis cake
is a rich plum cake, made rather thin and flat, with a
good covering of almond paste, iced, and with a sprinkling
of sweetmeats or green angelica cut very fine on the top.
In Cornwall many peculiar cakes may be met with,
but almost all of them contain saffron, which does not
commend them to all palates.
Scotland is known as ' the land of cakes,' and the variety
to be met with there is astonishing. The best known is
the shortbread, which is now sold largely in London
especially at Christmas daintily put up in boxes and
with a motto in candied peel on the top; but this short-
bread varies greatly : that made in Aberdeen is the best,
especially that sent to Balmoral, which is said to be made
of crushed macaroons.
There is a well-known cake which should rather be
classed under the head of puddings ; this is the pancake,
still religiously eaten on Shrove Tuesday, which the old
riddle has, in consequence, designated as the greatest fry day
of the year. The custom of eating pancakes on Shrove
Tuesday dates back to very remote times, and the tossing
them in the pan was the occasion of much merriment. For-
merly the master of the house was always called upon to toss
the first pancake, which was generally so clumsily done as to
cause it either to ascend the chimney, or to find a place on
the kitchen floor, for which the cook demanded a fine.
62 OUR VIANDS
Chambers's 'Book of Days' contains an interesting
account of tossing pancakes in Westminster School, the
cook being obliged to toss the cake over the bar which
divides the upper from the lower school, which being
done the boys scramble for the cake, and the one who
secures it unbroken, and carries it to the Deanery, receives
an honorarium of a guinea.
The same article gives the following quaint description
of the pancake by the poet Taylor :
1 There is a bell rung, called the Pancake Bell, the sound
whereof makes thousands of people distracted, and forgetful
either of manners or humanity. Then there is a thing
called wheaten flour, which the cooks do mingle with
water, eggs, spice, and other tragical magical enchantments,
and then they put it by little-and-little into a frying-pan of
boiling suet, where it makes a confused dismal hissing (like
the Lernian snakes in the reeds of Acheron) until at last,
by the skill of the cook, it is transformed into the form of a
flip-jack called a pancake, which ominous incantation the
ignorant people do devour very greedily/
Eggs, as a great ingredient in the pancake, are much in
request on Shrove Tuesday, which, in Cornwall, gave rise
to a very barbarous sport, for the hens, which had not laid
an egg before Shrove Tuesday, were placed on the barn
floor and beaten to death, or sometimes a hen, with some
bells hung round it, was tied to a man's back, and others
blindfolded and armed with boughs, ran after him and
struck at the bird, guided by the bells, and when the bird
had been killed in this manner it was boiled with bacon,
and eaten with the pancakes.
The British pancake has been transformed in France
CAKES AND PUDDINGS 63
into the omelette, the vol-au-vent, the souffld, supplemented
by delicate tartlets of extreme lightness, very sweet and
full of cream, iced and ornamented with dried cherries
and pistachio nuts. All these things have been elaborately
evolved from the inner consciousness of many generations
of French chefs, but primitive puddings doubtless consisted
simply of grain of different kinds boiled in water or milk,
to which various ingredients were added, according to
taste, after the fashion of the national dish of Barbary
called cuscosco, which consists of a sort of paste or porridge
made of crumbled bread and enriched with small pieces
of meat, vegetables, and condiments. This is placed in
a large wooden or earthen bowl set in the middle of the
company, each one thrusting their fingers in the bowl,
stirring its contents, and helping themselves to such tit-bits
as they may fancy.
This cuscosco reminds one of a famous dish of our
ancestors known as furmity, furmante, or frumenty, formerly
indispensable at Christmas, but now relegated to Mid-Lent
or Mothering Sunday, when the lesson for the day read
in the churches, is of Joseph and his brethren, for
this dish is popularly supposed to be that wherewith
Joseph regaled his brothers, giving a double portion to
Benjamin. The name comes probably fromfroment (wheat),
in French, which would point to its introduction by the
Normans. In Bath the wheat is sold in basins, boiled
ready for use. In Chambers's ' Book of Days ' the following
recipe is given as the most ancient known : ' Take clean
wheat, and bray it in a mortar that the hulls be all gone
off, and seethe it till it burst, and take it up and let it cool ;
and take clean fresh broth and sweet milk of almonds,
64 OUR VIANDS
or sweet milk of kine, and temper it all; and take the
yolks of eggs. Boil it a little, and set it down, and mess
it forth with fat venison or fresh mutton.' Venison was
seldom served without this accompaniment; but furmity,
sweetened with sugar, was a favourite dish of itself, the
'clean broth' being omitted when a lord was to be the
partaker.*
There was also an indispensable Christmas dish known
as plum porridge, of which the old nursery rhyme
relates :
' The man in the moon came clown too soon f
To ask his way to Norwich ;
The man in the south he burnt his mouth
Eating cold plum porridge. '
This plum porridge, always served as a first course at
Christmas, was made by boiling beef or mutton with broth
thickened with brown bread ; when half boiled, raisins,
currants, prunes, cloves, mace, and ginger were added, and
when the mess had been thoroughly boiled, it was sent to
table with the best meats. This is supposed to have been
the origin of the plum-pudding, which in its present form
does not appear in cookery books earlier than 1675, and
then not as a Christmas dish. Mince pies, shred pies, or
Christmas pies are, however, much older, and figure in Ben
Jonson's ' Masque of Christmas.' These pies seem to have
been particularly obnoxious to the Puritans, as savouring of
superstition, the crust which encloses them being supposed
* A more modern recipe for the making of Frumenty will be found
among those at the end of this section, and I can strongly recommend
it to those who like to try the dishes so much prized by our forefathers.
t Antiquaries say for ' too soon ' should be read ' to Sion.'
CAKES AND PUDDINGS 65
to represent the manger in which the infant Saviour was
laid. There is a rhyme which runs thus :
' The high-shoe lords of Cromwell's making
Were not for dainties roasting, baking ;
The chiefest food they found most good in
Was rusty bacon and bag pudding;
Plum broth was popish, and mince pie
O, that was flat idolatry ! '
Soyer's book, ' The History of Food,' gives us two recipes
worth reproducing. The first is for making the Athenian
national dish : ' Dry near the fire, in the oven, twenty
pounds of barley flour ; then parch it ; add three pounds of
linseed meal, half a pound of coriander seed, two ounces of
salt, and the quantity of water necessary.' This does not
read particularly appetising, and the same may be said of
the next the famous Carthaginian pudding. ' Put a pound
of red-wheat flour into water, and when it has steeped some
time transfer it to a wooden bowl. Add three pounds of
cream cheese, half a pound of honey, and one egg. Beat
the whole together, and cook it on a slow fire in a stewpan.'
Both these appear to have been something between porridge
and hasty pudding, and in the same category may be placed
the fermity or frumenty described above ; and from these
were doubtless derived the far-famed hasty pudding of Jack
the Giant-Killer, and our batter and custard puddings, as
well as that king and pride of British cooks, the Christmas
plum-pudding, which foreigners vainly attempt to imitate.
The Egyptians had learned to make pastry much as we
do now, and figures in the temples and tombs, and on the
papyri are represented kneading dough with their feet, roll-
ing the paste, cutting it into various forms, and carrying it
E
66 OUR VIANDS
to the oven. The cakes thus made were of various forms,
often resembling animals. One of these in the British
Museum is in the form of a crocodile's head ; and others
have been found deposited in tombs in the form of rings, or
rolled over like Swiss-roll, and sprinkled with seeds after
the manner of the Jew's bread of the present day.
Whether the Egyptian pastry consisted simply of bread
dough we do not know, but it probably contained oil or fat
of some kind, for it is certain that the cakes of the Hebrews
were composed of fine flour and oil, with probably honey
sometimes added; but none of the Egyptian pastry has been
found containing fruit like our pies, although cakes consist-
ing entirely of dates are known to have been made, and
called date bread.
Our fruit puddings are simply pies boiled instead of
baked. Who is there who fails to appreciate a pudding or
pie of fresh fruit, whether of green gooseberries in the early
spring, or of black and red currants and raspberries or
cherries in summer, and all the delicious plums, damsons,
and greengages of autumn ! Happily, the art of bottling
fruits has attained to such perfection that we may now get
fruit pies and puddings all the year round, instead of, as in
former times, having to depend upon apples and jams only,
during the winter months. The thrifty housewife, it is true,
used to bottle gooseberries for her own winter use, but they
could not be purchased ; whereas now, for a few pence, we
may indulge in pies of currants, cherries, and greengages at
Christmas.
PART II
MEAT
' 8 piece of a Itio is foortfj tfoa of a (fat 9
CHAPTER V
CHRISTMAS FARE THE ROAST BEEF OF OLD ENGLAND
AND THE BOAR'S HEAD
ON thousands of tables at Christmas-tide the roast beef of
Old England smokes with appetising odour. From the
lordly baron which always graces the Queen's table, and the
goodly sirloin of aristocratic renown, to the humble but far
from despicable aitch-bone, all is toothsome, wholesome,
and highly esteemed alike by high and low, rich and poor.
The wretched inmates of gaol and workhouse look forward
to the feast of roast beef and plum-pudding, which is almost
sure to be given by the charitable for their delectation at
Christmas, and in almost every parish the same substantial
fare is provided for the poorer parishioners. At the tables
of the rich, it is true, the time-honoured sirloin is now
relegated to a subordinate position, its place being usurped
by the turkey, which has superseded also the stately pea-
cock, formerly at this season, adorned with all its feathers,
introduced with something approaching to religious cere-
mony, as was also the great boar's head, with its chaplet of
rosemary and a lemon between the teeth ; but then, as now,
the loin of beef, knighted in due form by Charles II., was
always the piece de resistance, and from time immemorial the
double loin, known as the baron, has always been a royal
70 OUR VIANDS
dish, and one specially selected is always sent from Windsor
to Osborne to grace the Queen's dinner table, being accom-
panied by that other famous Christmas dish, a boar's head,
sent of late from Germany.
In olden times great rejoicings were generally accom-
panied by an ox roasted whole, huge fires and monster spits
being required for the purpose; and once history relates
that an ox was thus roasted whole on the Thames. This
was during the great frost in 1715-16, when the river was
frozen over for several weeks. This somewhat barbarous
mode of rejoicing is now almost obsolete, yet during the
severe frost of the winter of 1890, in which the Thames was
again frozen over in places, we heard of sheep being roasted
whole on the river at Christmas ; but in these days of refine-
ment people in general prefer having their portion of meat
to cook in their own way, instead of each slicing a half-
cooked morsel from a burning carcase.
The practice of cutting meat from the spit seems to have
been common before the invention of forks, and many old
Saxon drawings show the cooks, or servers, kneeling by the
king's table, holding spits from which the monarch cuts a
portion with a huge knife; nor must the cook's useful
drudge be forgotten, who, as late as 1800, when smoke-
jacks came into fashion, had the chief share in roasting the
meat in large establishments we mean the 'turnspit,' a
bandy-legged dog, somewhat resembling the modern dachs-
hund who was set to turn the spit by means of a wheel,
somewhat after the fashion of a squirrel in a cage, and was
probably beaten and sorely worried by the cooks whenever
the jack stopped. There are many stories told of these
useful dogs, who knew their proper turn, and would not be
CHRISTMAS FARE 71
persuaded to work out of it ; and if one of their companions
got out of the way when it was his day for turning the spit,
the one unjustly set to work has been known to find the
truant and kill him. The poor turnspits must have hated
Christmas, with its huge joints of roast beef, its peacocks
and game, all entailing hard work upon the poor kitchen
drudges.*
Beef was known and appreciated from the very earliest
times, the wild cattle having been hunted and slaughtered
long before they were domesticated, and the skulls of many,
of a species now extinct, are found all broken in the same
way, evidently by a blow with a very heavy stone hammer.
But as soon as men began to keep flocks and herds and to
till the ground, the ox became doubly valuable, not only as
a food but as a beast of burden, and it is continually
alluded to by the most ancient writers in this capacity,
whilst the earliest of paintings represent the patient kine
dragging the plough or wheeled cart, yoked together even as
in the present day by a heavy piece of wood bound over the
necks of both. The humane laws of Moses forbade the
muzzling of the ' ox that treadeth out the corn,' and in
several passages of the Bible the yokes of oxen are spoken
of. Elisha was ploughing with twelve yoke of oxen when
Elijah cast his mantle upon him, and it seems to have been
a common act of worship in those days to slay a yoke of
oxen and burn them with the implements in use, as a
sacrifice of thanksgiving or propitiation. ' Behold,' said
Araunah the Jebusite to David, ' here be oxen for burnt
sacrifice, and threshing instruments and other instruments
* A very interesting article upon the turnspit may be read in
Chambers's ' Book of Days.'
72 OUR VIANDS
of the oxen for wood.' Nor was it only among the Jews
that oxen were used for sacrifices : the Greeks and Romans
sacrificed white bulls to Jupiter, whilst the cow was sacred
to Juno, as it was to Isis in Egypt. In the latter country
the bull Apis was, as is well known, an object of idolatry,
being distinguished by special marks, and numerous
mummies of this sacred bull may be seen in the British
Museum. In India, Siva the destroyer rides upon a bull,
and the cow is as much venerated among the Brahmins as
it was in ancient Egypt, some of the Indian princes being
obliged to pass through a golden image of a cow in order to
become regenerated, and raised to the Brahminical caste.
There is evidently something of a sacrificial origin in the
eating of beef at Christmas, for it has undoubtedly a
reference to the birth of Christ in the cow-shed, in remem-
brance of which event, the old superstition says, all oxen
kneel in adoration at twelve o'clock on Christmas Eve.
All through Africa the ox is much in favour as an article
of food, and also as a beast of burden. James Bruce's
assertion that the Abyssinians sometimes cut steaks from
the living animal has been verified by later travellers, but it
is to be hoped the practice is not general.
Cattle in vast numbers are slaughtered apparently as
sacrifices among the Zulu tribes on great occasions; thus
we are told that on the election of Lo Benguela, whose
name has been so prominently before the world of late, as
king of the Matabele, his first act of sovereignty was to
superintend the slaughter of cattle brought as an offering to
him. ' Each tribe contributed a small troop, and from each
lot six, ten, or a dozen were, selected. The black were
killed first ; then the black and white speckled ; and lastly,
CHRISTMAS FARE 73
the coloured ones. The first were offered to the manes of
his father ; the second, to the Molimo or Great Spirit ; and
the rest for other purposes. The king made a short speech
as he pointed out each victim ; and then the sacrificer,
holding his assegai just as one would hold a pin, placed its
point low down behind the shoulder blade, where it does
not spoil the skin for a shield, assuring himself by a gentle
titillating motion that it was rightly directed.' *
What a coronation ceremony, and what an idea it gives
us of the sanguinary character of these dusky kings and the
despotic power they wield over their subjects. ' Of course,'
Baines continues, ' the slaughter of so many oxen in so con-
fined a space was a work of difficulty, especially when some
had fallen, and the rest maddened by the sight and smell of
blood, made frantic efforts to escape, but there was no con-
fusion. The place where the king had dismounted was
kept clear by a circle of Majokkas, bound in honour to die
upon the spot rather than let him be incommoded ; others
formed rings round each lot of cattle, and when two heaps
had fallen, and there was no room for more in the kotla, the
rest were killed outside, as the king successively devoted
them. In the evening the carcases were skinned and cut
up, and next day the king distributed the meat to his newly-
acquired subjects.'
Mr. Baines has also given us the mode of cooking and
serving the slaughtered oxen. 'A couple of earthen
cauldrons were simmering on the fire, and a stalwart warrior
approaching these, took off the lids, drove a sharp stick into
a filthy-looking mass, and finding it sufficiently cooked, har-
pooned and hauled out the contents, and heaped them on
* Baines's ' Gold Regions of South-Eastern Africa,' p. 35.
74 OUR VIANDS
two great wooden dishes, laying on each some twigs that
had been boiled with the meat as charms against evil
influence. The cook now intoned the praises of the king,
the hungry warriors joining in the chorus. One of these
vessels shaped its course towards us, steered by the kneeling
functionary, and he, drawing his knife, cut off large slices
from which we pared the filthy outside, and found the
remainder excellent. The king's supper was now ready, his
" plate " was laid on the waggon chest, and his knife and
fork, supplied only for himself. He invited us to draw out
our own and use them freely.' *
The hecatombs of this African despot throw into the
shade the sacrifices of more civilised peoples, for these
might be counted by units, as for example ^Eneas says :
' The sacrifices laid
On smoking altars to the gods he paid.
A bull to Neptune, an oblation clue,
Another bull to bright Apollo slew,
A milk-white ewe the western winds to please,
And one coal-black to calm the stormy seas.'
In the sacrifices of the Hebrews also one or two bullocks
sufficed, but it would seem from the account of Josephus,
that the table of Solomon was supplied almost as liberally
as that of Lo Benguela. Speaking of the tributes collected
by his officers, he says : ' Now these contributed to the
king's table, and to his supper every day, thirty cori of fine
flour, and sixty of meal ; as also ten fat oxen, and twenty
oxen out of the pastures, and a hundred fat lambs; all
these were besides what were taken by hunting harts and
buffaloes, and birds and fishes which were brought to the
king by foreigners day by day.'
* Baines's ' Gold Regions of South-Eastern Africa,' p. 36.
CHRISTMAS FARE 75
By this it may be seen that men of all colours and in all
ages have thought the ox a fit offering for the gods, pro-
bably because they have themselves loved the savoury meat,
for as Livingstone says of the Makololo, 'They have
abundance of game, but in their opinion, which I am sure
every Englishman will endorse, there is nothing equal to
roast beef.'
At present it must be allowed that as an article of food
beef is better understood and more appreciated among
English people than on the Continent, where the tasteless
pieces of beef which have been used to make the bouillon
are invariably served with sauce of various kinds, and the
bif steak, so called in honour of the famous English dish, is
often a piece of very coarse buffalo, or of some tough old ox
which has fulfilled his term of days at the yoke. Beefsteak,
or to speak more correctly, rumpsteak, is only to be had in
perfection in London, for it would seem as though country
butchers had not learnt the secret of the proper cut. A
rumpsteak grilled in a London eating-house is not to be
surpassed as a savoury dish, and may be eaten with fried
onions or oyster sauce, according to taste. It often sur-
prises colonists that they cannot obtain here the piece
especially prized by them, and known in South Africa as
the hump, but either our oxen are destitute of that appendage,
or our butchers cut the carcase differently.
The consumption of beef is now so great that our native
supply has to be largely supplemented by the cattle reared
on ranches in America and New Zealand, either brought
over frozen or in tins. Chicago, the chief tinning manu-
factory, is supplied with oxen in such profusion that they
are described as forming a constant stream moving ever
76 OUR VIANDS
onwards up an inclined plain to be killed when they reach
the top; being skinned, cut up, and tinned immediately,
almost entirely by machinery.
Since the introduction of diner ct la Russe> the great
joints which formerly appeared on our dinner, supper, and
breakfast tables have almost disappeared. We no longer
see, except in cooks' shops, the great salted rump, formerly
a famous breakfast dish ; and the baron is reserved for the
Queen's table, whilst the sirloin no longer appears entire,
but is cut into several pieces to suit the requirements of the
household. Doubtless, we lose much of the juices and
flavour of the meat in these small joints, but the national
taste has become of late more assimilated to that of the
French, and prefers made dishes to the simple cut-and-come-
again joints of our ancestors. It would appear that at
Christmas in the olden days the great boar's head, eaten
with mustard, held the first place ; then came the peacock
in his plumes, and geese, capons, " pheasants drenched with
ambergrease," and pies of carps' tongues.
Of these savoury dishes many have disappeared from the
modern menu, whilst some are retained in the form of
survival, and amongst the latter is the boar's head, which, in
its ancient and natural form, is no longer seen amongst us
except at the Queen's table, and perhaps on that of some
other princes and potentates, but the ancient dish is still
imitated by our cooks in forcemeat, and at almost every
supper at Christmastide holds a conspicuous place, brown
and glazed, with long, curved, white tusks of some composi-
tion, lemon in mouth, and buttered adornments, altogether
a travesty of that great cruel beast, the pursuit of which has
in all ages been deemed such noble sport, which formed
CHRISTMAS FARE 77
the standing dish of Scandinavian heroes, in the Valhalla to
which they aspired, and of which the ancient Romans were
so fond, that it is related of Anthony that eight wild boars
were usually roasted for his supper, not that they were all
served and consumed at once, but they were held in various
stages of preparation, that one might be ready whenever
called for. The mode of dressing this boar appears to have
have been to roast it stuffed with game and poultry.
Horace writes of
' A Lucanian boar of tender kind,
Caught, says our host, in a soft southern wind ;
Around him lay whatever could excite,
With pungent force, the jaded appetite ;
Rapes, lettuce, radishes, anchovy brine,
With skerrets, and the lees of coan wine.'
The modern Romans still love the flesh of the wild boar,
and I have eaten it in Italy served up with a sauce, the
chief ingredients of which were raisins and the kernels of
pine cones, but the flesh of the Roman wild boar is lean
and hard, and can scarcely rival that of the domestic porker,
well fatted, and served with apple sauce in the old English
style. But in various parts of Europe the wild boar still
affords excellent sport, and heads from these sometimes find
their way to England. It was probably to one of these that
the anecdote of Solomon Hart, the Jewish R.A., related in
'Frith's Reminiscences,' applies 'On the occasion of a
visit of a party of artists to Preston Hall, the pleasant seat
of Mr. Betts, they were entertained, as always, in baronial
fashion. At one of the splendid banquets for which
hospitable Mr. Betts was famous, a huge boar's head, with
the usual garniture, was placed upon the table. Hart was
78 OUR VIANDS
said to have looked longingly at it, when he exclaimed,
" Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian." '
It would appear from ' The Book of Days ' that in olden
times the boar's head garnished with bay and rosemary, and
heralded by trumpets, was borne to the king's table on a
dish of gold or silver by the server, followed by a long pro-
cession of nobles, knights, and ladies. The same book
gives the origin of the custom of serving this ancient dish
at Queen's College, Oxford, to a variation of the old carol.
This arose from the presence of mind of a student of the
college, who, when studying Aristotle in Shotover Forest,
encountered a wild boar, which rushed at him open-
mouthed, whereupon the scholar thrust the book down the
creature's throat, thus ' choking the savage with the sage.'
The carol used in serving the boar's head ran
1 " Caput apri defer o
Reddens laudes Domino."
The boar's head in hand bring I
With garlands gay and rosemary ;
I pray you all sing merrily
Qui tstis in cowuivio.
' The boar's head,- I understand,
Is the chief service in this land ;
Look wherever it be found,
Servite cum cantico.
' Be glad, both more and less,
For this hath ordained our steward,
To cheer you all this Christmas
The boar's head and mustard !
" Caput apri defer o
Reddens laudes Domino" '
CHAPTER VI
SUNDRY MEATS
WE will begin this chapter by treating of that which, by
universal consent, is allowed to be the best and most
wholesome of animal food that is, mutton.
In the colonies mutton ranks with daily bread as a
prime necessity of life mutton chops for breakfast, mutton
roasted or boiled for dinner, and cold mutton for supper,
till people say they are ashamed to look a sheep in the
face ; but it speaks well for the wholesomeness and tooth-
someness of the meat, that it can thus be eaten daily from
year's end to year's end without producing disease or
satiety. Perhaps of no other meat could the same be said.
The sheep was probably the earliest of domesticated
animals, for Abel was a keeper of sheep; but in many
countries in which it now abounds it was unknown before
the advent of Europeans. The many millions of "sheep
now pastured in Australia, Tasmania, and New Zealand
owe their origin to those taken over from Europe, for there
was no indigenous species in those countries; but there are
many wild varieties of this useful animal in Europe, Asia,
and Africa, and from these our domesticated varieties have
sprung. All these are traced by some naturalists to that
79
8o OUR VIANDS
remarkable animal the mouflon, which is still found wild
in Sardinia and Corsica, and certainly has the most singular
resemblance to the sheep, the goat, and the deer combined.
There is a very curious wild sheep in the Rocky
Mountains, much larger than any of our domestic breeds ;
it has close hair, rather than wool, whilst the wild goat of
the same region has a very long fleece. The rams have
such enormous horns that they are said to be unable to
feed on level ground.
Our European sheep seem to belong to two principal
divisions the horned and the hornless but of each of
these there are innumerable varieties ; and one very singular
kind, common in Asia and Africa, is not known in Europe.
This is the fat-tailed sheep.
When ancient writers spoke of sheep having hair instead
of wool, and tails so long and so large that they were
obliged to have little waggons to carry them on, the wise
men of Europe laughed, and hinted at 'long-bows' and
' travellers' tales ; ' nevertheless, our friends in South Africa
know these broad-tailed sheep well, and have even told
us of small boughs being fastened under the precious caudal
appendage, to prevent its being bruised and torn by
dragging over rough ground, for the tail is a delicacy,
and, being almost all firm fat, is often cured, and takes
the place of bacon. It is also used for many culinary
purposes, being superior to suet and equal to marrow;
but as the sheep has no wool, and the flesh is coarse
and poor, it seems wasteful in these utilitarian days to
rear it for the sake of the tail, and in consequence the
breed will probably soon die out it is, in fact, seldom
met with now in South Africa, except when kept as a
SUNDRY MEATS 81
curiosity, but the skin is valuable, having twice the strength
and thickness of that of an ordinary sheep.
There are several varieties of this broad-tailed sheep in
Asia, which are supposed to have been" derived from
Barbary, Egypt, and the Levant. Two very curious varieties
of this sheep are found in Tibet: in one, known as the
fat-rumped sheep, the tail is short and thin, and the rump
extremely fat, whilst in the other the tail is very broad,
and the head is adorned with four, five, or even six horns.
The wool of the first is good, but that of the latter very
coarse. Then there is the Angora sheep, found in Asiatic
Turkey, long-legged, lop-eared, and with very long tails,
but not particularly fat.
In almost all these varieties the wool is poor and hairy
and the flesh coarse, but, in the present day, the sheep is
bred entirely for its fleece and the quality of the meat, and,
therefore, the hairy fat-tailed species is retained only in
countries where farming is not carried out scientifically,
or where the finer long-woolled varieties will not thrive.
The merino sheep seems to be the prime favourite among
colonists, and certainly it would appear to possess many
excellent qualities, both as regards flesh and wool. In
England the Southdown mutton is esteemed the finest,
and the little Welsh mutton, fed upon the short heathery
mountain grasses, is a delicacy, although the housekeeper
is frequently imposed upon by inferior kinds falsely
denominated Welsh.
Mutton is not particularly good on the Continent, the
sheep producing it being generally of the long-legged
lop-eared variety, and not all the condiments with which
it is served can conceal the coarse quality and woolly
F
82 OUR VIANDS
\
flavour of the meat. Our own sheep possess naturally
long thin tails, but it is found advisable, if not necessary,
to amputate them at an early age to prevent injury to
the fleece and to the animal itself. Lamb-tail pie is a
' dainty dish to set before a king,' but we have heard an
anecdote regarding it which is worth repeating.
A lady sat at the table of a wealthy colonist, enjoying
a delicious lamb-tail pie. 'But,' said she, addressing the
host, ' is it not very extravagant to kill so many dear little
lambs just for the sake of their tails ? '
' Kill the lambs ! my dear madam ; why, bless my soul,
no ! That would never do ! The lambs are all alive and
well, and you shall see them skipping about and enjoying
themselves to-morrow.'
'What?' exclaimed the lady, horrified, 'and have we
been eating the tails of live lambs ? How very dreadful ! '
and she put down her knife and fork in disgust.
The occupation of the shepherd has perhaps given rise
to more poetic descriptions and to more artistic effects
than any other known to man. The biblical similes
relating to sheep and shepherds are innumerable, and no
pastoral picture, no descriptive poem, would be complete
without them. From the great god Pan, with his horns
and goat's legs, who piped to his flocks in Arcady, to the
dainty little Watteau shepherdesses in lovely costumes
not at all suited to their vocation, artists have found
exquisite subjects for their pencils, although not compatible
with real life. Nevertheless, the shepherd of the Campagna,
seated on a broken monument, with his pipe and shaggy
goatskin breeches, is a picturesque object not so very
unlike the Pan of ancient days. The Watteau shepherdess
SUNDR Y ME A TS 83
is only met with at fancy dress balls, but the Swiss and
Tyrolean senneren are perhaps quite as picturesque. Nor
must we omit the shepherd's faithful companion, friend,
and helper the dog for without him no rural landscape
would be complete. We all know Landseer's touching
picture 'The Shepherd's Chief Mourner,' and, indeed,
among the Highlands and the mountains of Wales, the
dog is indispensable, for sheep have a peculiar faculty for
going astray, and, like men, will follow their leader blindly
into any boggle, so that whole flocks would frequently
perish did not the sagacious dog come to the rescue. It
is an interesting sight to see a well-trained dog watching
his master's eye, and following his instructions far better
than a two-legged servant could do, and the shepherd's
dog will sometimes undertake voluntary duty. I witnessed
a case of this kind some years ago in the Lake district.
A dog sat at the door of a cottage, watching the vain
efforts of a man on the hills at some distance, to collect
together a flock of sheep. Up and down he ran, and as fast
as he got a dozen together they would start off again to join
their comrades, scattering in all directions. The dog watched
and watched, started up, lay down again, and fidgeted. At
last he could stand it no longer : off he went as hard as he
could go, and, without asking for instructions, collected the
wandering flock in a very short time, drove them up to the
shepherd, and then returned home and lay down quietly as
before. I asked his owner if he knew the man he had been
helping, but he said, ' Oh, no, it was just his nature ; ' and a
very good nature, too, I thought.
We often wonder what would be the effect upon the very
important industry of sheep farming should the fads of a
84 OUR VIANDS
few philosophers ever induce the bulk of mankind to become
vegetarian in diet. Wool is so necessary in our manufac-
tures that it must be had, so that sheep must be reared ; but
if the mutton is not to be eaten they could not be allowed
to increase. There seems, however, little fear of that day
arriving, for not one in a thousand can resist the savoury
joint, or the chops and tomato sauce of the immortal
Pickwick.
There are three meats tabooed by the doctors, but
delighted in, nevertheless, by the cook and the gourmand,
who know full well how exceedingly savoury they may be
made. Lamb, veal, and pork, 'all sadly indigestible and
unwholesome,' says the doctor with a shake of his wise head,
' and should never be eaten except by those who have the
stomach of a horse or an ostrich.' Now, of course, the
horse and the ostrich being graminivorous, could not digest
these foods ; but men, women, and children, with healthy
stomachs, and good appetites not spoilt by physic, can
certainly eat and digest all three, and derive both health
and pleasure from their consumption. The crusade against
lamb and veal as unwholesome because young and immature,
to be carried to its legitimate conclusion should be extended
to game and poultry, and a tough old hen, or a hare which
has for years defied the sportsman, should be extolled before
the tender chicken and the leveret.
The Jews, restricted in their diet by strict laws, rejected
all pork as unclean ; but veal and lamb, with kid, seem to
have formed the staple of their feasts. The paschal lamb,
roasted whole and eaten with bitter herbs, is familiar to
every reader of the Bible ; and lambs, as we know, formed a
large proportion of the sacrifices offered daily, and, of course
SUNDRY MEATS 85
eaten, with the singular exception that all the fat should be
burnt, for the fat as well as the blood of sacrifices seems to
have been forbidden to be eaten ; and, it may be remembered
as one of the sins of the sons of Eli, that they sent their
servant and demanded raw flesh with the fat, before it was
burned according to the sacred law of sacrifices. The
breast and the right shoulder of these sacrifices were allotted
to the priests, and thus it came to pass that when Saul was
sent to Samuel, the shoulder was set before him as the royal
and priestly joint. As to the calf, that was not only offered
in sacrifice, like the lamb, but it seems to have been set
aside especially for family feasts. The fatted calf, killed to
do honour to the returning prodigal, has passed into a
proverb, and to 'kill the fatted calf is now synonymous
with making a feast of joy. But the calf was' from the
earliest times looked upon as a delicacy to set before an
honoured guest ; hence we are told that when, in the days of
Abraham, the three angels came to him as he sat in his tent-
door on the plains of Mamre, in the heat of the day, he
' ran unto the herd and fetched a calf, tender and good, and
gave it to a young man, and he hasted to dress it. And he
took butter and milk, and the calf which he had dressed,
and set it before them ; and he stood by them under the
tree, and they did eat.'
What a vivid picture we have here of the hospitality of
the patriarch, of his mode of life, and of the food he thought
meet to place before his guests the calf tender and good,
eaten as at the present day, with butter and milk, the cake
kneaded and baked upon the hearth by Sarah, to be eaten
with it. It was no mean feast for hungry men in the wide
plain, but the celerity with which it is prepared strikes one.
86 OUR VIANDS
To kill a calf and skin it would take an English butcher a
considerable time, and the cooking would not be attempted
until the carcase was cold, but in hot climates this kind of
rapid slaughtering and cooking is frequent and necessary.
1 Sudden death,' as it is called, overtakes poultry very often,
even in England, and if cooked without being allowed to
get cold, the meat is tender and well-flavoured, and probably
the same holds good with regard to larger animals.
In England the killing of calves was formerly attended
with much cruelty, the poor animals being bled two or three
times before they were killed, in order to make the meat
white, which probably also made it hard and indigestible ;
but this is happily now done away with, as is the mode in
which they were conveyed to market packed in a cart with
their legs tied, and lying one over another, with their heads
hanging down over the tail-board, and making the most
piteous cries.
Although veal is still eschewed by many in England as
indigestible, we cannot imagine what our cooks would do
without this savoury meat, which, above all others, is
invaluable in the menu. What could supply the place of
the delicate sweetbread, the ragout, the calf s head with its
accompaniments, the hash, the stew, the mince, the veal
olives and cutlets, and the roast fillet, with its stuffing and
lemon-juice, beloved of Oliver Cromwell? All over the
Continent of Europe the value of veal is recognised, and a
cotelette dc veau is the one thing which may be safely ordered
by the traveller.
As for pork, what shall we say ? A whole treatise would
not suffice to recount all the virtues and uses of ' honest
piggy 5 the poor man's genuine friend every portion of
SUNDRY MEATS 87
which is good for food. The Jewish law which condemned
the pig as unclean, certainly deprived the Israelites of a
savoury food, but it does not appear to have prevented them
from keeping the unclean creature, and probably making it
a profitable article of commerce with the Gentiles, respecting
which, and the destruction of the herd of many swine, as
reported in the New Testament, a lively controversy was
lately carried on between two of our greatest men of light
and leading.
The parable of the Prodigal Son marks the depth of his
degradation by making him a swineherd. But our English
chroniclers give a story, in which a herd of swine running
into the water, caused the foundation of one of the best
known and most beautiful cities of England. As the story
is not generally known we will give it shortly. A British
prince, named Bladud, became leprous, and was driven
from his home, and, being forced to become a swineherd,
he communicated his disease to his four-footed companions,
and they wandered about, shunned by all. One day
Bladud's pigs took a strange freak. Being on a steep hill
in the forest, they all ran hastily down, and plunged into a
marsh at the foot of the hill, and there they lay wallowing,
and resisting all Bladud's efforts to draw them away. Day
after day they returned to their mud bath, till Bladud saw
with pleasure and surprise that they were all cured of the
leprosy. Being a wise prince, he was not above learning
even of a pig and, following their example, he too was soon
cured, and enabled to return to his father, and eventually to
become king in his place. He built a city on the spot
where he was cured, with baths for lepers, and this was the
origin of the far-famed baths of Bath which certainly were
88 OUR VIANDS
held in repute even before the coming of the Romans.
Should any of our readers visit that fairest of cities, they
may see an ancient statue of Prince Bladud, with an
assigned date of centuries B.C., still presiding over the hot
bath, which is supposed to have been the scene of his
cure, and will find in the city many allusions to the
tradition.
The pig is, as we know, all in all to the Irish peasantry
1 the gintleman that pays the rint,' when allowed to do so
and the bacon exported from Ireland is not to be surpassed;
but most of that consumed in London comes from the
celebrated manufactory of Harris, of Calne, Wiltshire, where
thousands of pigs are killed and cured somewhat after the
Chicago fashion going in at one end live pig, and coming
out at the other, bacon or sausages. I cannot say I quite
like this rapid curing process, which is not always perfect,
and, as a housekeeper, I often long for the old-fashioned
home-cured bacon and hams of my youth ; but a taste has
arisen for what is known in the market as mild-cured bacon,
which to my mind means only half-cured ; caterers for the
public, however, find it profitable to supply mild-cured meat,
which requires rapid consumption, so that it is difficult now
to find really well-salted meat or fish of any kind.
We all know Lamb's amusing story of the origin of suck-
ing pig, but few of us realise the vast importance of pork
and bacon as human food. Pigs have been introduced into
every country to which commerce has extended, and now
exist in great numbers all over the South Sea Islands, which,
when first discovered, had no quadrupeds fit for food ;
the inhabitants consequently feasted upon human victims.
The vast quantities of bacon and hams which come to us
SUNDR Y ME A TS 89
yearly from America and Canada, show how important the
pig has become commercially, but from the very earliest
times the wild pig seems to have occupied a foremost place
as an article of diet, for the bones of the wild boar are
found in almost all kitchen-middens of pre-historic times,
and the animal plays an important role in Scandinavian
legends.
All our early poets have drawn inspiration from the
noble sport of stag hunting, and certainly in all the
menus of ancient times, venison figured prominently; but
who can now compound such a venison pasty as that upon
which the bold Friar Tuck regaled the Black Knight in
Sherwood Forest ?
Nothing gave such offence to our ancestors as the turning
of waste lands into deer forests by some of the early Norman
kings for the sake of sport ; and the preservation of the deer
in these forests, required constant watchfulness on the part
of the keepers, for the forests were haunted by poachers,
some of whom, like Robin Hood and his merry men, were
not of the lower orders, but outlawed noblemen, for it
seems to be pretty well established that Robin Hood was
really the Earl of Huntingdon, who had been banished by
Richard I. for misdemeanours.
Everyone knows the story of the New Forest, in Hamp-
shire, created by William the Conqueror, and the tragic
death in it of his son William Rufus. But the New Forest,
although the largest, was far from being the only deer forest
in England; indeed, even as late as last century, there
were no fewer than 68, besides 18 chases and 780 parks'.
In all, or in most of these, fallow-deer were allowed to
roam freely, and the tenants of forest lands were forbidden
90 OUR VIANDS
to plough the land, and were obliged to preserve pasturage
for the deer. The number of deer thus kept must have
been enormous. In Cranbourne Chase alone we are told
12,000 were pastured, but the constant conflicts between
the poachers and keepers, which often ended in loss of life,
caused most of the forests to be disafforested, so that now
the deer in England are reduced to a comparatively small
number, and are mostly kept in gentlemen's parks, to the
beauty of which they largely contribute.
As a sport, deer-stalking is now quite unknown in England,
although carried on in Scotland, where the wild mountains
and forests still shelter some of the noble red-deer, which is
much fiercer than the beautiful dappled fallow deer of our
parks, in some of which a few red deer are also kept.
There is a sport called stag-hunting still carried on in
England, but which would be looked upon as a farce by
those accustomed to the chase of wild animals. The Queen
keeps a pack of stag-hounds and some trained stags, and
when a stag hunt is announced, one of the trained stags is
conveyed in a cart to a certain spot and there let loose.
After a few minutes grace the hounds are sent in pursuit,
followed by the whole field of hunters, till after a run of
some miles the stag gets tired, and deliberately waits till the
huntsman comes up and captures him, when he is again
put into the cart and taken back to his snug quarters. Oh,
shade of Robin Hood ! with what utter contempt must thou
regard this poor remnant of ancient British sport !
The death of the beautiful fallow-deer has always caused
a certain feeling of remorseful pity, even in the breast of the
successful hunter, and poets have drawn many beautiful
similes from the chase and its accompaniments.
SUNDR Y ME A TS 9 r
' As pants the hart for cooling streams,
When heated in the chase, '
will occur to the mind at once, and Shakespeare
describes the melancholy Jaques moralising on the same
event :
1 As he lay along
Under an oak, whose antique root peeps out
Upon the brook that brawls along this wood ;
To the which place a poor sequester'd stag,
That from the hunter's aim had ta'en a hurt,
Did come to languish ; and, indeed, my lord,
The wretched animal heav'd forth such groans,
That their discharge did stretch his leathern coat
Almost to bursting ; and the big round tears
Cours'd one another down his innocent nose
In piteous chase : and thus the hairy fool,
Much marked of the melancholy Jaques,
Stood on the extremest verge of the swift brook,
Augmenting it with tears. . . .
" Poor deer," quoth he, "thou mak'st a testament
As worldlings do, giving thy sum of more
To that which had too much." '
Pity, however, does not weigh much in the scale when
savoury meat is the result of a day's hunting, and from time
immemorial venison has been regarded as a delicacy fit for
a king's table. Solomon in his magnificence had his venison
of stag and roebuck daily, and Cyrus of Persia would not
dine without it. But long before Cyrus and Solomon our
rude forefathers had found uses, not only for the flesh, but
also for the horns and sinews of various kinds of deer ; for
among the earliest known relics of man, the horns of the
deer are found forming handles for stone implements, picks
for digging flints, etc., whilst the sinews were used as thread
92 OUR VIANDS
for sewing the skins together for clothing, and for making
strings for bows, fishing lines, and other purposes.
One of the earliest known drawings found in the caves of
France represents a group of reindeer, for the reindeer at
that remote period lived in France and Great Britain, as it
now does in Lapland, and appears to have been domesticated,
and was probably as useful to the old cave-dwellers as it is
now to the Lapps.
When we come to inquire how these old-world people
cooked their venison, the answer is not easy : they probably
broiled it over hot coals, or boiled it with hot stones after
the method mentioned elsewhere ; but in the old patriarchal
days they must have cooked with considerable skill, other-
wise Rebecca would not have been able so readily to convert
the kid into savoury meat so nearly resembling venison as
to be eaten for it by the blind old patriarch, who seems to
have been fond of good living, and evidently appreciated
venison as much as modern epicures.
Goat's flesh is so little appreciated among us at present,
that it is not even named in modern English cookery books.
Nevertheless, in the East and in southern Europe, even now,
it is much eaten and esteemed, as it is also in South Africa
where large flocks are kept for the hair, and for food. The
many allusions to the goat in Scripture shows that it formed
one of the staple articles of food among the Jews, as it did
doubtless among the Greeks and Romans ; and the goat is
one of the most familiar objects in ancient sculpture, as it
is in modern paintings of Italian landscape.
The Roman god Pan and his satyrs are depicted with
goat's legs, and the modern herdsman of the Campagna, in
his hairy goatskin breeches as he sits on a ruined tomb
SUNDR Y ME A TS 93
piping to his herd, with the graceful little kids playing
around him, is a good representative of the ancient sylvan
deity and his attendants.
In Italy at the present day, not only is the goat in great
request for its flesh and its skin, but the milk is largely used,
and a sort of cream cheese made of goat's milk is sold in the
streets and highly appreciated, being, in truth, very sweet
and palatable. A halfpenny spent on this ricotta, to be
eaten with the sour Italian bread, makes an excellent meal
for the frugal Roman, who cannot afford many table luxuries.
We used often to wonder that the useful goat, so easily
reared and fed, was not more commonly kept by cottagers
in England ; but we have since found out that his constant
activity, and the consequent difficulty of keeping him within
due bounds, is a great drawback to his usefulness in a small
and over-populated country like Great Britain. Among the
mountains of Wales he still thrives, being, as is well known,
an emblem of the country. The beautiful Angora goat, now
naturalised at the Cape, is a native of Syria, and is not hardy
enough for the cold, rough mountains of Europe, but its
flesh, I am told, is more palatable, as its coat is more
beautiful, than that of the common goat. A solitary goat is
often kept in stables or among a herd of cows in England,
being supposed to ward off disease ; and in South Africa
one is often trained to act as leader to a flock of sheep a
part it enacts with great sagacity.
CHAPTER VII
GAME AND POULTRY
THERE may perhaps have been vegetarians in all ages, but
they are certainly rare among the lower races of the present
day, and have probably always been so of necessity rather
than by choice, for doubtless man is by nature a hunter,
and has ever been engaged in trapping and slaying for
food the wild animals by which he has been surrounded.
The very earliest men of whom we have any record
whose weapons were of rough stone, and whose dwellings
were in caves and rock shelters, who probably built no
houses, and, as far as we know, wore no clothes except
the skins of the animals they had slain and devoured
were hunters. Noble game, too, they hunted in those days
in Europe, such as can now only be found in the wilds
of Africa, and some not even there, for they have perished
utterly. There were the cave lion and the cave bear, the
great sabre-toothed tiger, the woolly-haired rhinoceros, and
the great mammoth, with its long, curved tusks and shaggy
coat, known to us only by its skeleton, and by its likeness
drawn by these savage hunters on a piece of its own tusk
until some years ago a great thaw in Siberia revealed the
animal in its flesh, where it had lain packed in ice by the
hand of nature for many centuries, yet still remaining fresh
enough to be devoured by dogs, a fact which might have
GAME AND POULTRY 95
V
suggested the use of the refrigerating process to the wise
men of that day ; but they were so slow in following where
nature led, that it has taken half a century to bring frozen
meat into the European market. Then there was the
reindeer, useful then as now, and abounding at that time
in the south of France, instead of in the Arctic regions;
but in those remote ages the south of France was itself
Arctic in climate.
The wild cave men of those days have also left us
portraits of the reindeer, and of a little shaggy pony, which
they ate also, as well as fish and fowl, for people then were
not particular as to the choice of food, and ate whatever
they could catch, literally by hook or by crook, for, as
they had no guns and no weapons of metal, they had to
trust to their own skill and cunning rather than to their
weapons for their game, and it seems astonishing that with
such imperfect implements they should have succeeded in
slaughtering such a huge beast as the mammoth; never-
theless, some even now can trap and destroy the elephant
and other big game, using for the purpose poisoned arrows
and having ingenious methods, whereby the flow of blood
from the wound is increased, and, in some cases, the head
of the arrow is made to detach itself and the shaft to drag
along the ground, entangling itself in the long grass so
as to hinder the flight of the wounded animal. Mr. Stanley
has described the skill of the little African pigmies in
destroying big game with their tiny but beautifully made
weapons, and by traps.
European game has now dwindled down to small
proportions. The mammoth, and other great beasts its
contemporaries, are quite extinct; the reindeer has retreated
96 OUR VIANDS
to the Arctic circles ; the horse and the ox, the goat and
the pig, are no longer game, but domestic animals. There
are still a few bears, wolves, and wild boars to be found,
and several kinds of deer. The fox at least in England
can hardly be looked upon as a wild animal, being
carefully preserved ; and even of birds, few are now found
in the wild state, partridges and pheasants being reared
by thousands in poultry yards and turned out to be shot.
But in the north, grouse of several kind, blackcock, and
capercailzies are still to be found, and wild duck, woodcock,
and snipe may fall to the sportsman's gun in the lowlands.
There is, however, little excitement in the pursuit of
that which is harmless, and so our genuine sportsmen go
further afield for their game, and delight, like Nimrod of
old, in hunting the tiger and the wild boar in India, or
the lion, the elephant, the rhinoceros, the panther, and
various species of deer and antelope in Africa. The latter
continent still maintains the pre-eminence which caused
it to be named ' the hunter's paradise,' and those who saw
the great trophy of heads and horns displayed in the Cape
Court at the Colonial and Indian Exhibition must have
been struck with the vast variety of game there represented ;
and more especially they must have wondered at the
number of species of antelopes, from the great eland * to
the tiny little steinbok. The pursuit of these requires
great skill and cunning, for they are all extremely agile, and
easily scared, and frequent for the most part mountainous
regions, very difficult of access.
* It has been proposed to make an attempt to acclimatise this
giant antelope in England and to use it for food, which might, perhaps,
be possible.
GAME AND POULTRY 97
One antelope only remains in a wild state in Europe
namely, the chamois ; and the hunting of this active little
animal which most nearly resembles the klip-springer of
the Cape is attended with a considerable amount of
danger.
Those who would realise the pleasures and dangers of
chamois hunting, must visit their haunts among the wild
peaks of the Tyrolean Alps, and read the tales written by
the Baroness Tautphoeus ' The Initials ' and ' Quits ' old
now, but wonderfully true in their descriptions of the country
and the people, and of that wild chamois hunter and his
habits who has been thus described : ' The true chamois
hunter is a man apart. Gaunt and bony, with " brown and
sinewy knees, scarred and scratched, hair shaggy, dark
piercing eyes, marked eyebrows, a bent eagle nose, and
high, fleshless cheek-bones, with a hungry expression on his
face," to borrow the words of a famous Alpine hunter, the
"Gamsjager" is of a build not to be acquired among the
dwellers of cities.'
Once only have I tasted chamois flesh, and can testify to
its extreme delicacy and excellence, but it rarely falls to the
lot of modern tourists to taste the real article ; the Swiss
serve up goat flesh cunningly prepared to resemble chamois,
but which is no more to be compared with it than is mutton
to venison.
Time was when the only specimen of foreign game which
appeared on English tables was the French partridge, which
has long been naturalised among us, and of which a poet
writes
' As I was standing by a wood one day,
A little partridge came my way.
98 OUR VIANDS
His slender legs were dainty red,
And in a foreign way he said,
" Ne tirez pas, ne tirez pas !
Je suis Frangais.
Mon Dieu ! ne tirez pas ! "
' Another hand (not mine) then fired; he ft 11,
And, quivering, lay upon the ground.
But, ere the fluttering life had sped,
With little sob he bravely said,
" N'y pensez plus, n'y pens' z plus.
Aliens ! Voyons !
Je meurs Fran9ais.
Adieu ! " '
Now, however, the freezing system has allowed game, as
well as beef and mutton, to be sent from over the seas, and
thus we get the prairie hen from America, and are surprised
that we do not also get various other birds, even from greater
distances. We are told that we receive many tons of rabbits
from Australia and New Zealand, both tinned and frozen,
and we certainly get shiploads of ptarmigan, capercailzie,
blackcock, and white hares' from Norway and the north of
Scotland, which, coming as they do during the close season
for our native game, and when poultry also is scarce and
dear, are exceedingly acceptable to English housekeepers.
Why do we not also get the bush-turkey and other game-
birds from Australia, New Zealand, and the Cape ? It also
seems a pity the Australians do not send us kangaroo meat;
but then there is a prejudice to be overcome, for English
people don't like any outlandish meats, and even the
French, although they do enjoy frogs' legs and snails, and
were accustomed during the siege of Paris to all sorts of
strange viands, from rats to elephants, do not prefer these
delicacies in times of peace and plenty. We believe
GAME AND POULTRY 99
kangaroo tails may be purchased here, but the majority of
people will doubtless continue to give preference to the
bovine caudal appendage in making soup.*
Use is second nature, and it takes a long time to get used
to strange dishes. The late Frank Buckland tried the
flavour of everything he could 'try in the Zoo, from the snake
to the hippopotamus, but he didn't get many to enjoy his
savoury meats. However, game, whether bird or beast, is
much more readily accepted than other strange meats, and
we fancy if South Africa and Australia would send us game
during their early autumn (not at pairing time) in a frozen
state, it would be a most acceptable addition to the some-
what scanty menu of our backward spring, and, perhaps,
delay for a time the threatened total extermination of our
birds and hares, now apparently sold in season and out of
season indiscriminately.
There is nothing which tickles the palate of the epicure
more than a savoury dish of game of any kind, from the
lordly stag to the humble lark, the long strings of which
charming little songster hanging in the poulterers' shops
often cause a pang of regret to the lover of birds, although,
as a matter of fact it is no more cruel to kill and eat a lark
than a woodcock, only in the former case the slaughter
seems so wholesale, that the fear of total extermination arises;
but when we look back to the days of the Roman emperors,
and read that the table of Elagabalus was regularly supplied
with ragouts of the livers and brains of small birds, the heads
* The Australian aborigines insist that all animals must be cooked
in their skins, and their method of cooking the kangaroo is to cut it
open, take out the entrails and replace them by four hot stones ; the
animal is then roasted on hot ashes.
ioo OUR VIANDS
of parrots and pheasants, and the tongues of peacocks and
nightingales, and that ^Esop, the tragic actor, entertained
his guests with a dish of birds, each of which had been
taught either to sing or to speak, we wonder that any
singing birds should remain to be killed and eaten,
especially when we remember that from the days of the
Roman emperors to this present, an indiscriminate slaughter
of all birds has been going on in Italy.
Even now the traveller is regaled with all sorts of birds
daintily dressed and served under the name of ortolans or
becaficos, but the poulterers' shops reveal a mass of strange
birds of every kind from the owl to the kingfisher and the
wren, all awaiting the same fate at the hands of the Italian
cook, who does not disdain even the blood of his victims,
which is sold in the form of little cakes, whilst the livers,
mixed with poultry trimmings, help in the manufacture of the
most savoury and delicious of pies; whereas our extravagant
cooks throw everything away excepting, perhaps, the liver and
gizzard of domestic poultry, although they will sometimes
condescend to use the necks and pinions for making gravy.
Our domestic poultry now consists of fowls, ducks, geese,
turkeys, and guinea-fowls, but formerly at all feasts the
place of honour was assigned to the peacock, which,
dressed in its full plumage, was carried to the dining-hall
by the chief lady of the company, to the sound of music,
the rest of the ladies following in due order, and was set
down by the bearer before the master of the house or his
most honoured guest. The 'Book of Days' says, 'to
prepare Argus for the table was a task entailing no little
trouble. The skin was first carefully stripped off, with the
plumage adhering ; the bird was then roasted ; when done
GAME AND POULTRY 101
and partially cooled, it was sewed up again in its feathers,
its beak gilt, and so sent to table. Sometimes the whole
body was covered with leaf-gold, and a piece of cotton
saturated with spirits placed in its beak and lighted
before the carver commenced operations. This " food for
lovers and meat for lords" was stuffed with spices and
sweet herbs, basted with yolk of eggs, and served with
plenty of gravy ; on great occasions as many as three fat
wethers being braised to make enough for a single peacock.'
The same book tells us that the bird when served up after
a tournament, was usually placed in a pie, the head
appearing at one end and the tail unfolded in all its glory
at the other, and in this form was placed before the
victorious knight. Over this peacock-pie the knights-errant
swore, as Justice Shallow has it, ' by cock and pie,' to do
all manner of chivalrous deeds.
The peacock is seldom if ever sent to table at the present
day in its gorgeous plumes, the latest recorded instance of
its appearance being at a dinner given to William IV. when
Duke of Clarence, by the governor of Grenada; but our cooks
still adorn the supper table with game pies embellished with
the stuffed heads and displayed tails of pheasants ; and
young pea-fowls are still eaten with relish on the rare
occasions when they are obtainable, as are also cygnets, the
swan, like the peacock, having passed away from the ordinary
cook's domain, but the great swannery at Abbotsbury still
sends some yearly to the Queen's table, and we sometimes,
though very rarely, see swans hanging in poulterers' shops.
The place of both these former favourites has been taken
by the turkey, which, ever since its first introduction, has
been growing in favour until it has now become so much a
102 OUR VIANDS
necessity, that there is scarcely a household in the three
kingdoms of any social standing, which does not place a
turkey on the table at Christmas, and one wonders in
contemplating the tons upon tons displayed in shops and
stores during the winter, where they can have come from.
Norfolk turkeys take the first place in the market, and
magnificent specimens they are, with sufficient white dainty
meat on the breast to serve a family party, whilst all the
masculine members of the household may breakfast on the
well-devilled legs.
There has been much discussion as to whether the birds
known to the ancients as meleagrides were the same as our
turkeys, but the opinion is now generally held that the
former birds were guinea-fowls, and that the turkey was
unknown before the days of Columbus, being a native of
America, where it is still found wild, and having been
introduced to Europe by Jesuit missionaries, but it was
certainly known in England in the reign of Henry VIII.,
and, according to Beckmann, began to appear as a
Christmas dish about 1585.
TheTalegalla or brush-turkey, which builds curious mounds
in which to lay its eggs, allowing them to be hatched by
the heat generated by the fermentation of the heaped-up
material, is much sought by the Australian savages as an
article of food, and, like all wild birds, is eaten with gusto by
the sportsman, but it is not at all like the common turkey.
The guinea-fowl, supposed to have been the bird known
to the ancients as turkey, has long been domesticated in
England, and is a most useful stop-gap, coming into season
just when game and poultry are scarce : when young it is
almost equal to pheasant. It is a very shy bird, and
GAME AND POULTRY 103
although you may pet the pretty little chicks, they are sure
to fly away as soon as they can, and will seldom roost with
common fowls, but will prefer the highest tree they can
find, and lay their eggs in the most inaccessible places, by
preference in a bed of stinging nettles.
The chief rival of the turkey is the goose, which is, indeed,
so highly esteemed by the ' masses,' that goose clubs have
long been established, to which the mechanic subscribes
for many weeks before Christmas, in order to receive a fine
fat goose for the delectation of himself and family at the
winter festival. The savoury bird is not despised by more
aristocratic palates, although from the sage and onion
accompaniment which is indispensable, it may not appear
on state occasions.
Caesar tells us that the ancient Britons did not consider
it lawful to eat the hare and the cock and the goose,
probably because these animals were sacred among them,
as they were or at least the cock and the goose among
many other peoples. It seems probable that the geese
which saved the Capitol were sacred birds kept for
sacrifice, and the goose was certainly among the sacred
animals of Egypt, but that did not prevent their being
eaten; and since the day when Queen El'zabeth com-
manded the goose to be served on Michaelmas Day to
commemorate the destruction of the Spanish Armada, the
slaughter of the goose family has gone on in a yearly
increasing ratio, and of late a foreign trade has sprung up
in this favourite food, and we see in the market numberless
frozen geese from Russia. Now that feather beds have
gone so much out of fashion, the goose is seldom robbed
of her down before death; but the process was never a
104 OUR VIANDS
very cruel one, as the housewife only took what the bird
would have plucked oft' herself to line her nest. The grey-
goose quill has also been largely superseded by the steel
pen, yet probably hundreds of thousands of goose quills are
still used annually. The goose is not a favourite with the
farmer, who declares that nothing will feed upon the
pasture where geese are kept, as they make the grass rank
and sour; nevertheless, large flocks are kept on commons,
and share the pasture with horses, cows, and sheep. The
liver of the goose was as highly esteemed by the ancient
Romans as by lovers of p&te de foie gras nowadays, and
means had even then been found to enlarge it artificially.
Horace wrote
' The slaves behind in mighty chargfr bore
A crane in pieces lorn, and powder'd o'er
With salt and flour ; and a white gander's 1 ver,
Stuff'd fat with figs, bespoke the curious giv<r.'
Francis's Hor., B. ii., s. 8.
The duck does not seem to have been so highly esteemed
among the ancients ; nevertheless, in wisdom it beats the
domestic fowl hollow. Naturalists have lately been maligning
the tame duck, declaring that its brain is not so large as that
of its wild brother in fact, that it has lost in intelligence
from associating with human beings instead of shunning
them. It may probably have lost some of its native
cunning, nevertheless, the tame duck is certainly not
lacking in sense, and we have often been interested by the
'cuteness of this well-known bird. The way in which it will
escape from danger in a crowded thoroughfare, notwith-
standing its awkward gait, is quite curious, of which a very
singular instance was related by an omnibus- driver, who saw
GAME AND POULTRY 105
a duck with five or six young ones cross safely from Hyde
Park to Green Park in the middle of the day, when Hyde
Park Corner was thronged with vehicles of all kinds. We
remember an amusing episode relating to these birds which
will interest our readers.
Whilst on a visit in the country some years ago we
watched the polite behaviour of some neighbours' ducks
with much amusement Two ducks belonging to a cottage,
desirous of mixing with their fellows, used to creep under a
gate and cross the road in the early morning to a farmyard
where many others of their kind disported themselves, and,
after a day's grubbing, the drake from the farm used to
conduct the visitors to their own quarters at sunset in a
most ludicrous manner. After leading them to the gate of
their domain, he stood by to watch them creep under, but
never attempted to follow them : then a great deal of bowing
and quacking would take place between the ducks on one
side of the gate and the drake on the other evidently a
vote of thanks for polite attentions was duly conveyed and
graciously accepted. Then the two ducks would waddle off
across a small field to their bedchamber, whilst the drake
remained outside the gate watching till they had entered
their abode, when, after a few quacks from the ducks to
announce their safe arrival, and a good-night in reply from
the drake, he would turn away and waddle off to his own
harem, to repeat the same polite performance the next
night.
Everyone will allow that ducks are good eating, not-
withstanding the assertion that they are foul feeders.
Undoubtedly they will, like the pig, swallow any garbage,
but their preference is for slugs and snails, and, if allowed
io6 OUR VIANDS
to search for themselves in the early morning and late in
the evening, they will soon fatten upon these gardeners'
enemies, and require very little feeding except in dry, hot,
and frosty weather ; and, but that their waddling feet tread
down the earth too much, they are excellent assistants to
the gardener.
Seeing the enormous yearly consumption of the domestic
fowl, it is matter of surprise that eggs and poultry are not
more cultivated in England. There seems no reason why
English farmers should not find it as profitable an industry as
the French and Irish do ; but there exists a general opinion
that they cannot be made to pay, and consequently the egg
and poultry trade is largely given over to foreigners, and of
late an immense number of frozen fowls have found their
way into the London market little, short-necked, ill-favoured
things, said to come from Russia, but, appearing at a time
when English fowls are scarce and dear, they are a very
acceptable addition to the menu, although not to be
compared in quality with the home-grown fowls from
Surrey, Norfolk, and the west of England. Fowls seem to
have been domesticated from time immemorial. In Egypt
they were even hatched by incubators many centuries B.C.
In Greece and Rome the cock was frequently offered in
sacrifice, and the regularity of the hour of crowing made it
everywhere useful as a timekeeper before the days of clocks,
so that we find cock-crowing referred to in Scripture as the
time preceding the morning.
Cocks were largely used in divination in Greece and
Rome, for not only were auguries derived from an inspection
of the entrails, but they were supposed to divine "by pecking
grain from certain cards placed before them ; but, as there
GAME AND POULTRY 107
are tricks in all trades, it was discovered that the priests
had found the way to compel fate, by placing wax imitations
of grain on those cards they did not wish to have chosen,
and the bird was wise enough to prefer the real to the
imitation grain.
Among the many breeds of fowls some are preferred for
flavour, others for size, or for the superiority of their eggs.
The Dorking and the game fowl are, perhaps, the prime
favourites in England for cooking purposes, the Spanish
for laying properties, and the Cochin China for the size and
flavour of the eggs ; but the breeds cultivated by poultry
fanciers are too numerous to mention for profit, probably
the common barn-door fowl of mixed breed is the best.
CHAPTER VIII
EGGS
OF all articles of diet, eggs are perhaps the most generally
accepted ; they are relished alike by sage and savage, and
form a nutritious meal for prince or peasant. Nor is the
taste for this universal food confined to mankind, for the
hens themselves, the providers of the feast, often develop
cannibalistic tendencies, and will peck and devour the
very egg they have just deposited with so much care and
cackling; whilst snakes will lie in wait for the delicate
morsel, and will either swallow it whole, or tap it with their
teeth and suck out the contents ; and rats are credited with
making wheelbarrows of themselves, allowing themselves to
be pulled along by the ears by their comrades, in order to
secure the prize held safely in their paws. Dogs also
often develop a taste for eggs, which they will steal from
the nest without compunction, the only cure for the
propensity being to hold a hot egg in the mouth of the
delinquent. Monkeys, and particularly baboons, will also
diligently seek for and greedily devour all the eggs they
can lay their hands on, and are consequently much dreaded
by small birds. But, probably, rapacious birds are the
greatest devourers of the eggs of other species. It seems
a well authenticated fact, that the grey crow in Africa, will
108
EGGS iog
carry stones up to a considerable height and drop them
into an ostrich nest, in order to crack the hard shell which
would otherwise be prohibitive of the coveted feast ; whilst
travellers assert that wild ostriches always place several
eggs round the nest to serve as food for the young when
first hatched.
Happily for mankind, the eggs of noxious reptiles and
insects are relished as well as hen's eggs, and thus the
excessive increase, of deadly reptiles is prevented. The
ichneumon greedily devours the eggs of snakes and
crocodiles, and white ants' eggs are considered delicacies,
even by men. In our own country the magpie and the
jay are notorious thieves of the eggs of smaller birds; whilst
turkeys, pheasants, and guinea-fowls, will swallow millions
of ant eggs in a day, if they can get them.
The problem which puzzled the learned, centuries ago,
as to which was first created, the egg or the hen, has never
yet been unravelled. Theologians would probably say, the
hen, certainly ; but Darwin would be in favour of the egg,
as being of the nature of that protoplasm from which all
life originates. The ancients were certainly of Darwin's
opinion, and looked upon the earth itself as developed
from an egg by the power of various divinities, hence the
egg became a sacred symbol in many countries, was hung
up in Egyptian temples, and represented in paintings and
sculptures as encircled in the folds of the good Agatho-
dsemon, the serpent worshipped in so many lands, and
which was doubtless connected with that other famous egg
of antiquity, the serpent's egg of the Druids.
If we visit the British Museum we shall see eggs and
egg-stands of various shapes and sizes, which have been
i io OUR VIANDS
found in tombs in Egypt, Greece, and Etruria ; among the
Etruscan relics are several ostrich eggs beautifully painted.
These sepulchral eggs were, doubtless, symbolical of a
future life, but were also probably designed as food for
the dead, for it was well-nigh a universal practice to provide
food for the departed spirit, a practice still in use among
savages.
The eggs which are given at Easter time are supposed
to symbolise the Resurrection, but it is certain that the
custom originated in pre-Christian times. Eggs wrapped
in various-coloured ribbons, and boiled thus receiving the
dye from the ribbon used were formerly sent as Easter
gifts. These are still sometimes seen in little shops, but
the Easter eggs now sent as presents by those who can
afford them do not owe their origin to any feathered fowl,
but are artificially made of various substances, and filled
with gifts of differing value, from chocolate creams to
diamond rings or costly shawls. It is both curious and
interesting to note that in almost all countries this custom
of giving and receiving brightly coloured eggs at a spring
festival, has prevailed from time immemorial ; hence,
probably, we see in the painted ostrich eggs from Etruscan
tombs, which are at least two thousand years old, the
spring gift of friends to the beloved dead. A writer in the
Standard some years ago, in a very interesting article traced
this custom to China ; he says : ' Gustave Schlegel,
during his official residence in China as representative of
the Netherlands, in his interesting and erudite researches
through a mass of Chinese literature discovered that the
"painted eggs," as they are called in China, were used
in the great Spring Festival of Tsing-ming, and are noticed
EGGS in
in the records of the ancient State of King-ts-oo under the
date B.C. 722. The giving gifts to one another of brightly
coloured hard-boiled eggs at this season he also found
occurring in the annals of the old State of Ye, between
the dates B.C. 481 B.C. 255. Schlegel tells us the custom
is met with in the records of the Tang Dynasty, A.D. 618
A.D. 907. It seems the custom originated in China in this
wise. Annually, at the mid-spring time of year, which
answers to our Easter, Chinese functionaries were sent out
through the towns, villages, and country parts, each armed
with a wooden bell, their duty being to make proclamation
that all fires must be put out, and must remain out for the
space of three days, after which, by the friction of two pieces
of wood, new fire was obtained, and from this the household
hearths were rekindled. The three days specified seems to
have been intended to ensure that no smouldering ember
should by any possibility linger anywhere in the Celestial
Empire. For as the old Chinese writer has it " All fire
under the expanse of Heaven ought to be extinguished
before the new fire is lighted." During those three days
" sacred to the revival of spring and the sun's heat," when in
honour of the sun there must be no fire, of course no
cooking was possible. It is highly probable a large number
of the less devout among the millions of John Chinaman's
compatriots were ill-pleased to have to submit to the
cheerless, unpalatable diet imposed upon them while the
fast from fire lasted. At any rate, the Chinese feast of
Tsing-ming came to be popularly called the " Cold Meat
Festival." Hard-boiled eggs would, of course, be an
acceptable addition to the prepared viands to be used
during the fireless three days. Whether they were so used
ii2 OUR VIANDS
before I know not, but it is attributed to a certain " powerful
chieftain of antiquity " who lived in the before-named ancient
State of King-ts-oo to have been the first person who laid in
stores of " painted eggs," and set the fashion of dispensing
them as gifts to friends and acquaintances at that same time
of year when we celebrate Easter/
The Chinese spring festival always occurs in April when
the sun enters the fifteenth degree of Aries, and as the cock
is sacred to the sun, the egg may have come in this way
to symbolise the new spring birth of nature through the
vivifying influence of the sun. At all events the gift of
brightly coloured eggs at the early spring festival can be
traced not only in China but also in Persia, where we find
them in connection with a festival, the origin of which is
ascribed to the Persian mythical monarch Jemsheed, sixth in
descent from Moses, who is said to have reigned 700 years.
The writer above quoted says : * The greatest of Jemsheed's
festivals was the Nowroose, or Feast of the beginning of the
Religious or Solar Year. It commenced at the time of the
" natural reproduction of all that conduces to the sustenance
of man." With a slight variation from the Chinese calcula-
tion, the Persian Festival is held to begin the moment the
sun enters Aries, or towards the end of March. The
Nowroose Festival is, of course, much older than Maho-
metanism. Some writers call it the " Feast of the Waters,"
and consider it a memorial of the Deluge; while others
suppose it to have been instituted to commemorate the
Creation. A prominent feature that all travellers record as
taking place at the time is the handing about of eggs dyed
of various colours and gilt, given as gifts to each other, and
even to strangers, in honour of the great Spring fast.
EGGS 113
Whether the Nowroose was originally intended to com-
memorate the Deluge or the Creation may be questioned,
but the fact remains that here as elsewhere we find " painted
eggs " as gifts heralding the return of the sun in Spring at
the annual resurrection of Nature.'
The derivation of our Easter eggs from these ancient
sources is evident; it is not the only Pagan custom adapted
to Christianity by the early Church, and to quote once more
from the very interesting article referred to :
'When Pope Paul V. drew up a ritual to be used in
England, Ireland, and Scotland, among many other prayers
of Benediction for Eastertide was the following : " Bless,
Lord, we beseech Thee, this Thy creature of Eggs, that it
may become a wholesome sustenance to Thy faithful
servants, eating it in thankfulness to Thee on account of
the Resurrection of our Lord." Countless thousands of
eggs were thus annually blessed by the priests at Easter,
both before and after they were coloured. Having obtained
the blessing, the eggs became holy gifts, the bestowal of
which conferred much benefit on both givers and receivers.
It became a custom on Good Friday to "offer eggs and
bacon to the Lord Christ," and thus special favours were
secured to the donors. Some of our early Reformation
records bring strange matters before those who care to dip
into them ; not the least strange referring to the mode of
making "presentations of eggs to the Cross." It is a
custom still in vogue in some parts of the Continent for
each member of a parish to present the priest with an egg
on Easter morning.'
In process of time Easter eggs, which were originally given
and received as symbols of the Resurrection, degenerated
H
ii4 OUR VIANDS
into mere objects of sport, and were used as balls, or
for the performance of dances, which often took place in
churches ; thus we are told that * eggs always rose in price
at Easter, they were boiled very hard in water coloured with
red, blue, or violet dyes, with inscriptions or landscapes
traced upon them ; these were offered as presents among
the valentines of the year, but more frequently played with
by the boys as balls, for ball-playing on Easter Monday
was universal in every rank. Even the clergy could not
forego its delights, and made this game a part of their
service. Bishops and deans took the ball into the church,
and at the commencement of the autiphone began to dance,
throwing the ball to the choristers, who handed it to each
other during the time of the dancing and autiphone. All
then retired for refreshment ; a gammon of bacon, eaten in
abhorrence of the Jews, was a standard dish ; with a tansy
pudding, symbolical of the bitter herbs commanded at the
paschal feast.' *
When we consider the lavish use of eggs in former days,
we are constrained to believe that our forefathers certainly
paid more attention to the keeping and rearing of poultry
than English farmers do at the present day, for eggs must
have been more plentiful and cheaper than they are now,
even with our abundant foreign supplies, or they could
never have been used as balls, and employed by the dozen
in cookery, as old receipts show us they were.
We are now supplied with eggs from Ireland, Germany,
Belgium, Italy, and France, and it is computed that from
the last named country alone one million come daily to the
London market. The number consumed in England yearly
* Chambers's 'Book of Days,' vol. i., p. 429.
EGGS
"5
must be incalculable ; but new-laid English eggs are always
difficult to procure, and during the winter are often sold at
threepence apiece, whereas our grandmothers would prob-
ably have considered a shilling a score very dear. It has been
calculated that we pay six millions of pounds per annum for
eggs ; and French cooks say they may be dressed in more
than five hundred different ways. They are, however, used
not only in cookery. In one photographic establishment,
we are told, two millions are used every year ; and they are
also employed largely in calico printing, leather dressing,
and bookbinding ; and it is calculated that in France the
number used in wine clarifying amounts to more than eighty
millions a year. It may be well here to give a few of the
uses of eggs in medicine, for they are valuable in many
ways as household remedies.
' The white is the most efficacious of remedies for burns,
and the oil extractable from the yolk is regarded by the
Russians as an almost miraculous salve for cuts, bruises,
and scratches. A raw egg, if swallowed in time, will
effectually detach a fish-bone in the throat, and the white
of two eggs will render the deadly corrosive sublimate as
harmless as a dose of calomel. They strengthen the con-
sumptive, invigorate the feeble, and render the most
susceptible all but proof against jaundice in its more
malignant phase.' The old saw had it
' An egg, an apple, and a nut,
You may eat after any slut. '
That, however, is not quite true as regards eggs, for the
shell being porous readily absorbs anything malodorous
which is placed near it, so that it is not uncommon to meet
with eggs tasting of onions j and I remember once having
ii6 OUR VIANDS
had served to me three mornings running eggs highly
flavoured with paraffin through a careless servant having
thrown the cloth with which she cleaned the lamps over
the egg basket.* It is also believed that eggs are affected
by the food consumed by the hens ; and it is certain that
portions of foreign bodies such as insects, seeds, small
stones, etc., have been found in eggs, especially in ostrich
eggs, the stones found in which have been polished and
used as buttons or studs.
The ostrich egg is the largest egg at present known, but
that of the giant dinornis of New Zealand exceeded it in
size as much as the turkey's egg exceeds that of the hen.
One of these gigantic eggs was exhibited, with the skeleton
of the extinct bird, at the Colonial and Indian Exhibition,
and a cast of one may be seen at the Natural History
Museum, with an ostrich egg near it by way of comparison ;
but the dinornis egg is unique and unattainable, as well as
uneatable, and we must be content with that of the ostrich
as the largest now used for eating, one of which makes
a tolerable meal for five or six people, being considered
equal to twenty-four hens' eggs. It is, however, rather
strong in flavour, but makes excellent sponge-cakes, pan-
cakes, or omelets, and a find of ostrich eggs in the desert is
matter of great rejoicing to the wandering bushman <3r the
hungry traveller.
Besides the dinornis, there is another extinct bird, the
great auk, which has left behind it two or three eggs, which
are so much coveted as to fetch an extraordinary price;
one of these famous eggs was sold a year or two ago for
* Eggs placed standing upright in salt may be kept good for weeks,
and in China, salted goose eggs are highly esteemed as food for invalids.
EGGS 117
^225. Rumour had it that it was stolen from one of the
Paris museums during the troubles of 1848, but it is certain
that it was sold a few years afterwards by a dealer in Paris
to an English gentleman, in whose family it has remained
until now. At this gentleman's death it fell into the hands
of a married daughter, who resided near Reigate, but after-
wards removed to near Brighton, taking the egg with her.
It was lost trace of by ornithologists owing to this change
of residence, and had quite recently once more been
traced. The lady who owned it was induced to offer
it for sale owing to what was thought the extraordinary
price paid for another egg of the same bird, sold previously
for i 68.
We are not likely to find eggs of dmornis or great auk ;
but it is reported that eggs larger than that of the ostrich
have occasionally been found in the deserts of Africa, and
any traveller coming across such may find it a profitable
investment, although not as an article of food, for as the
bird which laid these eggs is unknown, and perhaps extinct,
the eggs would probably be partially petrified, although it is
possible that they may be found to be those of the gigantic
ostrich recently discovered in the interior, a specimen of
which has lately been forwarded as a present to the Queen.
Of eggs good for food we may mention, in addition to
those of the hen, duck, turkey, goose, guinea-fowl, and
plover, those of the penguin, which are much relished by
sailors, and dwellers on the sea-coasts where these birds
abound, as also the eggs of other sea-birds, although they
are apt to have a somewhat rank and fishy flavour. The
eggs of the turtle are eagerly sought by the epicure, and it
is related that one gentleman, having found what he supposed
ii8 OUR VIANDS
to be a nest of them, took some home and cooked them,
leaving the rest in the sand, but returning in a day or two
for the remainder, found instead a number of lively young
crocodiles, which would go far to prove that there is very
little to choose between turtles' eggs and those of the
crocodile, and probably those of snakes and lizards would
be equally palatable if prejudice did not interfere with
their consumption.
The Chinese are credited with a fondness for eggs half-
rotten, but that is hardly to be believed when we remember
the evil odour attached to them in this condition; they
may, however, enjoy them with the chick in, even as many
people will eat the young bees in the honey-comb, for it is
possible to imagine that a half-hatched chicken may be
palatable, but rotten eggs are certainly an abomination,
which no gastronomic peculiarities could render endurable
to a civilised taste, although they may not be worse than
some other half-rotten comestibles which commend them-
selves to some palates. The Australians, when they find the
eggs of the brush-turkey or the jungle-hen, make a hole in
them lengthways, and lay them in hot ashes, and when they
boil, eat the contents by means of a brush made of cane,
with the end chewed. Should there be chicks in the eggs,
as is often the case, they take them out, broil them on the
ashes, and eat them after the other contents.
A bird, perhaps of the same species as the brush-turkey,
and known in China as the Tabon, lays a very large egg in
the sand of the sea-shore, leaving it to be hatched by the
heat of the sun. These eggs are carefully sought, and are
said to be best when stale, or with young birds in them.
CHAPTER IX
DAIRY PRODUCE
How shall we estimate the debt we owe to the man or
woman who first thought of domesticating the useful cow
for the sake of her milk ? How early in the world's history
that domestication took place it is impossible to say, but
we know that the Egyptians appreciated the bovine race so
highly that they worshipped the bull Apis, and it would
not be hard to trace a similar worship through many other
ancient nations, to the Hindoos of the present day.
The Egyptians probably made butter and cheese, as we
do : certainly the Hebrews did, for the references to butter
and cheese in the various books of the Old Testament are
numerous. 'Hast thou not poured me out as milk, and
curdled me like cheese ? ' says Job ; and in another place
he speaks of 'brooks of honey and butter.' Butter was
one of the delicacies which Jael set before Sisera, and
ten cheeses of milk was the present which Jesse sent by
the hand of his son David to the captain of that thousand
of Saul's army in which his brethren were serving. It is
of course possible that this butter and these cheeses were
made of the milk of sheep or goats, but in enumerating
the presents sent to David by Barzillai, cheese of kine is
especially mentioned, and from the proverb which says,
119
120 OUR VIANDS
' Surely the churning of milk bringeth forth butter,' we may
conclude that both butter and cheese were known to the
ancients in much the same form as we have them now.
The most ancient butter of which we have any real know-
ledge is that known as bog butter, which is dug up from time
to time in Irish peat-bogs. Two or three crocks of this butter
may be seen in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy,
Dublin; it looks like a large lump of chalk, but still
retains its fatty nature, and burns like oil. From the hairs
which are found in it, the colour of the cows from which it
was derived has been ascertained, but at what period it was
buried, and for what reason, is not known. It may, perhaps,
have been hidden in troublous times, or it is just possible it
may have been buried as cream, in order that it might be
converted into butter, this process having been resorted to
with success at the Cape, after an accidental discovery that
cream buried in the earth will turn into butter without
churning, only the butter thus produced is not so good as
that made in the ordinary way by churning. Even at the
present day, in some parts of Ireland butter is made in a
very primitive fashion, by churning unseparated milk, the
temperature being raised by the addition of hot water.
This, of course, leaves a very large proportion of butter-
milk, which is eagerly sought by the peasantry to serve
as sauce to their potatoes, or to make cakes, instead of
yeast, for which purposes it is admirably adapted. Butter-
making in England, unfortunately, is by no means so much
thought of as in the old times, when every farmer's wife
and daughter looked upon that and cheese-making as a
portion of their education, as well as their own especial
daily task, and were not ashamed themselves to convey
DAIR Y PROD UCE 1 2 i
their produce to market. Things are altered now : the
farmer sends milk instead of butter and cheese to
market, and London is largely supplied with foreign
butter and cheese, not only from Holland, which was
formerly the chief source of import, but from Brittany,
Sweden, America, and Canada, the imports of cheese
from the latter country having increased so enormously
of late years that it is almost impossible to obtain
English cheese at an ordinary cheese factor's.
Then, too, the methods of butter and cheese-making have
been greatly modified by the introduction of machinery. It
is now no longer necessary to wait many hours for the
cream to rise in order to skim it off machinery separates
the cream at once from the new milk, and at the great
agricultural show at Windsor in 1887,- a machine was
exhibited which was a combination of churn and separator,
making cream or butter from new milk as desired, by
merely moving a lever, and turning out a pound of butter
a minute.
In our childhood, to watch the process of cheese-making
was a never-ending source of amusement. Great was the
delight of being allowed to stand on a stool beside the big
tub, deep enough to drown us, whilst the dairymaid first
cut into the vast mass of curds and whey, sometimes good-
naturedly giving us a basin of the delicious compound to
eat, whilst she strained off the whey, cutting the curd with
a large double-bladed knife, piling it up in huge flocculent
masses, and dipping out the whey with a brass or tin
dish ; then, breaking up the curd with her hands, heaping
it into vats lined with clean cloths, and putting the embryo
cheeses into a press to squeeze away all the remaining whey,
122 OUR VIANDS
taking them out to pare them and turn them daily, till they
had acquired solidity. We all remember the great cheese
made in this way at Cheddar, in Somersetshire, for presenta-
tion to the Queen : it was formed from one meal's milk
of all the cows in the parish, all the farmer's daughters
assisting as dairymaids ; but the huge cheese was not, we
believe, quite the success it deserved to be, its enormous
size requiring too long a time to ripen properly. Cheddar,
however, is even now at the head of British cheese-making,
and turns out immense cheeses of excellent quality, still
distancing all competitors, although Canadian Cheddar is
very good, and is very frequently passed off as the genuine
English article.
The prince of English cheeses is the Stilton, made of
cream added to new milk, but this also is now frequently
imitated, so that you can seldom be sure of getting the
real Leicestershire product. A Stilton cheese is, and has
always been, a famous Christmas dish, and when rich and
fully ripe is not to be surpassed. Formerly, the whole
cheese, with a napkin pinned round it, was set on the
table, and scooped out until the rind only remained, the
ripening process being hastened by a bottle of good port
wine being poured into it. But these are degenerate days :
people now seldom make their luncheon of bread and
cheese, and even the Dorsetshire peasant is no longer
content with a great crust of bread and that mouldy
cheesen which proverbially required a hatchet to cut it,
but which could be purchased at about threepence a
pound, and was so appetising that it was commonly said
it might be eaten till you were hungry again.
This was the poorer sort of Dorset cheese, made of milk
DAIRY PRODUCE 123
skimmed once, and sometimes twice ; but the richer kind
of mouldy cheesen, into which a portion of cream entered,
was almost equal to Stilton, holding a place midway between
that and the fashionable foreign makes known as Roquefort
and Gorgon zola, but it is little made nowadays, and may be
deemed extinct, as are also those thin cheeses which used
to be made in Wiltshire and Gloucestershire, and known as
single Gloucester, or toasting-cheese. The double Gloucester
still enters the market, and is a good cheese, although not
to be compared to Cheddar, or to that other well-known
variety from Cheshire, which latter is also scarce in the
London market, although you may purchase it in Rome.
The little round Dutch cheeses are still much sold, but it
is hard to see why they are chosen in preference to others
of far superior quality and very little higher in price.
The ripening process for cheese is a somewhat lengthy
affair, especially when the size is large, as in Cheddar.
Most English dairy farms have a loft, or sometimes several,
where the new cheeses are stored on racks, and frequently
turned and scraped till they become fit for the market. The
old way of sending cheese to table whole, scooping out the
centre and leaving the rind to be dealt with by the cook,
although perhaps extravagant, was commendable, for not
only did the cheese retain its flavour better, but the
necessity of eating close to the rind was avoided, and
certainly the rind does not commend itself to many palates.
We all know the story of the prudent young lover who,
being desirous of choosing one of three sisters, selected as
his bride the one who scraped her cheese. The one who
cut off the rind was deemed extravagant, the one who ate
it was a slut, whilst the third was supposed to be thrifty and
124 OUR VIANDS
cleanly. If put to the same test nowadays, there would be
few chosen on account of that economy, for the bits of
cheese sent to table are mostly free from rind when pre-
sented to the consumer.
There are some foreign cheeses which are deservedly
esteemed, the chief objection to them being the strong
odour which requires their being sent to table under cover.
Of these we need only mention, in addition to the Roquefort
and Gorgonzola, which are now to be found in every cheese-
monger's shop, the Gruy&re, always served on the Continent
at dinner, and generally with the dessert. It is not, indeed,
unusual in Italy, if you order fruit, to find a piece of this
cheese sent up on the same dish, and it certainly does not
eat badly, especially with dried fruits, which reminds us
that in some parts of England it is customary to eat cheese
with jam and marmalade, or with apple pie, and in other
parts, thin slices of cheese are cut and floated on cups of tea.
Gruyere is made partly, if not entirely, of ewe's milk, and
the famous Parmesan cheese is, I believe, also composed
partly of ewe's milk. This cheese, used almost always in
the form of powder, is a constant accompaniment of soups,
macaroni, and other Italian dishes, and is sold in the grated
form by the sack in all grocers' shops in Italy, and is
invariably sent to table in the same way as pepper and salt
in other places, to be used as a condiment. Even the
Lazzaroni find a small coin wherewith to purchase this
much-esteemed relish, which among ourselves is coming
more and more into use, and may be bought in bottles
ready grated, although it is best bought in a piece and
grated at home, in order to ensure its genuineness.
There are many other foreign cheeses to be met with,
DAIRY PRODUCE 125
but they are not in general use. There are, however,
several kinds of cream cheeses, and what are known as soft
cheeses, much esteemed, such as Bath cheeses, Bon-dons,
Camembert, etc.
The true cream cheese is made simply by putting cream
in a cloth, and allowing all the moisture to run away from
it, and then moulding it into shape, pressing and turning it
daily till ripe ; but soft cheeses are made in various ways,
one of which is given in verse attributed to the celebrated
Dr. Jenner, of vaccination fame, as follows :
; Would you make a soft cheese ? Then I'll tell you how :
Take a gallon of milk, quite fresh from the cow ;
Ere the rennet is added, the dairyman's daughter
Must throw in a quart of the clearest spring water.
When perfectly curdled, so white and so njce,
You must take it all out of the dish with a slice,
And put it 'thout breaking with care in the vat
With a cheese-cloth at bottom be sure to mind that.
This delicate matter take care not to squeeze,
But fill as the whey passes off by degrees.
Next day you may turn it, and do not be loth
To wipe it quite dry with a fine linen cloth ;
That this must be done you cannot well doubt,
As long as you see the whey oozing out.
The cheese is now finished, and nice it will be,
If enveloped in leaves from the green ashen tree ;
Or, what will do better at least, full as well
In nettles just plucked from the bank of the dell.'
There is a kind of cream cheese made from goats' milk,
which, under the name of rtcotta, is much eaten in Italy ;
it is very sweet and palatable, and has evidently been in
use from very ancient times. The vendors carry it through
the streets on their heads, like the muffin sellers here, and
retail it by the centime to poor purchasers.
126 OUR VIANDS
A product of the dairy now seldom, if ever, seen, is the
syllabub^ for that which is sold as syllabub has very little
affinity with the genuine article, as formerly set before
guests on grand occasions in country houses, and which was
made as follows :
'Put into a large china punch-bowl a bottle of sherry,
half a bottle of brandy, some loaf sugar, the juice of a
lemon, and a nutmeg grated. Give the bowl thus charged
to a careful dairymaid, and let her milk into it till nearly
full, from a cow yielding good rich milk ; then set aside,
covering the bowl with a cloth, and, after it has stood
about half an hour or more, place it on the table, and fill
the glasses with a silver punch-ladle. This is a capital
recipe, and sufficient for a large party.'
Devonshire is celebrated not only for its butter and cream,
but for that which is known as Devonshire Junket, and
which is now largely made and sold by the various dairy
companies in London. It is, in fact, the old-fashioned
curds and whey with a little brandy and sugar added, and
with a surface dressing of Devonshire cream, which makes
it a very tempting dish, especially in the summer. It is
very easily made.
' Place in a glass dish a quart of new milk made lukewarm,
add to it sugar to taste, a tablespoonful of brandy, a little
sherry, and three teaspoonfuls of rennet. Let it stand till
cold, then cover with Devonshire cream, and grate a little
nutmeg over. The rennet can be bought at the chemist's
in small bottles.'
Devonshire cream, which is so highly esteemed, and can
now be purchased in jars, is made thus :
1 The new milk from the cow is strained into large flat
DAIR Y PROD UCE 1 2 7
pans or tins, and let stand for twenty-four hours (or twelve
only in very hot weather) to allow the cream to rise. It is
then placed, still in the same pan, upon a hot dresser or
gas stove (not too hot), and let warm gently till just on the
point of boiling; then removed and set aside till cold, when
the cream may be taken off and used as cream, or it may
be turned into butter with the hand or by gentle churning.
Devonshire cream is always sold by the pint, equal to a
pound, at the same price as butter.'
Cream of this kind is also made and largely consumed
in Cornwall, and the Cornish hostess is quite insulted if
you ask for Devonshire cream. One way of eating it in
Cornwall I have not met with elsewhere, it is spread thickly
on bread, and then a little treacle is allowed to flow over
it, this is called Cornish thunder and lightning.
One very general use of cream and butter in former
times was in the manufacture of melted butter, which at
present too often consists of a sort of water-gruel made of
flour-and-water, with a little bit of butter added, a sauce to
be scrupulously avoided, but which, when made as follows,
is a delicious adjunct to vegetables and poultry :
' Take a good lump of fresh butter and roll it in flour,
place it in a lined saucepan with half a pint of good rich
cream, stir it gently over a slow fire, always the same way,
till it begins to simmer. Milk may be substituted for the
cream, but the sauce will not be so good.'
One of the most delicious of the many dishes manu-
factured from eggs and cream is the custard, which, either
boiled or baked, is a dainty generally irresistible. The
custards of our grandmothers, however, little resembled
those set before us at the present day; they were composed
128 OUR VIANDS
solely of the yolks of many eggs, pure rich cream, a little
sugar, and a flavouring of ratafia, or bay leaves and brandy,
and were not indebted to custard powders, corn-flour, or
other artificial thickening matter. They were used freely
as a covering to tipsy-cakes and trifles which were
genuinely tipsy with wine and spirits, and not merely
soaked with milk and water, for our ancestors were by no
means teetotallers, and could stand an amount of wine, as
their receipts show, which would prostrate their 'degenerate'
descendants.
At present the chief use of cream in cookery is for
making creams and ice-creams, which latter do not appear
in old recipes, as probably the artificial method of freezing
was then unknown, and hot dishes seem to have been
preferred to cold.
There is a very curious old custom described by Tennant
in his * Tour in Scotland/ in which a kind of custard was
used as a propitiatory offering to animal gods or totems.
' A number of herdsmen at a certain season would form a
square trench, leaving the turf in the middle. They next
lighted a fire and cooked a dish composed of eggs, butter,
oatmeal, and milk. They had also oatmeal cakes on
which they raised nine square knobs. The ceremonies
then began by spilling, as a libation, some of the dish
prepared with eggs and milk. Each of the knobs on the
cakes was dedicated to some particular being, the supposed
protector of their flocks and herds, or to some particular
animal, the real destroyer of them. Each person, turning
his face to the fire, broke off a knob from his cake, and
flinging.it over his shoulder, said, "This I give to thee,
preserve thou my horses ; " " This I give to thee, preserve
DAIR Y PRODUCE 129
thou my sheep," and so on. After this they used the
same ceremony to the noxious animals, saying, " This I give
to thee, O fox, spare thou my lambs;" " This I give to thee,
O hooded crow;" "This to thee, O eagle," etc., etc.'*
A similar custom existed also in the Isle of Man, and
probably in many other parts, for these old superstitions
prevailed everywhere among dwellers in the country, having
come down from very ancient pre-historic times when
animals were looked upon as supernatural beings or
ancestors, and were assumed as totems, having power to
protect those who thus placed themselves under their care.
* Archceological Review, June 1888.
CHAPTER X
FISH
FISH, which is at once the most common of food and the
most difficult to procure, has been esteemed by almost all
peoples in all ages. Nevertheless, some tribes, even at
the present day, reject fish altogether, whilst the Jews, in
accordance with the law of Moses, abhor all fish destitute
of fins or scales.
There are few sights more charming than that of a fleet of
fishing-boats putting off to sea, or returning after a successful
cruise, and in watching them we are apt to forget the perils
which these l Toilers of the Sea ' must encounter in search
of our table luxuries. No wonder that in boisterous weather,
as the old Scotch song has it, ' Wives and mithers, 'maist
despairing ca' them lives of men.' Yet along our coasts
thousands of men, women, and children get their daily
bread by various industries connected with the extensive
fisheries, always a most important branch of commerce
among seafaring peoples. There is first the making and
repairing of nets, the work mostly of women and children,
although fishermen are also adepts in the mysteries of
netting an art handed down to us from the remotest ages,
and practised by the most ignorant of savages, although
requiring considerable skill. Nets, however, are now largely
130
FISH 131
made by machinery. Then there is the manufacture of fish
hooks of various kinds from the harpoon for the gigantic
whale to the delicate hook, with artificial fly attached, for
the capture of the wary trout. The making of these artifi-
cial flies is an art requiring great skill, and the kinds made
are innumerable, and many of them extremely natural and
beautiful ; but the South Sea islanders take almost as much
pains with their fish-hooks, which are attached to a piece
of highly-polished shell, to attract and dazzle the fish.
Angling has always been a fascinating sport to most men,
although the spectator is rather inclined to agree with the
cynic, who defined it as a rod with a worm at one end and
a fool at the other ; but it doubtless exercises the patience
and skill as well as the strength of the fisherman, especially
where the lordly salmon is the prey, for the landing of such
fish as we sometimes see on the fishmonger's slab, must
be a feat of considerable strength and agility, as well as
patience.
The enthusiasm inspired by the sport was rather amus-
ingly illustrated by a newspaper correspondent some time
since, who wrote : ' On one occasion in Ireland, our train
was brought almost to a standstill by a river, "just to see
if the gentleman would land his salmon," and not a single
remonstrance was heard from the passengers, who entered
into the matter as warmly as the driver and guard, and
cheered enthusiastically when a fine fish was brought safely
to the bank.'
To enumerate the various fishes good for food would be
impossible. In a certain sense, the proverb, 'All's fish
that comes to net ' is literally true, for there is hardly a
monster of the deep from the great whale to the porpoise
132 OUR VIANDS
and the seal that is not deemed gcod for food by some ;
whilst the tiniest of sea-creatures, such as whitebait and
shrimps, and the ugliest, such as sea-slugs and anglers, are
all esteemed delicacies by others. It will be remembered
that the unfortunate Greely and his companion?, during
their terrible sufferings in the Arctic regions, had to sustain
life for weeks on small shrimps, or sea-fleas ; and many a
shipwrecked mariner has been glad to gather limpets and
mussels to appease his hunger.
Along the shores of Great Britain and Ireland the herring,
1 Bonnie fish and halesome farm',' holds the first place
among the fisheries, and many hundreds of boats are
employed in this industry on the east and north coasts
of Great Britain, Ireland, and the Isle of Man. In the
latter interesting little island the herring is, or was, the
staple food of the people, and the chosen emblem of
justice, the deemsters or judges taking the singular oath
that they will administer justice as evenly * as the backbone
of the herring lieth in the middle of the fish.' *
In Cornwall, the herring gives place to its first cousin,
the pilchard, a smaller and fatter fish, from which a large
quantity of oil is extracted. These pilchards, when cured
as herrings, are known as 'fair maid?,' and are largely
exported to Italy and the south of France, where they
are eaten by the peasantry during Lent. The pilgrims
who visit Rome during Holy Week, and whose feet are
washed by the noble ladies and gentlemen of the Eternal
City, are all feasted (?) upon a dish of salad, with one of
* The vast consumption of herrings in olden times may be judged
from the fact that the tax levied upon almost all seaports, in the reigns
of the early kings, consisted of from 50,000 to 100,000 herrings annually.
FISH I33
these pilchards on the top, and a roll of bread, not very
substantial fare after a long and toilsome pilgrimage.
It is very interesting to see the process of curing the
pilchards. As soon as the laden boats arrive, the fish are
carried in baskets up the steep streets of the Cornish fishing-
towns, where cellars exist devoted to this especial use ; in
these cellars semicircles are drawn on the floor, in accord-
ance with the quantity of fish brought in ; within these the
fish are piled, all the heads outwards, making a heap as
high as the fish belonging to each boat will allow, some
heaps being three, or four, or even ten times as large as
others ; then gentle pressure is applied to the mass in order
to express the oil, which runs, by means of grooves in the
stone floor, into barrels placed to receive it. After this the
fish are taken up and salted into barrels for export, the oil
also being a valuable product.
Herrings are salted at once into barrels in Ireland, and
Dublin Bay herrings are highly esteemed; but at Yarmouth
and in Scotland they are rather differently cured, some
being converted into the famous bloaters, whilst others
are split open and put into a ham pickle, and sold as
kippers, and others more heavily salted, smoked, and
dried, become the palatable red herrings, or Digby chicks.
Unfortunately, of late years many badly-cured herrings
have been placed on the London Market under the name
of Yarmouth bloaters; these consist of fish cured in London,
being those fresh herrings remaining unsold, and already a
little tainted before being salted, so that it has become
almost impossible to obtain bloaters in perfection except
in Norfolk and Suffolk.
Next to herrings, probably whiting and mackerel are
134 OUR VIANDS
the most numerous fish met with on our coasts ; but large
quantities of mackerel are now brought from Norway, as
well as cod and salmon. Cod has an immense consumption,
and during Lent many tons of salted cod may be seen in
the fishmongers' shops. This, when not too salt, and served
with plenty of egg sauce and parsnips, is not to be despised,
and is still eaten by the orthodox on Ash Wednesday and
Good Friday, as it used to be by our forefathers, although
there is great laxity in our day, and we often find fresh cod
or even salmon, substituted for the ancient Lenten dish.
We do not often see now the dry salt cod, which used to
be sold so cheaply tied up in bundles. It is probably
still consumed by sailors and fishermen, and can be
purchased at Billingsgate and other fish markets, but it has
been quite superseded by the wet fish in the fishmongers'
shops.
The red mullet, so greatly esteemed by the Romans, who
gratified their aesthetic taste by having it brought alive to
table that they might watch the lovely changing colours
produced during the death struggle, and did not object to
give from ^15 to ^60 apiece for them, according to size,
is still considered a delicacy, and is too scarce ever to
become food for the million. The same may be said of
almost all flat fish, although plaice, brill, and flounders are
usually tolerably cheap ; but soles and turbot, which may
be regarded as the kings of sea fish, remain scarce and
dear. It is related that the Emperor Domitian called the
Senate together to decide how a turbot of extraordinary
size should be cooked, and the grave senators decided that
it should be boiled, which our modern taste also approves
as the best way of cooking it.
FISH 135
Aquariums have given us an opportunity of studying the
graceful movements of fish, and especially of flat fish,
which, from their burrowing propensities, are rarely seen
in their natural state. It is most interesting to watch them
in an aquarium rising to the surface with that beautiful
undulatory motion, which reminds one of the flight of a
bird, and then sinking to bury themselves in the sand, or
to rest on the surface, when their colouring so exactly
resembles the sand and pebbles upon which they lie that it
is difficult to distinguish them. Once at the aquarium at
Southport I was highly interested and amused by the
curiosity exhibited by the soles. It was evening, and the
electric light was exhibited for the first time, whereupon
the soles sat up on their tails one behind the other,
reminding one of Indian pictures of the cobra, evidently
astonished at the light and the moving multitude. Their
attitude was ludicrous, but it showed an amount of intelli-
gence for which we are slow to give fish credit. Flat fish,
from their burrowing habits, are rather difficult to procure,
a trawl net being required for their capture ; and the use of
this trawl net is much resented by orthodox fishermen, for
not only does it gather all sorts and sizes of fish, but it cuts
through the herring and mackerel nets, and drives the
shoals of herrings away.
We must not omit to mention the useful haddock, St
Peter's fish, still retaining, it is said, the marks of the
apostle's thumb, when he opened its mouth to take there-
from the piece of tribute money. 'Finnon haddies' are
prime breakfast fish, but the majority of those sold in
London are only surplus fresh haddocks, slightly salted and
smoked, and do not possess the flavour of the Scotch-cured
136 OUR VIANDS
'baddies.' Another very good breakfast fish is the gurnet,
or gurnard, which, cut open and broiled, with a little pepper,
salt, and butter added, makes a capital dish. The ugly
John Dory, which shares with the haddock the honour of
being St. Peter's fish, is seldom seen now, but is excellent
eating. The imperial sturgeon, formerly reserved for royal
personages, is sometimes seen in the modern fish-market,
but it is not generally esteemed, the flesh resembling veal
with a fishy flavour; nevertheless, the ancient Romans
thought it such a delicacy, that the servants bringing it to
table were crowned with wreaths of flowers. The Russian
dainty, caviare ', is prepared from the roe of the sturgeon.
The salmon, the king of fish, is caught in the chief rivers
of Scotland and Ireland, and in some of those in England,
that of the Severn being particularly delicate; but great
quantities now come from Norway, where it is so plentiful
that tourists get tired of seeing it brought to table at every
meal. It seems formerly to have been equally abundant
in England, as many of the indentures of apprentices
contained a clause to the effect that they were not to be
obliged to eat salmon more than three days a week : now
they would be only too glad to be allowed it once a week.
Next to the salmon the trout is the most delicate of river
fish, but there is a species of trout called the char, found
only in certain lakes in Westmoreland, which is considered
by many superior to both salmon and trout; the flesh is
of a lovely pink colour, and the flavour delicious. Tradition
asserts that this fish was introduced into Britain by the
Romans. It is, however, very scarce, and, being too
delicate for transport, is only eaten in perfection near the
lakes in which it is found, although it is sometimes to be
FISH 137
bought potted. Let me advise all who may visit Winder-
mere to taste this very delicious fish. There is a species
of trout much esteemed, and which probably resembles the
char, found in the lakes of the Tyrol. Travelling in this
region, en route to Ober-Ammergau, and arriving at a little
village inn about the time of mittag's essen (i.e., dinner at
12.30 P.M.), we ordered a dish of these trout (forelleri),
which we saw others eating, and a dish of cutlets ; but it
happened to be a fast-day, and mine host was a good
Catholic, so, although there was a dispensation for travellers
to Ober-Ammergau, we were told we might have either
fish or flesh, but not both, a difficulty which was overcome
by ordering fish for half our party and cutlets for the others,
and then dividing the spoils. One of the most picturesque
sights I remember to have seen was that of a Tyrolese
peasant spearing fish on a very lonely lake among the
Dolomite Mountains. He stood in a very small boat,
holding aloft a trident, which he darted into the fish, and,
drawing it out of the water still writhing on the trident,
offered it to us for a small coin.
Some of my readers who have, like myself, long passed
the season of youth, will remember how, in our juvenile
days, the more sophisticated of our fellows used to try to
puzzle our infantine intellect by a jangling rhyme having
the semblance of Latin, which ran thus :
Infirtaris inoaknonis,
Inmudeelsare inclaynoneis ;
and in this way we learnt two very useful scraps of know-
ledge, viz., that tar was obtained from fir trees and not from
oaks, and that eels might be found in mud, but not in clay.
But there are eels and eels, and the great conger, the head
138 OUR VIANDS
of the clan, instead of hiding himself timidly in a mud
bank, swims boldly about in the ocean, and lays him down
to rest fearlessly on a rocky shelf, in sight of other fishes,
most of which are too weak to attack him and drive him
from his chosen resting-place. It is only of late years
that the conger has found a place among edible fishes
in England, although credited with forming the chief
ingredient in turtle soup; but on the Continent it has
long been valued, especially for imparting richness to
soups and gravies. There is, however, a soup^on of
danger in the delicacy, for our medical works recognise a
special poison appertaining to the conger, which sometimes
produces a disease resembling cholera, although it may
usually be eaten with impunity. This applies also to other
fish, and may probably be referred to unwholesome food on
the part of the fish, which is certainly the case with oysters
living near the mouths of rivers, the waters of which are
contaminated with lead or other minerals.
But in South Africa the eating of a dried fish known as
snoek produces a curious effect, causing the face to swell
as though there existed an epidemic of mumps. This, it is
believed, is due to the fish having been hung up to dry in
the moonlight. Men of science are slow to believe in
lunar influence, but in this case it appears to be a well-
known fact which seems deserving of investigation.
There are a great number of kinds of eels beside the
conger sold in the market, most of which come from
Holland, and it is calculated that each vessel will bring
over from 15,000 to 20,000 Ibs. of live eels; but eels are
also found in most of the English rivers, and during the
cold months they bury themselves in the mud of the river
FISH 139
banks. People in Somersetshire find out their hiding-
places by observing that the hoar frost is absent in certain
spots, and, digging there, find them in great numbers. In
America they are taken by spears thrust into the mud.
Eels are generally believed to migrate to the sea in the
autumn, and to return to the rivers in the spring, but, from
their being so frequently found hibernating in mud banks
during the winter, it is evident they do not all go out to sea.
A gentleman kept some eels in a walled garden near
Montrose for several years, and noticed that they always
became very restless about August, trying to get out of the
pond whenever it overflowed, and were always found
travelling in the direction of the sea. The eels lay torpid
during the winter, but became voracious in the spring, one
swallowing as many as twenty-seven large worms at a meal.
The eel would seem a singular kind of pet, yet we read in
Ellis's book on the South Seas that a chief of Otaheite had
a pet eel, which would come to the surface when he
whistled for it, and feed out of his hand.
The lamprey strongly resembles the eel, but belongs to
a different class. It is not often seen in the market now,
but was formerly considered a great delicacy ; and it will
be remembered that King Henry I. died from the effects
of eating too many of them. The Severn is famous for
lampreys, and Pennant says that it is an ancient custom in
the city of Gloucester to present the Sovereign annually
with a lamprey pie, covered with a large raised crust.*
The Thames formerly supplied a million or more lampreys
to Dutch fishermen for bait.
* In 1341, 12, 55. 8d. was paid to the Sheriff of Gloucester for
forty-four lampreys for the king.
140 OUR VIANDS
The most remarkable of the eel tribe is the gymnotus^ or
electric eel, a native of tropical America, which has the
faculty of imparting a very powerful electric shock to anyone
touching it. Humboldt wrote that this creature was caught
by driving horses into the water to receive the shock, after
which they are for a time powerless, but his account has not
been verified. One of these electric eels was kept for many
years in a tank in the old Polytechnic Institution. Some
of the species may still sometimes be seen in aquariums.
Turning from these wriggling semi-serpents to edible
Crustacea, we find a large number of shell-fish to a certain
extent resembling each other, but varying in size from the
great crab, lobster, and crayfish weighing several pounds,
to the tiny shrimp all excellent eating, although con-
demned by physicians as unwholesome.
The aquarium has revealed to us a great deal with
regard to these as well as to other denizens of the ' vasty
deep,' and it is a most amusing and interesting sight to
watch two lobsters stalking, with measured strides, on
their toes across the sand of their tank, and sitting down
opposite to each other in a threatening attitude, each
apparently waiting for the other to commence hostilities,
and both being too lazy to begin ; whilst the frisky little
shrimps go darting through the water at full speed as
though bound on an errand of life or death. The fisher-
men at Gordon Haven say, according to Mr. Peach, that
they have often seen the old lobsters with their young
ones playing around them, and that when they have found
themselves watched, the mother lobster would give a
danger-signal by rattling her claws, whereupon they would
all rush to shelter under the rocks.
FISH 141
Almost all these Crustacea change colour in boiling a
fact now known to everybody, but we have probably all
heard the story of the great artist who, in painting the
miraculous draught of fishes, took his models from the
fishmonger's shop, and, all unconsciously, painted his
lobsters red. Upon his error being pointed out to him
he coolly exclaimed, 'That makes it all the greater miracle.'
It is also well known that all these Crustacea cast their
shells, and just before and after this performance they are
soft and watery, and so unfit to eat ; but the hermit crab
never possessed a shell on the hinder part of the body, so
he requisitions disused shells of various species of molluscs,
and uses them as his habitation, changing from time to
time as need or inclination dictates.
Among molluscs we find many dainty morsels, the prime
favourite being the oyster. Nothing can exceed the delicate
flavour of a ' Whitstable native,' but, unfortunately, not-
withstanding the laudable efforts of the late Frank Buckland
to preserve and cultivate this oyster, it continues scarce and
dear, ' natives ' which come from beds at Whitstable,
Rochester, Melton, Colchester, Burnham, and a few other
places, being seldom, if ever, to be had under half-a- crown
a dozen. There are, however, other kinds, such as the
Anglo-Dutch, which are brought from abroad and laid down
in English waters, which are cheaper, and fairly good j and,
of late, deep sea oysters, in great, rough, heavy shells, but
of good flavour, have been sold as low as sixpence a dozen.
We get also great numbers of cheap American oysters
blue points relished by some people, but the flavour of
which does not commend itself to palates used to English
' natives.' There are such vast beds of oysters on the
142 OUR VIANDS
shores of some of our Colonies notably at the Cape that
we cannot help thinking a great industry might be developed
in exporting them to Europe. Even in days when travelling
was so slow that it probably took longer for vessels to come
from Italy to Britain than it now does from the Cape, the
Romans contrived to transport the highly-prized British
oyster to gratify the palate of Roman epicures; and Juvenal
speaks of the taste of one who
' At the first bite each oyster's birthplace knew,
Whether a Lucrine or Circsean he'd bitten,
Or one from Rutupinian deeps in Britain.' *
The fact is the ancients were not only greater epicures than
the moderns, but took much more trouble than we do to
gratify their tastes. In many respects this was a decided
gain to the community, for it led to the acclimatisation of
various animals and plants; and in the case offish, not only
were they transported long distances, but they were much
more carefully preserved in ponds and lakes than at present.
It is even said that Lucullus had a canal cut through a
mountain in the neighbourhood of Naples, that fish might
more easily be transported to his villa, whilst many noble
Romans seem to have kept fish as pets. It is related that
the daughter of Drusus adorned one of her finny pets with
rings of gold ; whilst Hortensius, the orator, wept at the
death of a turbot which he had fed with his own hand.
Coming down to mediaeval times, we find fishponds
* It is to the Romans we are indebted for the discovery of our native
oyster, for antiquaries are agreed that it formed no part of the dietary
of the Britons prior to the Roman occupation, so that whenever oyster
shells are found in the excavation of tombs or habitations, the remains
discovered are relegated to Roman or post- Roman times.
FISH 143
attached to every monastery. The pilgrim adorned his hat
with the scallop-shell, the reason for which practice is rather
obscure : it seems probable that it was taken in the first
place as a useful article, a substitute for a plate or spoon,
in which doles of various kinds might be received, and that
it afterwards became the badge of pilgrimage, especially to
the shrine of St. James of Compostella ; and it is a curious
fact that even at the present day, oyster eating commences
in London on St. James' Day, when the children collect the
shells to form a grotto or shrine, in which they burn a
candle in honour of the saint, and solicit alms from the
passers-by, the contribution being received in an oyster
shell. The scallop is not so delicate in flavour as the
oyster, but is more substantial, and, fried in egg and bread
crumbs, is not to be despised ; neither are those plebeian
delicacies periwinkles, cockles, and whelks sold so largely
on barrows in the London streets, so many of the latter piled
on shells, with vinegar and pepper ad libitum for a penny.
It would seem that in the fourteenth century, whale,
porpoise, and grampus were sold as fish, large prices being
paid for slices of these creatures during Lent, and one of
the Harleian manuscripts contains a recipe for making
' puddynge of porpoise.'
CHAPTER XI
UNAPPRECIATED TRIFLES
' NECESSITY knows no law,' says the proverb, and starvation
will cause people to eat anything, but nothing short of that
would induce the average English man or woman, to partake
of some of the dishes which foreigners relish. There are,
however, some who are ready to experiment upon anything
and everything presented to them in the shape of food. The
late Dr. Buckland made soup of the bones of extinct animals,
and his son, Mr. Frank Buckland, tasted every animal he
could get at from the Zoo, and induced some of the members
of the Zoological Society to join him in his * feast of reason,'
although it is doubtful whether the * flow of soul ' was quite
up to that which would have followed a feast of turtle,
oysters, etc., followed by mutton, beef, and game. And
yet there seems no reason why turtle should occupy the
proud position it enjoys, whilst we reject the land tortoise
its near relation, and why oysters should be prized and
snails rejected.
In eating and drinking there is a great deal of fashion
and prejudice. We know that during the siege of Paris the
Parisians were reduced to the necessity of eating all the
animals in the Jardin des Plantes, as well as * rats and mice
and such small deer,' and since then they have retained a
fondness for horseflesh, to which we have never yet attained,
144
UNAPPRECIATED TRIFLES 145
although, as we know, it has been eaten from time imme-
morial by the Tartars ; whilst hunters in Africa, as well as
natives, highly appreciate the meat of the zebra or quagga,
and that of the donkey is said to be superior to both ; but,
if placed upon the London market, in all probability all
three of these kindred meats would be allowed to rot
unpurchased. In like manner the porcupine is esteemed a
delicacy in South Africa, but its next-of-kin here, the
hedgehog, is only eaten by gipsies. The eel, and even the
great conger, is eaten with relish ; but the snake, which is
said to be good and wholesome, is regarded with horror
and loathing by men rendered squeamish by civilisation.
The lordly elephant is made to contribute his quota of
food to his pursuers, the foot being the tit-bit ; but the lion
and tiger, being carnivorous, are not appreciated by civilised
man any more than the shark, the eagle, the vulture, and
many other birds of the air, beasts of the earth, and fishes
of the great sea, which are greedily devoured by savages.
Even the hyaena is eaten by the Bushmen, although it is so
hated by them that every one passing the carcase gives it a
blow with a whip or stick.*
The whale and the seal are highly appreciated by the
Greenlanders and Eskimos, although hunger alone would
cause them to be relished by ourselves. Yet a whale or a
good fat seal would have saved the lives of many an Arctic
voyager, and the eagerness with which Greely and his
* Miss Gordon Gumming tells us that the Veddahs 'never eat
elephant, buffalo, or bear, though squirrels, mongooses and tortoises,
kites and crows, owls, rats, and bats are highly esteemed ; while a
roast monkey, or a huge, hideous iguana-lizard, is an ideal dainty.'
'Two Happy Years in Ceylon,' vol. ii., p. 91.
K
146 OUR VIANDS
starving followers hunted foxes and the great Polar bears,
shows how hunger will whet the appetite ; and certainly, if
the choice lay between old boots, skins, and candle ends,
and a seal steak, or piece of whale, there is no doubt which
would be taken. We are told 'the seal, when young, is
excellent, and as a material for soup is quite equal to the
hare ; while the skin of any of the Cetacea, especially that of
the whalebone whale, if boiled down to a jelly, is a dish fit
" to set before a king." It is often sent in hermetically-
closed tins from Greenland to Christian IX., of Denmark,
and therefore has in reality that destination/
When, however, we turn to countries where food is
plentiful, we are surprised at the singularities of taste in the
choice of viands. Take, for instance, China, with its fatted
dogs, its bird-nest soup, and trepang, all of which seem to
us disgusting, yet doubtless had we been bred in China we
should have esteemed them delicacies, as the Chinese do.
There is no reason why dogs should not be good eating
when well and carefully fed ; but we from time immemorial
have made of them such pets and companions that to eat
them would seem like cannibalism. As to the birds' nests,
they are of a peculiar kind, made of a gelatinous substance,
and might probably be esteemed a delicacy by ourselves,
were they not too scarce for export. Rats and mice are
also relished by the Celestials, and in the account of the
astonishing escape from death of some entombed miners in
America, we read that they managed to preserve life by
catching and eating the rats which came to prey upon them.
This was, of course, a case of dire necessity ; but an African
traveller tells of a little Bushman, who picked up the mice
which had been caught, and after putting them in the hot
UNAPPRECIATED TRIFLES 147
ashes for a few moments, devoured them greedily half-raw,
entrails and all.
There is no one in England so poor as to eat these
rodents willingly, but we remember hearing a French
gentleman relate how, during the siege of Paris, he and
his companions were attracted by a savoury smell in a
restaurant, and determined w&te qui coute to satisfy their
hunger with the appetising delicacy. Upon paying a good
round sum they secured the dish, and learnt with surprise
that they had partaken of a ragout of rats. This was, of
course, an exceptional dish ; but the French habitually
indulge in some viands which we despise, as, for instance,
frogs. Of these, the hind legs only are taken, skinned, and
the claws twisted together. In this form they resemble
delicate little lamb cutlets, and are, as we can testify,
extremely palatable. Then, all along the sea coasts of
France and Italy may be seen the octopus occupying a
place in the fishermen's baskets, and often boiled in
cauldrons of oil in the streets, and taken out to be offered
for sale to the passer-by, always with the recommendation,
' It is good, very good; ' and, indeed, it smells good, and is
said to enter largely into the savoury soups at the hotels.
Again, in the south of France and Italy you see people
eating with relish the sea urchin, brought to table, like
oysters, in the shell, and scooped out with a spoon. Having
purchased some of these to bring home as curiosities, I
could not induce the natives to believe I did not want to
eat them, so they invariably cut and trimmed them for
table, thus spoiling them as specimens. The trepang of
the Chinese, consisting of the sea cucumber dried, most
probably strongly resembles these sea urchins in flavour.
148 OUR VIANDS
We have left to the last a favourite French and Italian
dish, namely snath in French escargots which several
writers have lately been advocating both as food and
medicine. It would seem from these articles, that snails
and slugs are still sought and eaten in some parts of
Wiltshire, being in season only when dormant during the
winter, when they are taken, soaked in salt and water, and
grilled on the bars of the grate. Probably they are quite as
good as the periwinkle, so greedily devoured by those who
would look upon the snail with disgust, and who would
reject a dish of spring cabbage, because a careless cook had
allowed a slug to remain ensconced in the leaf upon which
it had been feeding when consigned to the pot.
Snails and slugs especially the latter are supposed to
be particularly efficacious as a remedy in consumption,
being not only eaten, but also crushed and rubbed on
the chest and back, and we have known this snail juice
extolled as superior to cod-liver oil. In France the
escargots are dried and prepared as a lozenge for coughs.
It would appear, according to the writer of a very interest-
ing article on the subject in the Standard^ that 'in several
parts of England snails are regularly eaten ; not, it is true,
as an ordinary article of diet, but at stated feasts, and
considerable quantities are collected round Lorfdon and
exported to France.' But the same writer adds: 'The
Latin people are its principal friends, whilst it is rejected
by all Scandinavian and Teutonic peoples. The Romans
were its especial patrons. Not content with eating it
stewed in every form, they fattened it in " cochleariaj*
or styes, meal boiled in wine being regarded as the food
best fitted for producing large and juicy specimens. How
UNAPPRECIATED TRIFLES 149
successful they were, may be inferred from the fact if fact
it be that some of the shells of these domesticated snails
would hold a pint of wine. But the trade in them is per-
haps better than ever it was during the palmy days of
Roman luxury. In the neighbourhood of Dijon, a small
farmer has been known to clear ^300 per annum from
snails, the vine growers keeping them in dry cellars, or
in trenches under coverings of leaves and earth ; and
from certain escargotieres near Ulm, in Wiirtemburg, no
fewer than ten millions of the vineyard snails are sent
every year to other gardens to be fattened before they
are dispatched for the use of the Austrian convents during
Lent. From Troyes it has been calculated that snails to the
value of ^"20,000 the wholesale price being 45. per hundred
are forwarded to the Paris markets. Packed in casks,
they are also exported in a small way to the United States.'
Would it not pay Cape Colonists to institute ' cochlearia '
of the great Tiger snail for the French or Portuguese
markets? Anyone who has passed through the Lisbon
fruit market in autumn, must have noticed the huge
baskets of snails for sale, and in Madrid and other wealthy
Spanish cities as many as fifteen different kinds may some-
times be counted on the slabs of the dealers. In Italy
they are equally popular, but no sooner are the Alps passed
than the snail begins to disappear from the menus, until, by
the time Denmark and Sweden are reached, it is never seen
on the table.*
* Friends report that, having at Barcelona been served with a very
tempting dish, ornamented with large snail shells, they partook of it
and enjoyed it greatly, believing the snails to be still in the shells, but
after having eaten the savoury morsels, they discovered they had been
eating the snails, the shells being empty and used only as garnishing.
ISO OUR VIANDS
Our French neighbours have of late years suffered con-
siderably from a scarcity of escargots, for it was found that
the sulphate of iron used to destroy the phylloxera, also
poisoned the snails, and rendered them wholly unfit for
food, so that it became necessary to have snail farms, in
order to guarantee them on the market as free from the
sulphate, and consequently wholesome. ' E scar got s a la
mode de Burgogne' are not to be despised as a food.
Stewed in butter, with eggs and savoury herbs, they might
well tempt even a prejudiced English palate, but then you
must not whisper snails to the eater, although snail feasts
are still known to the glass-workers of Newcastle. Perhaps in
these feasts the snails are conspicuous by their absence ; but
in Greece, snails dressed with garlic are still a favourite dish.
Much has been written of late in recommendation of
insect food, including caterpillars, cockchafers, ants, and
even spiders and wire-worms.* Locusts are certainly much
relished in those countries which are subject to their depre-
dations, and we have seen boys in Germany greedily devour
the cockchafer alive, first depriving it of its legs and wings,
and declaring it was just like a nut. Fried white ants are
also highly esteemed in some countries, and the grubs of
bees are relished even by Englishmen, but we think some
considerable time must elapse before we adopt of free will
the articles of diet of which we have been writing. Siege
and famine might reconcile us to some of them, but as long
* Kirby and Spence tell us that spiders are eaten by Bushmen and
the inhabitants of New Caledonia ; and Reaumur relates that a young
lady cracked and ate every spider she came across. Anna Maria
Schurman ate them like nuts. Lalande, the astronomer, was equally
fond of them ; and a German, immortalised by Rosel, used to spread
them on his bread like butter.
UNAPPRECIATED TRIFLES 151
as we can get beef, mutton, and pork, eggs, poultry, and
game, economists may write and reason as long as they
please they will not induce a score of English men and
women to sit down to a dish of snails and caterpillars,
frogs or mice; and even horseflesh, which is, we are told,
beginning to find its way into the English market, will
continue to be regarded by the vast majority as food fit
only for dogs and cats.
Nevertheless, our forefathers were certainly less squeamish
than we are ; they eat the queerest conglomerations, and
seasoned their dishes with ambergris and other strange
sauces, nor has the taste for odd combinations quite died
out from among us, as witness the Scotch haggis and the
Cornish pasties, for which a writer in the Western Antiquary,
after quoting the Cornish saying that 'The devil will
not venture into Cornwall for fear of being put in a pie,'
gives the following recipes. ' The composition of the
Squab-pie, deemed luxurious beyond all others, has been
given by an unknown writer in verse, as follows :
" Of wheaten walls erect your paste ;
Let the round mass expand its breast,
Next slice your apples cull'd so fresh :
Let the fat sheep supply its flesh :
Then add an onion's stinging juice
A sprinkling be not too profuse.
Well mix't these nice ingredients, sure,
Might gratify an epicure ! "
' The Herby-pie is another peculiar dish, composed of
nettles, pepper-cress, parsley, mustard, and spinach, together
with thin slices of pork ! Leeks and pilchards form a third
sort, and a fourth is filled with goose feet, gizzard, and blood,
with raisins, sugar, and apples ; a fifth of leeks and bacon,
152 OUR VIANDS
cooled, before eaten, by Cornish cream ; a sixth of mackerel,
parsley, and cream. All these, how piquant to the palate of
Cornish people especially.'
The same writer gives the following impromptu. ' In a
season of scarcity, the attorneys at Quarter Sessions
resolved to abstain from eating pasties, and the following
epigram was extemporaneously delivered on the occasion :
" If the proverb be true that the fame of our pies
Prevents us from falling to Satan a prey,
It is clear that \i\sfriends the attorneys are wise
In moving such obstacles out of the way." '
The Spanish olla podrida seems nearly related to these
Cornish pasties. Carli, whose travels are given in Pinker-
ton's collection, speaks thus of this famous dish :
' Being come to Cordova, I went to our monastery, where
I was forced to be satisfied with the Spanish dish they call
Olla Podrida, signifying rotten pot; which name is not
improper, for it is an extravagant medley of several things,
as onions, garlic, pumkin, cucumber, white beets, a bit of
pork, and two of mutton, which, being boiled with the rest,
are almost lost. The fathers asked me whether I liked it.
I told them it was very fit to kill me, being as I was almost
sick, and so weak that I had need of some better restorative
than that Podrida, to which I was not used. They put
so much saffron in it that, had I not been yellow enough
already with my distemper, that alone might have been
enough to dye my skin of that colour. It is a great dainty
for Spaniards, but a scurvy mess for those that are not
used to it.'
All these things are, however, as nothing to some of the
dainties enjoyed by the old Romans, who not only feasted
UNAPPRECIATED TRIFLES 153
upon snails, and the maggots found in old timber, but
thought
'A lamb's fat paunch was a delicious treat,'
and revelled upon water rats and stewed sow's teats, which
Martial says were prepared by a certain cook with so much
art as to appear still full of milk, and upon sucking puppies,
which Pliny declared were worthy of being served at a
supper for the gods.
Then there were dormouse sausages, of which a quaint
writer remarks : ' Petronius delivers us an odd receipt for
dressing 'em and serving 'em up with Poppies and Honey,
which must be a very Soporiferous Dainty, and as good as
Owl Pye to such as want a Nap after Dinner.' *
After such an account of the dainties indulged in by the
highly civilised masters of the world, we need not feel any
disgust at the taste of the Chinese and Red Indians for
dog's flesh, or of the poor Australian savages, who regale
themselves upon the larvae of beetles found in decaying
timber, that from the acacia tree being, says Lumholtz, of
excellent flavour, in size the thickness of a finger, and
glittering white, the taste resembling nuts. The natives
roast these larvae, and also the beetles and wood-lice, but
will sometimes eat the larvae alive, f
It would seem that nothing in the way of food comes
amiss to savages ; but they do not, as a rule, eat their meat
raw. The iguana and its eggs are considered delicacies by
the Australians, and so are snakes, which they will hunt
fearlessly. Some tribes eat even the poisonous kinds,
* ' The Art of Cookery,' by the author of ' A Journey to London.'
+ The aurelias of the silk- worm, as well as the white earth -grub
and the larva of the sphynx-moth, are esteemed delicacies in China.
154 OUR VIANDS
but others content themselves with the non-poisonous, of
which the python, being often twenty feet long, makes a
splendid meal. The mode of cooking this dainty we have
given elsewhere. Lumholtz says of snakes that the meat is
white, but dry and almost tasteless, but that the liver is
excellent, resembling ptarmigan in flavour.
The natives first eat the fat, which is considered the best
part, then the heart, liver, and lungs, and finally the body
is divided, after which the backbone is crushed between
stones and eaten, every morsel being consumed, and every
drop of grease licked up, which reminds one of many
European and Asiatic folk-lore stories, in which serpents
are cooked and eaten for the purpose of acquiring the
language of animals, which in many cases is imparted
accidentally to the cook, in the act of sucking a finger
which has been burnt by touching the roasted snake, or
dipped in the broth in which it has been boiled.
Most savages revel in grease, which they use both
externally and internally. We can understand this taste
in cold regions, so that the fondness of the Eskimo for
whale's blubber and train oil seems justified by the necessity
for nitrogenous food ; but it seems strange that dwellers in
hot climates should also relish oily compounds. Yet, as
we have seen, the Australians revel in the fat of snakes, and
imagine that when a man is ill, it is because some enemy
has stolen his kidney fat ; and of the Bushmen in South
Africa we are told : * Occasionally we had an opportunity
of presenting our Bushmen friends with an ample supply of
grease, and then would follow a scene. The elder person-
ages first helped themselves, smearing their bodies to their
heart's content; the children were next treated, until all
UNAPPRECIATED TRIFLES 155
had changed their rough, weather-beaten exteriors for a
glorious shining appearance. Often not contented with
this external embalming, they would drink cups of melted
fat, and when asked for a reason, the reply was, " Oh, sir,
it is so very comfortable (or nice) to smear both in and
outside."'* The Bushmen also enjoy locusts greatly, and
the writer quoted above gives the following as the method
of preparing them : * Fire being applied to the brushwood,
the legs and wings of the locusts were consumed, the bodies
dropped in heaps to the ground, and were collected next
morning, and having been exposed to dry in the sun on
skins, when sufficiently desiccated they were pounded to
powder, to be cooked with a little fat, milk, or water. This
paste formed a material part of the food of this poor race
of human beings.'
In Soyer's ' History of Food ' we are given the menu of
a Roman supper which is worth transcribing : ' First course
Sea hedgehogs, raw oysters, all sorts of shell fish and
asparagus. Second course A fatted pullet, a fresh dish
of oysters and other shell fish, different kinds of dates,
univalve shell fish, as whelks, conchs, etc., more oysters
of different kinds, sea nettles, beccaficos, chines of roebuck
and wild boar, fowls covered with a perfumed paste, a second
dish of shell fish and purples (a very costly crustacean).
Third course A wild boar's head, fish, a second set of hors
d'xuvres, chicks, potted river-fish, leverets, roast fowls, and
cakes from the marshes of Ancona.'
Here we see several curious combinations, many of the
favourite dishes of modern times mixed with others which
would now be relished only by Chinese, such as sea hedge-
* ' Memoir of Petrus Borchardus Borcherds, Esq.'
156 OUR VIANDS
hogs (which, however, are still eaten in Italy), sea nettles,
whelks, conchs, and fowls covered with perfumed paste,
reminding one of the ambergris and rose water so much
used in the last century. After all, we are constrained to
see that the tastes of civilised man do not vary much from
those of the savage, and that the unappreciated trifles of
to-day were highly esteemed by those who, in former ages,
were regarded as the most fastidious of epicures.
The feast of Tetuan, described by Hall Caine in the
' Scapegoat,' deserves to be recorded here as showing the
strange mixtures still eaten, and the ceremonies observed
in Mohammedan countries. First, steaming dishes of
meat, in which each plunged his fingers, then a dish of
dates, followed by fish in garlic; keskoos covered with
powdered sugar and cinnamon ; meat on skewers ; browned
fowls and fowls with olives ; flake pastry and sponge
fritters; and, in conclusion, three cups of green tea as
thick and sweet as syrup. After which a washing of hands,
and fumigating of garments with scented wood burnt in a
brass censer.
CHAPTER XII
CONDIMENTS
THE proverb that * hunger is the best sauce ' is, like many
other proverbs, trite, and true to a certain extent, for a
starving man would not ask for pepper and mustard to
make his meat relish, although he probably would look for
a little salt, that being Nature's own condiment, lavishly
provided, and grateful alike to the palate of man and
beast. Nevertheless, there are tribes of savages in various
parts of the world who did not use salt until it was intro-
duced among them by Europeans, and never felt the want
of it; although many semi-civilised tribes have adopted
various condiments, the most common being the betel,
which is a species of pepper, universally chewed by the
Malays of all ages, and by the inhabitants of almost all the
East Indian islands, where it is regarded as one of the
necessaries of life. Slices of the Pinang or Areca nut are
wrapped in a betel leaf, previously sprinked with chunam,
or quicklime, and chewed, causing the gums and lips to
assume a bright red hue, and the teeth to become black.
The ingredients for this indulgence are carried about
everywhere the rich possessing boxes of silver and gold,
whilst the poor man has the same articles in a brass box,
or mat bag and the betel box is invariably offered to a
guest, as the snuff-box used to be among ourselves.
In South America the coc.a plant is substituted for the
157
158 OUR VIANDS
betel, and is also chewed with lime, and carried about in
curiously-carved boxes. In both hemispheres this custom
is of immense antiquity.
Amongst ourselves the coga, in the form of cocaine, has
recently come greatly into use in medicine, being of great
value as a local anaesthetic ; but it was first heard of in the
form in which it is used in South America, the leaves being
chewed for their sustaining properties. As to the betel, we
seldom use it in England, its place being supplied by the
pepper of commerce, which, in its three forms of pepper-
corns, ground black pepper, and white pepper, has become
a requisite, no dish of meat, and scarcely any of vegetables,
being properly seasoned without it. Many people fancy
that white pepper is quite different from black, but it is
in reality the same, being prepared from the black pepper-
corn deprived of its outer husk.
Cayenne pepper, so useful in highly-seasoned dishes, is
made from the ground fruit or seed pods of different kinds
of capsicums, some of which are yellow and others red,
which accounts for the difference in the colour of the
pepper. Next to the pungent peppers, all of foreign
origin, comes the old English condiment, mustard, used for
centuries as a seasoning for roast beef.*
'Good Master Mustard-seed,' says Bottom in the
' Midsummer Night's* Dream,' ' I know your patience well :
that same cowardly, giant-like ox-beef hath devoured many
a gentleman of your house : I promise you, your kindred
hath made my eyes water ere now.'
* Coriander seed was considered by the Romans to be like mustard,
strengthening and digestive, and was used with vinegar to keep meat
fresh.
CONDIMENTS 159
This would seem to prove that mustard as a condiment
for roast beef was in common use in Shakespeare's time ;
but it was probably used then coarsely pounded, for we are
told that mustard in its present finely-powdered form, was
introduced by a Mrs. Clements, of Durham, about the year
1729, and was hence known as Durham mustard. We
sometimes think that a return to the old form that is, the
genuine seed coarsely pounded would be preferable to the
frequently adulterated article which now often appears at
table. The French make their mustard with tarragon
vinegar, which renders it more agreeable to some palates.
Horse-radish is another English condiment largely con-
sumed with the national roast beef, but accidents have
from time to time occurred from the likeness of the root to
the poisonous aconite or monk's-hood. The leaves of the
two plants are, however, so very distinct, that they cannot
be mistaken the one for the other when growing.
The adaptation of certain herbs and sauces as condi-
ments to particular meats dates from very early times. The
Paschal lamb was to be eaten with bitter herbs. What
these herbs were is not definitely known, but mint, which
is still the favourite condiment for lamb, was perhaps one,
since we find it mentioned, with rue, and all manner of
herbs, as being tithed by the Pharisees. Mint sauce and
gooseberry sauce are the appropriate condiments for lamb.
Red currant jelly and tomato sauce, and sometimes that
very dirty-looking seaweed known as laver, are eaten with
roast mutton, and caper sauce with boiled ; whilst on veal
we bestow a forcemeat composed of various herbs, such
as thyme, parsley, marjoram, savory, basil, lemon peel,
pepper, salt, a soupQon of onion and mace or nutmeg, suet,
i6o OUR VIANDS
and bread crumbs which same forcemeat we use for
turkeys and other poultry. With game we serve bread
sauce ; whilst pork, ducks, and geese are considered
properly dressed with a seasoning of sage and onions, and
apple sauce.
These are the chief of old English condiments, used
from time immemorial; and it is only of late years that
these things have been supplemented by the highly-
flavoured Indian curries and chutneys, and by a variety of
piquant sauces with names sufficient to make our grand-
mothers' hair stand on end. Our schools of cookery have
made us familiar with aspic, bechamel, consomm^, maitre
d'hotel sauce, mayonnaise, sauce piquante, and a variety of
other names which glide smoothly from the tongue of the
initiated, but are meaningless to those who have not studied
in the modern schools.
Nevertheless, our forefathers were as highly appreciative
of spices as we are, and those who could afford them, used
them perhaps more than we do. We learn from Chambers's
' Book of Days ' that the arrival of a ship laden with spices
1 was an event of such importance, and perhaps rarity, that
the King usually hastened to satisfy his wants before the
cargo was landed. Thus, in the reign of Henry III., the
bailiffs of Sandwich were commanded to detain, upon their
coming into port, two great ships laden with spices and
precious merchandise which were exported from Bayonne,
and not to allow anything to be sold until the King had
had his choice of their contents.' At that time vegetables
were scarce, but pot-herbs, such as parsley, mint, purslane,
fennel, smallage, thyme, and hyssop, are mentioned, and
also lettuce, celery, beetroot, and small white onions ; some
CONDIMENTS 161
of which were eaten raw, with olive oil and spices. Thus
we find that salads were in use in the fifteenth century, but
are somewhat surprised to find olive oil mentioned, as even
to the present day it is very little used in England, except
among those who have travelled much on the Continent.
The spices known, in the reign of Henry III. were of
course those of the East Indies cinnamon, nutmeg (with
its outer network, known as mace), cloves, pepper, and
ginger ; and to these must be added the most important of
all condiments, which has come to be regarded, not as a
luxury, but a necessity that is, sugar, which Strabo tells
us was found in the East Indies by Nearchus, Admiral of
Alexander the Great, 325 B.C.
Pliny speaks of sugar as an article of merchandise
brought from Arabia and India used only as medicine.
He describes it as ' honey collected from canes, gum-like
at first in appearance, but which becomes whitish and
brittle when dry.' There is a passage in Isaiah which runs,
' Thou hast bought me no sweet cane with money,' which
would seem to prove that the sugar-cane was an article of
commerce in Judea also at an early date ; the sweet cane
is likewise mentioned by Jeremiah, who speaks of it as
coming from a far country. Paulus ^Egineta, writing in
the seventh century, calls sugar the Indian salt, being in
form and colour like common salt, but in taste and sweet-
ness like honey, and recommends that a piece should be
kept in the mouth to moisten it during fevers.
Eleven camels laden with sugar were captured by the
Crusaders in mo, and shortly after this time the cane was
grown as a curiosity in Spain and Southern Italy.
The date of its introduction into England seems
L
1 62 OUR VIANDS
uncertain, but in 1546 a manuscript letter to Lord Cobham
speaks of * twenty-five sugar loaves at six shillings a loaf,
which is eightpence a pound,' the penny at that time being
worth much more than at present ; and the diary of a lady
of Herefordshire at the time of the Civil War, October 29,
1640, has the following entry ' For a pound of shugger to
send Mrs. Eaton when her son Fitz-Wm. lay on his death-
bed, 20</.'
If we compare this with the importation of sugar at the
present day, and the price per pound, we shall realise the
enormous growth in the consumption of this condiment
since its cultivation in the West Indies.
In 1887 the importation of sugar to the United Kingdom
reached the enormous total of 1,080,590 tons, and this was
rather under the quantity consumed in the two previous
years. With these figures before us it seems hard to
realise that there was a time when sugar was unknown, its
place being supplied by honey, which has now sunk into
a subordinate position; but we see also how extremely
important must have been the keeping of bees among the
ancients, since almost all the sweetness required in cookery
was dependent upon the productive industry of these little
insects. The Egyptians sent boats laden with bees up the
Nile to enable the industrious insects to fill their combs
from the flowers near its banks. The Greeks celebrated
the honey of Mount Hymettus, and even to the present
day this honey is highly prized, and the modern Greeks
use it, as probably their ancestors and the ancient Egyptians
used it, mixed with flour and oil in the manufacture of
Honey, says Soyer, was the basis of the seasoning of
CONDIMENTS 163
Apicius, and Pythagoras, who ate only bread and honey,
lived to be ninety ; and we are told * whoever wishes to
preserve his health should eat, every morning before break-
fast, young onions with honey.' Honey, indeed, seems to
have entered into every sauce among the Romans, and
mixed with mustard was served as a condiment with brawn,
but it was also freely used formerly in British cookery.
The anonymous author of 'The Art of Cookery' says
' Our fathers most admired their Sauces sweet,
And often ask'd for Sugar with their meat ;
They butter 'd Currants on fat Veal bestowed,
And rumps of Beef with virgin Honey strew'd.' *
Olive oil was almost as important as honey in ancient
cookery, but it was cot the only oil used, for Horace
gives the recipes for two sauces of the Romans as follows :
' Two sorts of sauce are worthy to be known,
Simple the first and of sweet oil alone ;
The other, mix'd with rich and generous wine,
And the true pickle of Byzantian brine,
Let it, with shredded herbs and saffron boil,
And when it cools pour in Venafran oil.'
Brine was water in which bay salt had been dissolved,
but we read also of herring and anchovy brine, and of that
remarkable compound garum, made of the semi-putrid
intestines of fish, put into a vessel with much salt, and
exposed to the sun till fermentation began, after which
wine was sometimes added, and it was filtered through
willow baskets, and kept for use. The best and most
expensive garum was made of the liver of the red mullet.
The sauce of Apicius was thus compounded: 'Mix
* Nor must it be forgotten that among the ancients honey was
frequently used in embalming the dead, and coffins full of honey are
slill sometimes found.
164 OUR VIANDS
with honey \ oz. pepper, 3 scruples eschalots, 6 scruples
cardamum, i scruple spikenard, and 6 scruples mint, add
vinegar, and pour in some garum.' And the same chef
gives us a stomachic condiment in which garum figures :
* Mix carefully some pine nuts, pepper, benzoin, mint, dried
raisins and dates, with fresh unsalted cheese, vinegar, oil,
honey, and wine, reduced by boiling to one half; add
garum.'
Vinegar appears to have been used as a beverage in
ancient Rome, and to have been commonly served at
banquets, probably mixed with water. The extravagance
of Cleopatra, in dissolving her splendid pearl earring in
vinegar and drinking it, is frequently quoted, but this is
not a solitary instance of wasteful lavishness at Roman
banquets ; the same story is told of Caligula, and of the
son of yEsop the actor, of whom Horace writes :
1 An actor's son dissolved a wealthy pearl
(The precious earring of his favourite girl)
In vinegar, and thus luxurious quaff'd
A thousand solid talents at a draught.'
And since our vinegar would certainly not be powerful
enough to dissolve pearls, we must suppose that used in
Egypt and Rome to have been much more powerful, so
that to drink it, even much diluted, must have been any-
thing but agreeable.
One of the English condiments greatly in favour formerly
seems to have fallen into disuse except in certain counties,
this is saffron, which at one time was used in many sauces
and cakes, and appears very frequently in old recipes, but
is now seldom used except in Cornwall, where it still forms
the flavouring and colouring matter of almost all the cakes.
CONDIMENTS 165
In modern Greece, mastich is used in the same way to give
a pleasant flavour to bread ; and in Germany, carraways,
aniseed, and pimento are freely used for the same purpose,
whilst almost all sweet sauces are flavoured with rum,
which is rejected among ourselves in favour of brandy or
ratafia. A more recent flavouring, vanilla, the product of
a Mexican orchid, has become the prime favourite among
French and English cooks.
There are two or three important condiments which
come to us from the West Indies. One of these is molasses
or treacle, beloved of children, and another, the pimento or
allspice ; but there is another which is very little known,
but which is supposed to form the basis of most modern
sauces. This is casareep, a dark fluid prepared from bitter
cassava, which gives both colour and piquancy to the sauce
to which it is added. Tamarinds, too, are much used by
modern cooks in curries and sauces, and the very hot West
Indian pickles are highly esteemed.
Curry-powder, mulligatawny, chutney, and various pickles
and preserves from India are now so common, that it is
unnecessary to do more than name them, but the following
South African condiments may, perhaps, be new to most of
our readers.
For blachang to eat with fish or meat one table-
spoonful of powdered chili, one teaspoonful coriander
seed pounded, twenty pounded almonds, one baked onion,
two cloves of garlic, enough vinegar for proper consistency,
and a little salt. For samball peel a cucumber and cut
it into pieces two inches long, slice each piece round and
round till you get to the seedy part, which throw away.
Roll the sliced part into a small roll, and then slice it
1 66 OUR VIANDS
again very fine into cold water with a little salt. Let it
stand two hours. Pour boiling water over two onions
sliced as thin as possible ; which also let stand two hours,
then strain off the water from both and squeeze as dry as
possible. Take a teaspoonful of vinegar, a dessertspoonful
of anchovy sauce, cayenne pepper, and a little mustard, mix
together and pour over the onion and cucumber.
To these we may add an old English recipe for making
walnut soy : Take 120 green walnuts, cut them into slices ;
shalots skinned and sliced, one pound ; salt, a quarter of a
pound. Pound all together in a stone mortar, then put the
mixture into an earthen pan with a pint of vinegar. Cover
it over for a week or ten days, and stir it three or four times
a day. Strain the liquor through a thick flannel bag. By
means of a press, pass it a second time through the bag ;
then put it into a stewpan with a quarter of a pound of the
best anchovies, half an ounce of whole pepper, and a little
sliced ginger. Boil the whole as long as any scum arises,
which must be carefully taken off : then bottle it, and add
of cloves, mace, and nutmeg, each a quarter of an ounce.
Cork, and keep it in a cool, dry place, till fit for use, which
will be in about six months.
Mayonnaise, which is now so much used for salads, fish,
etc., is rather a difficult sauce to manipulate, so that the
following may be useful to amateur cooks : Beat the yolks
of six eggs with six table spoonfuls of broth, six tablespoon-
fuls of best salad oil, one tablespoonful and a half of vinegar,
and a good pinch of salt, in a narrow bowl, until all is well
mixed and smooth. Place the bowl into a pan with boiling
water over a slow fire, beating the mixture briskly with an
egg whisk until it becomes stiffened, so that it can be easily
CONDIMENTS 167
spread over the salad, taking care that it does not get hard,
and that no water boils into it. If more acidity is desired,
add some lemon juice.
It would be impossible even to name the innumerable
sauces and condiments deemed necessary in the kitchens
of the present day to add flavour and piquancy to modern
dishes. Instead of the pints of wine and brandy, the
ambergris, saffron, and rose water of the last century, we
get delicate sauces compounded of a soup9on of a score of
different ingredients carefully mixed. There are, however,
certain old sauces which have never been superseded, such
as mushroom and walnut catsups; and it may be safely
asserted that a good housewife, anxious to tickle the palate
of her lord and master, and her guests, both male and
female, will see that her store-closet is well supplied not
only with such universal condiments as salt, pepper whole
and ground, vinegar, and mustard, but also with cayenne,
ginger, cloves, allspice, cinnamon, garlic, shalots, a large
variety of potherbs, especially mint, thyme, sage, marjoram,
celery seed and celery salt, chili and tarragon vinegar, curry-
powder, chutneys, anchovies and anchovy sauce, tomato,
mushroom, and walnut catsups, Worcester sauce, soy,
Harvey sauce, almonds, pistachio nuts, and various
essences and flavourings such as lemon, ratafia, and vanilla,
as well as all kinds of pickles, preserves, and jellies. A
tolerably long list, but far from exhaustive; whilst the
gardener must be called upon to supply fresh vegetables
and salads, and the fishmonger to provide lobsters, shrimps,
and oysters for sauces, as, although all three may be kept
stored in tins, they are infinitely better fresh.
PART III
VEGETABLES
Unions foill ntafte e'en f^eirs or TOtrotos beep.
STfje tenner 3Leitice brings on softer sleep.
(Corntoal Squaft^ge anfc IBeijon SSEfjite^pot ortngs,
Hctster i3eans anti 33acon JFooli of Isttngs.'
CHAPTER XIII
NUTS AND APPLES
OF all the fruits of the earth, perhaps nuts are the most
important and the most highly appreciated, for every part
of the world has one or more, forming a great portion of the
food of the people.
Of course, in civilised countries nuts do not hold so
important a position as in uncivilised, for with the growth
of civilisation comes luxury, and with luxury a variety of
food brought from all parts. But in early times nuts were
in especial request, as may be seen by referring to almost all
archaeological discoveries j for wherever pre-historic human
remains are discovered in Europe, there the hazel-nut is
almost always found. The hazel tree was largely used in
divination, and is still employed by those who profess to
discover water by means of the divining-rod.
Among the relics of the Swiss lake-dwellers, the beech-
nut and the water chestnut are found, as well as the hazel-
nut, all three having been used as food ; but the hazel-nuts
found among pre-historic relics have probably been used
in some sort of religious or superstitious rites, a remnant
of which is found in the Hallowe'en festival (October 31), at
which time, even now, in many parts of England, Scotland,
Ireland, and the Isle of Man (but more particularly in the
two latter), when a young girl wishes to know whether her
171
172 OUR VIANDS
lovers are faithful, she takes three nuts and places them on
the bars of the grate, naming two after her lovers and the
middle one for herself. If a nut pops and jumps, the
lover represented by that nut is unfaithful, but if the nuts
named after the girl and her favoured lover burn together,
they will be married. Burns's poem on c Halloween '
describes this country custom so well, that we will quote
a couple of verses :
' The auld guidwife's weel-hoordit nits
Are round and round divided,
And mony lads' and lasses' fates
Are there that night decided :
Some kindle couthie, side by side,
And burn thegither trimly ;
Some start awa' wi' saucy pride,
And jump out owre the chimlie
Fu' high that night.
Jean slips in twa wi' tentie e'e ;
Wha 'twas she wudna tell ;
But this is Jock, and this is me,
She says in to hersel :
He bleezed owre her, and she owre him,
As they wad never mair part ;
Till, fuff! he started up the lum,
And Jean had e'en a sair heart
To see 't that night.'
The hazel-nut grows abundantly in woods throughout the
British Isles, and it is one of the delights of autumn to
form nutting parties, with hooked sticks, to pull down the
branches, and bags, to carry home the ripe fruit to store
for winter use. The squirrel has taught us that nuts stored
underground retain their freshness for a long time, but we
may also assure our readers, from observation, that nuts
NUTS AND APPLES 173
put in an empty jar which has held spirit, and corked
tightly, will keep beautifully fresh for months, in a cool place.
The. filbert is a cultivated variety of the hazel-nut, and so
also is the cob-nut, which is extensively grown in Kent,
and is the largest kind. But it is not equal in flavour to
the filbert, which name is a corruption of the old English
TL&mtfuU-btard, from the long fringed husk.
Next to the hazel-nut and its varieties which include the
Constantinople nut, the American nut, and those brought
over kiln-dried from Spain the chestnut probably ranks
second in importance in Europe as food for man. In Italy
and Spain the chestnut groves yield food much appreciated
by the lower orders, who not only eat it in its natural state,
but also make it into meal ; and a pudding made of this
meal, under the name of polenda dolce, is sold in the
streets of Italy, and forms a staple food of the Italian
peasants. The sweet chestnut, although it will grow in
England, and even in Scotland, and produce eatable fruit,
is not largely cultivated at present, although it appears to
have been one of the trees introduced by the Romans, for
it is found among the relics unearthed at Rushmore by
General Pitt-Rivers. The ornamental horse-chestixut, red
and white, is one of the best known trees of our parks, and
we often wonder that some use has not been found for the
abundant nuts it produces, which are too acrid even for the
taste of children, who delight in them as playthings. These
nuts were formerly used in washing instead of soap, and
have lately been made into soap, which is especially useful
for coloured garments ; and we are told that a portion of
the flour of these nuts added to common flour improves its
quality.
174 OUR VIANDS
The walnut, which is very valuable as a timber tree, is
also useful in many other ways, the green fruit being used
for pickling, and the green outer skin for dyeing, for which
purpose the gipsies employed it largely, centuries ago. It
is now sometimes used as a hair dye, but the fruit is the
product most highly and generally esteemed. It is too well
known to need description, but there is one way in which it
is prepared on the Continent which might be easily carried
out wherever walnuts are abundant. In Italy, they take
and peel the fresh walnut, dividing it into quarters, which
are stuck on small white sticks and dipped into melted
barley sugar. The Venetians treat other fruits, such as the
almond and orange, in the same manner, but none equal
the walnut in flavour.
The hickory nut, so much talked of in American books,
is a species of walnut, but not equal in flavour to the
European.
In the early spring the almond forms the chief ornament
of our gardens, with its bright pink blossoms on a leafless
stem, respecting which Moore writes :
' The hope, in dreams, of a happier hour,
That alights on misery's brow
Springs out of the silvery almond flower
That blooms on a leafless bough. '
The almond does not come to perfection in our cold
climate. It is a native of the East, and was considered one
of the most important of the products of Palestine. In
Rome it was known as the Greek nut. The almond is
much used in cookery ; the oil of the bitter almond is a
powerful poison, but in very small quantities it is useful for
flavouring.
NUTS AND APPLES 175
When we journey into tropical regions we find a great
many very tough, but extremely valuable, nuts to crack,
and first and foremost is the cocoanut, which is the prin-
cipal food and wealth of the natives of the South Sea
Islands, the tree itself (Cocos miciferd] serving all the
multifarious uses of the household. It forms the timber of
the huts, the leaves are used for thatch, the fibre for mats
and ropes, the nuts for eating, the shells for drinking and
cooking utensils ; the milky juice in the nut forms a pleasant
drink, and in the East Indies, toddy and arrack are extracted
from the tree.
Latterly the cocoanut has become a favourite ingredient
for cakes, puddings, and biscuits, but it always appears
indigestible, probably because not used when quite fresh.
The oil extracted from the nut has also many uses, but it
quickly becomes rancid. Each cocoa palm yields about a
hundred nuts, and it may be readily understood that a grove
of these trees would be of extreme value in the tropical
countries which produce them. Two of these graceful
cocoa palms may be seen growing in the gardens of the
Due de Rochefoucault, at Cannes, but, like the other palms,
they do not thrive and bear fruit in Europe.
The Brazil nut, although well known as a fruit, is not so
much used in this country as the other nuts we have men-
tioned, and few people are aware that these triangular nuts
are the contents of a large outer shell of extreme hardness,
which forms a nut as large as a child's head, within which
the Brazil nuts of commerce are tightly packed, sometimes
to the number of fifteen to twenty or more. Humboldt
described this nut as one of the most extraordinary fruits of
South America. It grows on a tree 120 feet high, and at
i;6 OUR VIANDS
the time of ripening the natives dare not enter the woods
where they grow without a wooden buckler over the head,
lest they should be killed by the falling nuts. The monkeys
are said to unite to break the shell with stones, and the
Indians hold a feast at the ingathering, which they say is
the feast of animals as well as of men. The fall of the ripe
nut from so great a height is, it may be supposed, generally
sufficient to break it, otherwise it must be a very hard nut
to crack even for men ; but, besides the reputed breaking
by the Capuchin apes, the Cavia aguti is said to be able to
gnaw through the shell and eat the nuts.
Another very hard-shelled nut, the butter nut of the West
Indies, known locally as the Souari nut, was brought over
among the products of. Guiana at the Colonial and Indian
Exhibition, and when fresh is a most delicious nut, eating
like rich cream, but I suspect that it very frequently becomes
rancid when old, otherwise it would seem a fruit well suited
for exportation.
The cashew nut, also a product of the West Indies,
strongly resembles the walnut, and is much used in flavouring
various dishes. In India and the Philippine Islands it is
roasted in the husk and eaten with salt, and the husk itself
produces an indelible stain used in the manufacture of
marking ink, and also for burning warts and ulcers.
The pistachio nut, now so much used, comes to us from
Persia and from Western Africa, which is rich in nuts of
various kinds, and these nuts, with the oil extracted from
them, form a very important branch of commerce. The
chief of these are palm nuts and ground nuts, the oil from
the latter being often sold as olive oil.
The nut of the poisonous palm, Cycas media> is eaten by
NUTS AND APPLES 177
the Australian natives, after the kernel has been subjected
to much pounding and soaking in water, a process which
I have pointed out in Chapter III. as that adopted by
many savages in the case of poisonous plants, such as the
manioc. The porridge made from these roasted and
pounded nuts, which is called Kadjera, forms the chief food
of the Australian natives from October to December, when
other fruits come in.
The acorn, which was formerly eaten in Britain, had
to be prepared in the same manner before it could be
made palatable, but we are told that acorns were
esteemed delicacies among the Arcadians and Spaniards,
and Pliny says the latter eat them as dessert, roasted
in wood ashes. Acorns, like beech-nuts and horse-
chestnuts, are now consigned to pigs, goats, deer, sheep,
and poultry.
Next to nuts, we may perhaps place apples as the fruit
of greatest value, at all events in temperate climates. In
the extreme north the apple is unknown, and in the tropics
it is supplanted by more luscious fruits. ' An apple a day
keeps the doctor away,' says the proverb, and there can
be no doubt that in temperate climes the apple, from its
excellent hygienic and keeping qualities, ranks first in
usefulness. It has a very extensive range, for it is found
apparently wild in Persia and Syria, in Africa, and through-
out the continent of Europe. In Great Britain the crab
or wild apple is very frequently referred to by old writers,
and roasted crabs were always the accompaniment to the
Christmas wassail bowl; but when the art of grafting became
known the crab was soon supplanted by a great variety
of excellent apples brought, probably, in the first place from
M
1 78 OUR VIANDS
France, as their names testify, ai}d cultivated largely by the
monks. It is greatly to be regretted that these famous
old sorts, such as the nonpareil, the rennet, and the codlin,
have been allowed to die out or to degenerate, for they
are scarcely equalled in flavour by the innumerable varieties
of modern times, and it is also matter of regret that
English apples should have been supplanted of late years
in the London market by foreign consignments, chiefly
American, and yet those who have visited the late
exhibitions and congresses of fruit-growers would hardly
suppose that the cultivation of this favourite old English
fruit was on the wane; the innumerable varieties exhibited
at the Mansion House in 1890, and at the Horticultural
Exhibition this year, and the crowds assembled to gaze
upon and admire with longing eyes and watering mouths
the juicy fruit displayed, seemed to show a great revival
of interest in British apples and pears, but as I overheard
a grower remark of some of the splendid fruit exhibited,
'This is all very well for exhibition, but it would not
pay to grow, for a tree could not carry a bushel of
such fruit';' added to which our uncertain climate always
renders fruit of any kind a precarious crop, and a
good apple season seldom comes oftener than once in
three years, so that we are obliged to resort to America
and our colonies to supply the deficiency in years of
scarcity, and this so lowers the market price as to render
a good crop unprofitable to the English grower, although
I believe most housekeepers are willing to pay more for
English than for foreign apples, as being of better flavour
and more juicy.
The common tradition that the apple was the forbidden
NUTS AND APPLES 179
fruit, with which Eve was tempted, shows at all events
the pre-eminence of the fruit in the esteem of ancient
gastronomers, although the much lamented General Gordon
was not only heterodox enough to locate the Garden of Eden
in the Seychelle Islands, but also to recognise as the for-
bidden fruit the great double cocoa-nut, which certainly
would have required some assistance, Satanic or other, to
break it before eating.
There are several other fruits which bear the name of
apple, but which are in no way related to the well known
orchard fruit. First of these comes the pine-apple, grown to
perfection by careful cultivation in English hothouses. It
is said to have been introduced into England in the reign
of Charles II. It was certainly known earlier in Holland,
and was probably first brought from America or the West
Indies, of which it is supposed to be a native; but it
is found also wild in Asia and both on the west and
east coasts of Africa, where many varieties are found.
Those sold commonly in the streets of London come
mostly from the West Indies, but in tinned fruit that from
Singapore is the best
The custard apple which is now frequently met with in
fruiterers' shops is a tropical fruit, found in Asia, Africa, and
America. There are several species of custard apple ; that
best known looks somewhat like an artichoke, but when
the rind is removed a soft pulp is found which resembles
sweet cream with the scent of a rose; this is known as the
sweet-sop, whilst another and coarser variety is called the
sour-sop, and is said to resemble the black currant in
flavour and scent. Two other species of custard apple are
sometimes seen, one is the alligator apple, which is a
j8o OUR VIANDS
strong narcotic, and the other the cherimoyer, much praised
by Humboldt; it is an American fruit, and very little
known in England.*
Then there is the mammee apple of the West Indie?,
which somewhat resembles a large russet apple, the pulp is
very delicious and is compared to a fine ripe apricot, but
the rind and seeds are bitter and resinous.
The star apple, which is also a West Indian fruit,
resembles a large apple externally, but the interior is divided
into ten cells, each containing a black seed set in a gela-
tinous pulp.
The quince, which is regarded by some antiquaries as the
golden apple of the Hesperides, resembles a pear in shape,
but the common sort grown in our gardens is not eatable
raw, although it makes a delicious marmalade, and, in fact,
is the origin of the name, as the Portuguese name for quince
is marmelo. The quince is eaten raw in South Africa and
perhaps in China and other eastern countries, but the fruit
must be a different variety from that grown in England.
The tree is extensively used in France as a stock for
grafting pears.
The pear, which botanically is nearly related to the apple,
is one of the most delicious fruits grown, and the modem
varieties are innumerable, yet in flavour none can excel the
old varieties known as beurries^ jargonelles^ chaumontelles,
etc., all of which show a French origin. Jersey is now
famous for pears, and they are grown of immense size there,
as also in many of our colonies, but none seem to attain the
* For many particulars relating to fruits and vegetables I am indebted
to a little book entitled ' Vegetable Substances used for the Food of
Man,' published in 1846.
NUTS AND APPLES 181
weight of those seen by Marco Polo in China, which
weighed ten pounds each, and were yet of excellent flavour.
The Romans are said to have introduced this fruit into
England, and it was certainly very anciently cultivated in
Greece, for it is named by Homer.
Of apples and their kindred we need only mention further
the Siberian crab, which used to be cultivated in its two
varieties of yellow and red, chiefly for the beauty of the
flowers and fruit, which latter is not of much value except as
a preserve. The red variety with the stems attached, lightly
boiled in a rich syrup, makes a very ornamental dessert
dish, and is well flavoured ; but the core is large in propor-
tion to the pulp.
The medlar, like the quince, cannot be eaten as it comes
from the tree; but when suffered to decay, the flavour is
very fine, and an excellent jelly, resembling guava, may be
made from it. The small fruit is much superior in flavour
to the large variety, but it is one of those fruits which is
less cultivated and esteemed than formerly, having been
supplanted by others which now reach our shores from
many distant lands.
Apples were formerly much used in old English sports
and were always ducked for by the girls and boys on
Halloween, causing great merriment and much dabbling
in water, which would now be thought hurtful. But there
was another sport indulged in, wherein a stick with an
apple at one end and a lighted candle at the other being
tied up to the ceiling, was jumped at, the lucky jumper
catching the apple, whilst the awkward or unlucky, found
himself burnt by the lighted candle. The apple also entered
into another old superstitious ceremony of Halloween, for
1 82 OUR VIANDS
it was believed that if a young woman on that night ate an
apple in front of a looking-glass, her future husband would
appear and look over her shoulder, regarding which custom
Burns makes an old grandmother thus reprove her grand-
child :
' Ye little skelpie-limmer's face !
I daur you try sic sportin',
As seek the foul thief ony place,
For him to spae your fortune ; v
Nae doubt but ye may get a sight !
Great cause ye hae to fear it ;
For mony a ane has gotten a flight,
And lived and died deleeret,
On sic a night.'
CHAPTER XIV
GRAPES, FIGS, AND ORANGES
How is it that we always think of the grape rather as a
wine-producer than as a fruit ? Perhaps because the earliest
historical record of it is when Noah began to be a husband-
man and planted a vineyard, and, instead of being content,
as so good a man should have been, to eat the fruit of his
vines in a rational way, or to press out the pure juice into
his cup as the temperance people, had they then been
living, would have persuaded him was the only true wine
he set to work to make experiments, and, as people do
under such circumstances, got bemuddled over them, until
he did not know exactly what he was about, and hence the
vine has been associated with wine, and the juice of the
grape with drunkenness, ever since.
And yet the grape as a fruit is excellent, as we all know,
and the great luscious bunches which hang in our green-houses
are tempting in the extreme; but these are only produced at
a cost which puts them beyond the reach of the million^ and
fits them only for a place on the table of the millionaire.
In countries where grapes grow with little care, the ripe
clusters are gathered and eaten as required, and the rest
are thrown into the wine vat, for it is a fruit which will not
bear much handling and packing, although of late years it
183
1 84 OUR VIANDS
has been found possible to pack the ripe bunches in barrels,
filling up the interstices with sawdust or with cork- dust, and
thus the London market is supplied all the year round with
a fruit always grateful to the palate, especially of invalids,
at a ridiculously low price. The best qualities of these
foreign grapes seldom exceed a shilling a pound, and they
are sometimes to be had for fourpence. Most of these
grapes come from Lisbon, but some were sent over from
Australia during the Colonial and Indian Exhibition, and
arrived in good condition.
It seems a pity that in lands so remote, the superabundant
grapes should not be converted into raisins, and sent to us
in that form, for grapes au naturel are of no use in the
kitchen ; but the dried grapes, both raisins and currants,
are indispensable. Where would be our country's boast,
sent all over the world now the Christmas plum pudding
if we could not get raisins and currants ? What dismay
there would be amongst our cooks, if the markets of Malaga
and Valencia were closed to us ! And yet we have seen
raisins from Cape Colony and Natal equal to any of these.*
Why do they not send us more of them, and of dessert fruit,
too, muscatels dried on the stalk, which, with almonds,
blanched or not, are the delight of all children, and not
despised by those of more mature age, for we have seen
grey-haired men discuss a dish of them with considerable
relish, without thinking much of Tommy's disgust at finding
the dish empty.
* Two Australian colonies, of which the chief is Milcura in Victoria,
have lately been formed for the cultivation and drying of raisins, figs,
apricots, peaches, etc., so that we may soon hope to have sun-dried
fruit in the market, from the Antipodes.
GRAPES, FIGS, AND ORANGES 185
Greatly as grapes are esteemed and valued, especially by
invalids, it would seem possible to have too much of them
sometimes, as those know who have been ordered to Meran
in the Tyrol, to undergo that celebrated grape-cure, wherein
the patient, beginning with a pound or two a day, has to
increase the dose to nine or ten pounds, of course eating
nothing else. It might be supposed that such a regimen
would not only cure the patient of his disease, but would
so disgust him with grapes that he would never eat another,
but it is said people have been known to return again and
again for the grape-cure.
Dried raisins bring us naturally to another favourite
dessert fruit dried Turkey figs, as they are called, although
they certainly do not all now come from Turkey, whatever
may have been the case originally, but the Smyrna brand is
still regarded as the best.
The fig, quite unlike the grape, is grown only as a fruit,
and a very delicious fruit it is, too, when ripened under a
good hot sun ; but in England, although the fig will thrive
and bear fruit, it always appears to us wanting in flavour
and in lusciousness. Singularly enough, the fig tree will
flourish and grow to an immense size, even in the dirt and
smoke of London. There is one house, close to the
Foundling Hospital, which is covered to the very top with
a fig tree of most luxuriant growth, but I have never seen
any fruit upon it. The fig tree is said to have been first
introduced into England by* Cardinal Pole, but it was
probably known here long before his day, for there are
many historical fig trees, and one is spoken of as an old
tree in the time of James I.; it grew in the Dean's garden,
Winchester, and bore small red figs, and on the stone wall
1 86 OUR VIANDS
near was an inscription to the effect that in 1623 King
James I. tasted of the fruit with great pleasure. We, how-
ever, certainly do not much relish the ripe fig in this
country ; it has, in fact, passed into a term of contempt
' I don't care a fig for it.' But very different is the estima-
tion in which it is held in the East, and in the south of
Europe. The constant references to it in the Bible prove
how important it was considered by the Israelites, the two
or even three crops a-year produced by fig trees in the East,
causing it to be looked upon as a staple food, the failure
of which meant famine. The first of these crops comes to
maturity about June, whilst the second is forming ; it is the
second which is dried for export, and then in some climates
a third crop appears, which hangs and ripens on the tree
after the leaves are shed.
The fig entered largely into the food of the Greeks, for,
when Lycurgus ordained that the Spartans should dine in a
common hall, almost everyone contributed wine, cheese, and
figs to the fare. Those who have not studied the origin of
words will be surprised to hear that our word sycophant
comes from two Greek words signifying 'a fig' and 'to
show/ and that in its original meaning it was applied to
those who informed against the breakers of an edict made
by the Athenians against the export of figs, and, even as
used by our older writers, sycophant means a tale bearer.
The French still use the word in the sense of liar and
impostor, instead of flatterer only.
The present importation of dried figs into Great Britain
must be enormous. Many years ago, from Turkey only,
it amounted to nine hundred tons annually, besides those
coming from France, Italy, and Spain.
GRAPES, FIGS, AND ORANGES 187
The fig enters very little into recipes for cooking it is
too luscious and devoid of pungency ; but I have tasted
green figs from the Cape, preserved in bottles, which are
excellent, although the peculiar, resinous flavour would
perhaps not quite suit everybody's palate. There seems no
good reason why this should not be added to our list of
English preserves. Thousands of green figs are allowed to
drop off the trees year after year, which might thus be
utilised and rendered valuable, especially in seasons of
scarcity of other fruits.
A writer in 1846 estimated that 272,000,000 oranges
were imported annually into Great Britain, allowing about
a dozen to every individual, and adds : * This extraordinary
consumption of a product which is brought here from
very distant places, is a natural consequence of certain
qualities which fit the orange in a remarkable degree for
being the universal fruit of commerce. If we would have
foreign figs and grapes, they must be dried, for the undried
grapes which we bring even from the short distance of
Portugal are flat and vapid; the tamarind is a liquid
preserve; the guava must be made into a jelly; the mango
destined for us requires to be pulled before it is ripe, and
is pickled; the date must be dried, and the cocoa-nut
becomes, when here, consolidated and indigestible. But
the orange, man may have fresh in every region of the
world, and at almost every season of the year. The
aromatic oil and the rind, preserve it from the effects
both of heat and cold, and the acridity of the former
renders it proof against the attacks of insects. It is
true that oranges rot like other fruits, but that does not
happen for a long time if the rind is uninjured and
1 88 OUR VIANDS
they are kept from moisture, and so ventilated as not
to ferment.' *
With the improved means of transport since the above
was written the import of oranges must have increased
enormously, so that now it would be almost impossible to
estimate the number imported, although the tonnage might
perhaps be found by reference to the Board of Trade
returns. It is, however, sufficient for our purpose to know
that now, all the year round, oranges and lemons may be
bought at a penny a-piece, and often at three or four a
penny, whilst only a few years ago they could scarcely be
eaten before Christmas, and were not to be had after June.
Nevertheless, the facility with which they are now conveyed,
even from Australia, does not tend to the perfection of the
fruit, inferior sorts being thrown on the market, because of
their abundance, to the partial exclusion of those which
require greater care in cultivation and in packing. The
St. Michael prince of oranges is now seldom to be seen,
whilst thick-skinned, coarse-grained, and bitterish-flavoured
varieties are foisted upon the purchaser as equally good.
Very few people are good judges of oranges in the fruiterers'
shops : they look to size and darkness of skin, instead of
weight, fineness and delicacy of skin, with medium size, which
are the points of excellence in an orange. The genuine St.
Michael is flattish, pale in colour, and destitute of pips, whereas
that sold for it, is full of pips, and pale only because unripe.
The orange requires abundance of heat and sun to bring
it to perfection, and therefore cannot be cultivated success-
fully in Northern Europe ; the trees may, indeed, be grown
in tubs in greenhouses, and will produce fruit, but the fruit
* 'The Food of Man, 'p. 79.
GRAPES, FIGS, AND OAANGES 189
is not good. Even in the south of France and Northern
Italy the orange is never met with in 'perfection, although
the trees will grow luxuriantly in the open air, and bear
abundant fruit ; but it is cultivated there chiefly for the rind,
from which the essential oil is extracted which is so
much used in the manufacture of perfumes. The streets in
the south of France are frequently festooned with orange
peel to be dried for this purpose, whilst women and children
sit at their doors peeling oranges as we should peel potatoes,
the fruit divested of its peel being used for making citric
acid, so useful both in the kitchen and the laboratory. The
orange trees in the south of France are cut and trimmed
till they resemble nothing so much as the trees out of a
child's Noah's ark, but in South Italy they are allowed
more liberty, and the miles of orange groves about Sorrento
are beautiful with loads of golden fruit, and fragrant at the
same time.with the lovely blossom. There, too, it is a pretty
sight to see the peasant women and girls, in their bright
costumes, tripping down to the coast with large trays on their
heads laden with half-green oranges and lemons ready to
be packed for exportation, for the fruit must be gathered
before it is quite ripe, or it would not bear the carriage.
In Spain, Southern Italy, and Sicily the orange comes
to perfection, but the far East is looked upon as its
native habitat, and the Arabs are credited with the intro-
duction of this valuable fruit to the West. According to
Galessio, the Arabs penetrated farther into India than
Alexander the Great, and found there various kinds of
oranges growing, and they brought them thence by two
routes the sweet ones, known as China oranges, through
Persia and Syria, and thence to Italy and the south of
190 OUR VIANDS
France ; and the bitter or Seville oranges by Arabia, Egypt,
and the north of Africa to Spain. But it is thought that
the sweet orange introduced by the Arabs was not the
variety known as St. Michael's, but rather that still
cultivated in Italy. The St. Michael orange was brought
direct from China by the Portuguese, who sent it from
Portugal to the Azores, whilst the Spaniards are credited
with having introduced it to America. Humboldt found
wild oranges growing in a forest in America, but they are
not believed to be indigenous to that continent, although
at present they are cultivated there with great success, the
orange groves of Florida, California, and other Western
States being very extensive.
Oranges grow and thrive wonderfully in South Africa,
where they are supposed to have been introduced by the
Portuguese, but the early Portuguese navigators speak of
them as growing on the eastern coast ; and it is a singular
fact that the Chartered Company of British South Africa
found miles of wild orange trees growing in Manicaland,
with many other fruits not supposed to be indigenous. The
orange found would seem, from the description given of it,
to be quite an unknown species, and one which may prove
of great value. One of the pioneers writes : ' Riding
along we came to groves of wild orange trees, laden with
ripe fruit of a yellow colour; the fruit is encased in a
hardish shell ; inside it has the appearance of an over-ripe
sweet melon ; the flavour is a combination of sweet melon,
pine-apple, and orange, and is very nice eating.'
Oranges have been divided into eight species, known as
sweet oranges, bitter oranges, bergamots, limes, pampelucos,
sweet limes, lemons, and citrons, and of each of these there
GRAPES, FIGS, AND ORANGES 191
are numerous varieties. The variety known as the blood
orange, which comes from Malta, is said to derive its colour
from being grafted on the pomegranate.
The lemon is a more delicate tree than the orange, and
requires more warmth ; it will not flourish in the south of
France, except at Mentone, which has given rise to an
interesting legend. They say when Eve was driven out of
Paradise she managed to carry away with her two or three
of her favourite fruits, and among them the lemon : with
these she wandered over the earth till she came to Mentone,
where, finding the climate and the soil so much resembled
the lost Eden, she planted the lemon, which has grown and
flourished ever since.
What the cook would now do without lemons we can
hardly surmise : they seem an indispensable adjunct to so
many savoury dishes, and are become so plentiful that it is
no uncommon thing to hear them hawked about the streets
of London at three or four a penny. The lime, on the
contrary, is very seldom seen, although lime-juice cordial
has long been used as a beverage, and the little island of
Montserrat has become famous for the production of this
useful fruit, the juice of which seems indispensable, where
vegetables cannot be obtained, and the lack of which has
so often caused the decimation by scurvy of the crews of
vessels engaged in Arctic exploration.
The citron is chiefly known to us by the preserved peel,
which forms such a delicious condiment for cakes, Christmas
puddings, and mince pies.
The Shaddock, so called in honour of the ship captain
who introduced it into the West Indies from China, is now
little valued, although in China, its native habitat, it is
192 OUR VIANDS
known as the ' sweet ball.' We occasionally see it in the
market, as well as its near relative the pomelo, but the
bitterness of the rind prevents its becoming a popular fruit.
On the contrary, the little Mandarin orange, called narije
at the Cape, the rind of which is so highly perfumed, has of
late years been very freely imported chiefly from Malta
and Spain, from which latter country we also receive the
bitter Seville, so valuable for many purposes, and especially
for making that favourite adj unct to the breakfast table
orange marmalade of which many tons must be consumed
annually.
We have by no means exhausted the uses of the varieties
of the orange family, which are as valuable medicinally as
in a culinary sense, and seem to bear out the Mentone
legend that they were brought originally from the Garden of
Eden. Undoubtedly they 'are all natives of the far East,
and the probability is that they were indigenous in India
and China, and were introduced into Africa in very early
times by traders, possibly Chinese, although Galessio believes
them to have been brought originally from India by the
Arabs; and it is pointed out that they were apparently
unknown to Pliny and other early naturalists.
All the varieties now grow in perfection at the Cape, in
the West Indies, Australia, and America in fact, wherever
there is abundance of warmth and sun ; and with care
they will live to the age of three hundred years, even in
England, there being some at Hampton Court said to be of
that age, but the fruit will not compare with that of foreign
climates, for these golden apples of the Hesperides require
the sun-dragon to guard them from frost and blight, and to
bring them to perfection.
CHAPTER XV
STONE FRUITS AND BERRIES
PRUDENT folks are always impressing the fact upon juveniles
that stone fruits are unwholesome, but what boy or girl can
resist the cry of * Cherry Ripe ! ' or avoid the luscious
plum, and the still more luscious apricot, peach, or nec-
tarine, when it falls in his or her way ? Indeed, we do
not believe that even the most prudent of mothers can
always be proof against the temptation of these much-
maligned delicacies.
As regards apricots, peaches, and nectarines, we in
England are never likely to get a surfeit of either, for they
cost too much to grow in this part of the world, ever to
become a food for the million. In truth, there are millions
who probably never taste a peach, or a nectarine j and
although apricots are more plentiful, being imported, half
ripe, in boxes from France, yet these are also too dear for
poor people to buy, and when bought are not satisfactory,
the flavour being poor compared with the ripe Moor Park
apricot grown on a sunny wall in England. The envy of
the British youth is great when he hears that in America,
and in South Africa and Australia, pigs are fed upon
peaches, and he wishes they would just send some of them
over here j but, in truth, these fruits are too delicate for
ies N
194 OUR VIANDS
export, unless bottled or dried, although a consignment of
peaches has recently arrived from South Africa in excellent
condition, packed each in a separate compartment like eggs,
and wrapped in cotton wool. Many of these fruits come
to us in tins and bottles from America, but they seem to
lose flavour in the process, and will never take the place
of the highly-cultivated wall-fruits of England at the tables
of the rich, although convenient as a substitute, when the
superior article is deficient or out of season. The best
mode of importing these fruits is in a dried form especially
in the case of apricots. The colonists of the Cape prepare
apricots in various ways : one called ' meibos ' known also
as ' matrimony,' from being sour and sweet is very good.
The fruit is, as it were, crystallised by being dipped in a
strong ley, dried in the sun, and then laid in sugar ; but
this is never seen in England, except when brought over
by individuals as a present to friends. We have seen and
tasted another preparation of this fruit, and of peaches, in
the form of paste. The fruit is peeled, slightly boiled
without water, mashed, and spread out very thin on buttered
boards or sheets of paper, dried in the sun, and folded up
like paper, forming a pleasant refreshment in travelling, or
at any time when a little fruit is desired and not otherwise
obtainable.
It need hardly be said that all these fruits, although
brought to great perfection by careful cultivation in England,
are natives of sunnier climes. The peach and nectarine,
which are so closely allied as to be virtually the same fruit
although one has a smooth coat and the other a rough
one belong to the same botanical family as the almond,
and are supposed to have been brought originally from
STONE FRUITS AND BERRIES 195
Persia by the Romans. The peach has been cultivated in
England since the sixteenth century, and seems to have
been introduced wherever civilised man has appeared. The
natives of South Africa are indebted to the traveller Burchell
for it, he having given a bag of peach stones as the best
present he could think of, to the chief of the Bachapins,
upon which he remarks, ' Nor did I fail to impress on his
mind a just idea of their value and nature, by telling him
that they would produce trees which would continue every
year to yield, without further trouble, abundance of large
fruit of a more agreeable flavour than any which grew in
the country of the Bachapins.' Whether the natives appre-
ciated the wisdom of the benevolent traveller in making
this gift to them, and whether they continue to cultivate
the fruit, is not known ; but the colonists of South Africa
generally do so largely, finding the tree very easily reared
and the fruit excellent. It is not, however, indigenous to
South Africa, although a small apricot is found growing
wild there.
The country recently traversed by the pioneer force of
the Chartered Company would seem at one time to have
been quite a garden of fruits, as the following extract from
a letter of one of the men shows : ' I called the country
around these parts (Matabeleland, about one hundred and
fifty miles from Mount Hampden) the land of fruits, for the
whole place is like a great orchard of fruit trees growing
wild. Although the winter season (July), many are loaded
with fruit. Imagine riding for miles and miles under the
shade of wild orange trees, branches weighed down with
fruit, and more of others than I can name wild grapes,
guavas, limes, plums, apples, and pomegranates a
196 OUR VIANDS
veritable garden of Eden, and this under a cloudless sky
and delightful climate.'
The apricot belongs to the plum tribe (Prunus Armeniaca),
a tribe very widely distributed, and including the cherry,
the laurel, the sloe, and a vast number of cultivated species
of plum, chief among which is the delicious greengage, the
Reine Claude of the French. Some naturalists believe that
the apricot has been developed from the wild African species;
but it is generally supposed to be a native of the East, where
it grows in great abundance, from China and Japan to the
Caucasus. It is perhaps a greater favourite than the peach
in cookery, making a most excellent jam, apropos of which
I may say that the pulp, now imported in tins, is almost
equal to the fresh fruit for this delicate preserve; but it
requires its full weight of sugar and a few bitter almonds
as a substitute for the kernels. Apricots crystallised and
in syrup are also much esteemed, and in all these forms our
colonies might supply the English market quite as well as
the French do now.
There is also another mode of utilising these abundant
gifts of Nature to sunny climes, which is in the making of
noyau, or ratafia, from the kernels. Years ago we used to
collect the kernels of all the apricots and peaches consumed
in the house, putting them into a bottle filled up with brandy,
and this home-made ratafia was the very best flavouring we
could ever obtain for custards, puddings, etc. Surely, in
countries where these fruits are so superabundant as in
South Africa, and where brandy is also largely manufactured,
something might be made both of the fruit and its kernels.
The most singular of the peach family is the flat peach of
China, which somewhat resembles a Normandy pippin with
STONE FRUITS AND BERRIES 197
a stone in the centre, of which the flavour is said to be
excellent.
Of the plum there are more than three hundred varieties,
so that we cannot attempt to enumerate them, but must
mention two or three of the principal. Two wild plums
grow in Britain, the bullace and the sloe the one white or
yellow, the other black. They are not eatable in the raw
state, but the former is used for making tarts and puddings
very highly esteemed by many and the sloe is, or was,
used in making an excellent cordial known as sloe-gin. Of
the cultivated sorts the palm is given to the greengage so
named after the first English cultivator. The Orleans,
which came to us from France, is the best for puddings and
pies, but for table fruit the many varieties of the egg plum
are preferable, whilst that known as the London plum is
capital for preserves. We do not know the species of plum
which, under the name of prunes, or French plums, forms
such a splendid addition to desserts at Christmas, but
believe it to be the Imperial. It appears to be a very rich
fruit, and one which might be cultivated and preserved in
the same manner in our southern colonies. A very
delicious variety, about the size of the bullace, known as the
golden drop, seems to have ceased to be cultivated in this
country. And now we must hark back to the cherry, which
is perhaps the most interesting and highly-esteemed of all
stone fruits, because the most easily obtained, for two hun-
dred and fifty varieties are said to be cultivated in England,
and the little black cherry grows wild even in Scotland.
The cherry orchards of Kent are famous, and in good
seasons extremely profitable, realising as much as ^30 to
the acre, the fruit being sold on the trees, the buyer
198 OUR VIANDS
taking all risk and the cost and trouble of picking and
conveying them to market. One of the greatest risks is
from the birds, which will strip a cherry tree in an hour or
two in the early morning. But although cherries are grown
in England in perfection, we yet receive vast quantities
from France and Germany, in which latter country, miles of
cherry trees line the roads, the fruit being used not only
in cookery but for making the favourite liqueur known as
Kirschwasser. It is also used for making Maraschino and
ratafia, to say nothing of our old English favourite liqueur,
cherry-brandy particularly favoured during the winter
season by sportsmen. For this the Morella cherry is best,
which is generally gathered before it is ripe, and is therefore
regarded as sour and unpalatable, but if allowed to hang on
the tree till October it is a most delicious fruit. The cherry
was formerly much used in games : that called cherry pit,
which consisted of pitching the stones into a little hole, is
often alluded to by old writers, as well as bob cherry, which
is still played by children. The song of ' Cherry Ripe ' was
written by the poet Herrick, in the time of Charles I. The
French make a tisane of the cherry stalks for colds and
coughs. Cherries, we believe, cannot be grown in hot
countries, where they revert to the wild type.
Berries have from the remotest ages formed an important
part of the food of man. Milton speaks of the banquet of
Eve as formed of fruits and berries from all climes.
' Whatever earth, all-bearing mother, yields
In India, East or West, or middle shore,
In Pontus or the Punic coast, or where
Aleinous reign 'd, fruit of all kinds, in coat
Rough, or smooth rind, or bearded husk, or shell.'
STONE FRUITS AND BERRIES 199
And, indeed, the fruits of the earth seem to be so widely
distributed, and their cultivation dates back to such hoar
antiquity, that it seems hardly possible to trace the primitive
home of the commoner varieties. Thus, among the relics
of the Lake-dwellers we find the strawberry, raspberry, black-
berry, elderberry, bilberry, and whortleberry; and although
all these grow wild in the woods, yet, when they are found
stored with corn and other plants requiring cultivation, and
with apples and plums, we may fairly suppose that they were,
to a certain extent cultivated also, probably in gardens on
the mainland, and they were perhaps boiled, or in some way
preserved for use; otherwise the seeds would have germinated
in the mud in which they have lain for so many centuries.
The gooseberry and currant do not appear among these
fruits of the Lake-dwellers, probably because they belong
naturally to our northern climes, and were unknown in
early times in Southern Europe, for these are hardy fruits,
which thrive better in Scotland than England, although
they grow freely and abundantly all over the British Isles.
Currants red, white, and black are most valuable
fruits to the British housewife, for, although even at the
best they are too acrid to be much relished as dessert
fruits, they are largely employed in puddings, pies, tarts,
and preserves indeed, some people add red currant juice
to all preserves, which appears to me a great mistake, being
calculated to destroy the flavour of the other fruits to which
it is added. Used alone, the juice of the red currant forms
the most delicious jelly in universal use as an accompani-
ment to game, venison, and roast mutton, and for making
sauce for various puddings. The black currant, which is a
different species, has excellent medicinal properties, and
200 OUR VIANDS
finds an honourable place in the Pharmacopoeia; indeed,
there is nothing better for sore throat, hoarseness, and cold
on the chest, than black currant jam, or jelly, with boiling
water. There is a belief that tons of black currants get
exported to Oporto yearly, to supplement the juice of the
grape in making that famous vino cC Oporto which for
centuries has been the panacea of all physicians, and
the source of many of the ills it is supposed to cure.
Turning to the gooseberry also a native British fruit
we find it more used in the green than in the ripe state.
Green gooseberry puddings and pies, green gooseberry jam,
gooseberry-fool, and that famous beverage of our grand-
mothers green gooseberry wine which, when well made,
was a fair home substitute for champagne such are a few
of the uses of this much-esteemed fruit.
South African colonists compare this old British fruit with
that which is called the Cape gooseberry, and are inclined
to believe like our American cousins with the Indian corn
that theirs is the genuine article and ours the counterfeit,
forgetting that centuries before the Cape gooseberry was
known, the British fruit was widely cultivated and highly
esteemed. The Cape gooseberry is, in fact, no gooseberry,
but a kind of winter cherry, which, although much relished
by those who are accustomed to the flavour, is not quite to
the taste of those who enjoy the British gooseberry; and
although it makes a splendid jam which might, we believe,
be imported profitably yet the resinous flavour requires an
educated palate to be fully appreciated. This fruit is also
cultivated in India, and a jam known as teparee is made
from it, and sometimes imported.
Few colonists have the opportunity of tasting our British
STONE FRUITS AND BERRIES 201
fruits in perfection, and especially berries, such as goose-
berries, which, when ripe, should be picked and eaten from
the bush, as they get flat and tasteless when sent to market.
We venture to think that could they wander through an
English garden when gooseberries yellow, green, and red
are ripe, they would find them worth running the risk of
a few scratches from the superabundant thorns, to obtain.
The same may be said of the raspberry, and that universal
favourite the strawberry, both of which, to be enjoyed in
perfection, should be picked and eaten where they grow.
Nevertheless, tons of strawberries find their way daily to
Covent Garden market from the provinces, and even from
Jersey and France, in the season, to be eaten and enjoyed
by those who, if they had to pick for themselves, would
never taste a berry. Yet they are still grown largely in the
immediate neighbourhood of London, and a feast of straw-
berries freshly picked may even now be eaten with cream
and sugar in many gardens in the suburbs ; but to those
accustomed to the smoke and dirt of this great Metropolis
it seems impossible that strawberries could ever have been
grown in Holborn, yet Shakespeare repeats an historic fact
when he makes Glo'ster say to the Bishop of Ely
' My Lord of Ely, when I was last in Holborn
I saw good strawberries in your garden there.'
Ely Place, the site of the Bishop's palace and garden, may
now be searched in vain for any fruit, except such as is
brought there in baskets from Covent Garden.
There is now an endless variety both of strawberries and
raspberries cultivated, but whilst in the latter the flavour is
improved as the size is increased, in the strawberry the very
large berries are seldom equal in flavour to those of medium
202 OUR VIANDS
size. Both these fruits are also much esteemed in their wild
state, and, strange to say, the wild raspberry becomes more
luscious and more highly flavoured, the farther north it is
found, forming the most delicious of fruits in Norway and
Sweden; whilst the wild strawberry is an indispensable ad-
junct to the dinner table in Alpine countries, as all travellers
know, for heaped-up dishes of strawberries appear daily at
every hotel and restaurant in Switzerland and Northern
Italy during the season, till one is constrained to wonder at
the abundance of the fruit, and the patient industry of the
gatherers, who must wander over miles of mountainous
country to supply innumerable voracious travellers daily with
this never-failing luxury. There are numerous other wild
berries, which have their use in due season, although not so
universally esteemed as the strawberry and the raspberry.
In mountainous districts the bilberry a little black berry
growing abundantly on low bushes, is excellent for pies and
puddings, whilst the cranberry which is of the same family,
but red is not only used when fresh and ripe, but is im-
ported in barrels from Norway and Russia, and a larger kind,
though not so juicy, from America, to the extent of many
thousands of gallons annually. The blackberry, which is
the fruit of the bramble, comes into the market at a season
when fruit is scarce, otherwise it would hardly hold a high
place in public favour; but, mixed with apple, it makes
excellent puddings and pies, and blackberry jam and jelly
are highly esteemed by many. The fruit of one species of
bramble which grows in the extreme north is highly lauded
by Linnaeus ; and the cloudberry is also a great boon to
dwellers in the cold and barren regions of Northern
Scandinavia and Lapland, even to the North Cape.
STONE FRUITS AND BERRIES 203
The elderberry, once so highly esteemed as a wine
producer, is now neglected. Fifty years ago a glass of hot
spiced elder wine, with sippets of toast, formed a Christmas
beverage handed nightly to honoured guests in country
houses. Now, even our peasants must have port or sherry,
and the flower and berry of the elder are left to ' waste their
sweetness on the desert air.' Yet elder-flower wine was
once thought equal to Frontignac, and there was a scramble
between man and bird for the berries : the latter are now
allowed to enjoy them unmolested, and they do not let
them hang long upon the tree when ripe. The elder was
also formerly much esteemed in medicine, and is still used
in ointments and soaps, being an excellent emollient for
the skin.
The barberry is also a fruit which has gone out of fashion.
Once upon a time preserved barberries were used in tarts,
and thought delicious ; now, however, you very seldom see
them in the market, and, if used at all, it is only by way of
garnishing, for which they are eminently suitable.
The mulberry, too, although when fully ripe it is the
most delicious of berries, is so little esteemed in England
that we have seen the ground red with the fruit which the
owner has not thought worth gathering. This, however,
was not the opinion of our ancestors, who prided themselves
upon their mulberry trees, which they cultivated with care,
and many of which survive and still bear abundance of
fruit, although planted in the sixteenth century. The
earliest recorded were planted at Sion House in 1548, and
still bear fruit. The mulberry tree is considered the wisest
of trees because it never puts forth its leaves until the frosts
are over, for which reason it is employed in heraldry to
204 OUR VIANDS
signify wisdom. The white mulberry, which is cultivated
abroad for the sake of its leaves, upon which the silk-worm
thrives better than on the black variety, is not grown in
England, probably because it is not so hardy as the other ;
but should silk ever become an industry in Ireland, as many
philanthropists have proposed to make it, the cultivation
of the white mulberry must also be attempted, and planted
in hedges, as in the Tyrol, it would probably thrive.
The olive, so famous for its oil, which is indispensable
in salads, will not thrive in Northern Europe, but is largely
grown in Spain, Italy, and the south of France. At Cap
St Martin, between Mentone and Monte Carlo, there are
some fine trees, said to have been planted by the Romans,
for the olive will live and bear fruit for a thousand years,
and the great gnarled trunks, twisted and contorted into
the most weird and fanciful shapes, give a truly venerable
appearance to these valuable trees. There is one tree, not
far from Mentone, which is said to have been planted by
Julius Caesar.
We in England do not make much use of the olive as
an article of food, but it forms an excellent addition to
stews and hashes, and is served at table as an appetiser.
Spanish olives are imported in small barrels, but the French
are usually sold in bottles, both being pickled in brine.
In Italy a single olive tree often forms a family patrimony,
the sole source of income to several sons ; but, as may be
supposed, the living derived from it is scanty and precarious.
The olive grows wild at the Cape, and attempts have
been made from time to time to cultivate it, but as yet
with little success. The olive, as we know, was one
of the famous trees of Palestine, and the oil was used in
STONE FRUITS AND BERRIES 205
the sacrifices and for the making of cakes and pastry, as
also in Egypt.
Among stone fruits, t we ought perhaps to name the
tamarind, although it is hardly a fruit to be classed with
peaches, plums, and cherries, being exceedingly acid ;
nevertheless, the acidity is its most valuable property,
rendering it of special use in flavouring various dishes,
especially curries. This pleasant acidity causes it also to
be much valued when mixed with water as a cooling drink
in fevers and other diseases. The tamarind tree is a native
of the East and West Indies, and also of Arabia, and the
fruit is a long pod, containing from three to six hard seeds
enclosed in the acid pulp. Tamarinds are imported in the
form of preserves, both from the East and West Indies.
The latter are best for cooking purposes, and the East
Indian for medicinal, as the latter are prepared without
sugar.
The mango may also be called a stone fruit, of which,
however, we do not know the true flavour, as it is known
to us only in the form of chutney; but when eaten ripe
from the tree it is said to be delicious.
Many other delicate Indian fruits might also be mentioned
here, but as they seldom appear in our markets they may
be omitted. The loquat or Japanese medlar comes to us
sometimes in the natural state, but is much cultivated in
the south of France, and forms a considerable item in that
excellent preserve of various fruits made at Grasse, which
is so commonly introduced at luncheons on the Riviera.
The guava also is known to us chiefly in the form of that
delicious jelly which has for more than a century formed
one of the exports of India.
CHAPTER XVI
ON THE BORDERLAND *TWIXT FRUIT AND VEGETABLE
IN visiting national collections of pictures in this country
and on the Continent we are almost sure to come across
one of Murillo's charming Spanish boys, sitting, ragged and
dirty, munching a huge slice of melon the very picture of
contented enjoyment. In hot weather the mouth fairly
waters at the luscious-looking morsel, deeply indented with
the teeth of the ragged urchin, and we wonder why this
delicious, cool fruit has so long been beyond the reach of
the little dirty boys of London, when for centuries their
representatives in sunny Spain and all over the south of
Europe, as well as in the Eastern Bible lands of Asia,
almost live upon it and its congeners the water-melon,
the cucumber, and the pumpkin ; whilst, if perchance this
watery diet should disagree, ' a hair of the same dog ' may
perhaps be administered in the shape of a dose of colocynth,
or bitter cucumber.
The most remarkable point in the history of this family
of fruits is their power of absorbing and retaining moisture.
Growing abundantly in the hottest and most arid countries,
they are eagerly sought as a means of assuaging thirst as
well as hunger. Humboldt says of the water-melon, that
in the Peninsula of Araya, where rain does not fall some-
206
'TWIXT FRUIT AND VEGETABLE 207
times for fifteen months, water-melons weighing from 15
to 70 Ibs. are not uncommon. Many a traveller's life
has been saved by finding a patch of these water-reservoirs
in the thirsty desert. It is said to be a native of the south
of Europe, the Levant, Egypt, and South America; but
several species abound in South Africa, and of one of them
Dr. Livingstone writes :
' The most surprising plant of the Kalahari Desert is the
water-melon kengwe or k&me. When more than the usual
quantity of rain falls, vast tracts of the country are literally
covered with these melons. Then animals of every sort
and name, including man, rejoice in the rich supply. The
elephant true lord of the forest and the different species
of rhinoceros revel in the fruit, although naturally so diverse
in their choice of pasture. The various kinds of antelopes
feed on them with avidity, and lions, hyaenas, jackals, and
mice, all seem to appreciate the common blessing. These
melons are not, however, all eatable, some being sweet and
others bitter. The natives select them by striking them
with a hatchet and applying the tongue to the gashes.'
In the East and in Egypt, melons serve also as food for
man and beast. Niebuhr, speaking of Arabia, says : c Of
pumpkins and melons several sorts grow naturally in the
woods, and serve for feeding camels, but the proper melons
are planted in the fields, where a great variety of them is to
be found, and in such abundance that the Arabians of all
ranks use them for some part of the year as their principal
article of food. They afford a very agreeable liquor.
When the fruit is nearly ripe, a hole is pierced into the
pulp ; this hole is then stopped with wax, and the melon
left upon the stalk. Within a few days the pulp is, in con-
208 OUR VIANDS
sequence of this process, converted into a delicious liquor.'
We wonder whether this practice is still continued. It
sounds so simple that people in those favoured lands where
melons grow so abundantly might try it advantageously.
Here, although melons have been grown successfully on
hot-beds for some centuries, they are still articles of luxury,
and the crop cannot be depended upon, for one day's
neglect will often cause the loss of a promising bed of
melons. Nevertheless, at our flower shows may always be
seen numbers of varieties, reared with great care, and
brought to the highest perfection, from seed obtained from
all parts of the world. The chief varieties are the red
fleshed and the green, each of which has its vehement
admirers. They also vary considerably in size, some of the
very small kinds being greatly esteemed for their fineness
of flavour.
Pliny and Columella speak of the fondness of the Emperor
Tiberius for melons, and of the contrivances by which they
were provided for him at all seasons; whilst of another
Emperor, Frederick the Great, it is related that his physician,
finding him suffering greatly from indigestion during his last
illness, learned that he had eaten three or four melons
(small ones, we may suppose) daily for breakfast, and his
only reply to the physician's remonstrance was, that he
would send him some to taste, thinking the excellence of
the fruit would show the doctor the difficulty of abstaining
from so favourite a dish.
Many people besides Frederick of Prussia have found
melons indigestible in our colder climes. In truth, they
are best suited to hot climates and hot weather, and will
be sure to disagree in cold seasons ; and so well was this
'TWIXT FRUIT AND VEGETABLE 209
understood formerly, that melons were never sent to table
without an accompaniment of ground ginger. Nowadays
people risk indigestion, and eat them with sugar only, or
sometimes with pepper and salt. Melons of some kind have
of late become almost as abundant in our streets as in those
of the sunny South, for they are imported by thousands from
Spain great green-looking things called water-melons, but
not really so, and of very good flavour when ripe slices
being now sold in the streets at a halfpenny, or even less, so
that it is no longer an uncommon sight to see our ragged
urchins munching their slice of melon, like Murillo's little
Spanish boys.
It is not easy to say whether the cucumber should be
classed as a fruit or a vegetable ; it stands upon the border-
land, and may be eaten as either, but whether fresh, stewed,
or pickled, is a very delicious accompaniment to many
savoury dishes, and especially salads j and what would those
pleasant cooling summer beverages, claret and champagne
cup, be, without a slice or two of cucumber floating on the
top ? Cucumbers, like melons, have become so much more
plentiful of late, that they may be purchased all the year
round for a few pence, being cultivated largely in green-
houses, and, in the summer, in the open air. ' A lodge in
a garden of cucumbers' will come to the mind in writing
of them. Here we have not to put up sheds to safeguard
them from foxes and jackals, as in Syria, but the market
gardener has to watch against human prowlers, ever on the
alert to fill their own pockets at the expense of their neigh-
bours ; for a crop of cucumbers the plants trained under
glass in greenhouses like vines, the fruit hanging from them
by hundreds, straight, and often half a yard in length if
210 OUR VIANDS
they can be brought forward early enough in the spring, is
worth a very large sum, but they diminish rapidly in value
as the season advances.
Pumpkins and vegetable marrows, which belong to the
same tribe as the melon and the cucumber, are certainly
vegetables, not being eaten in the raw state. As vegetables
they are much more esteemed abroad than in England,
although the vegetable marrow has grown greatly in favour
of late years, but the pumpkin so much used on the
Continent, in America, and in our Colonies is still utterly
rejected by our peasantry, as fit only for pigs. In vain do
philanthropists show how easily it is grown, and how it may
be stored for winter use. Hodge will have none of it.
Nevertheless, of late pumpkin in slices has been sold at the
greengrocers for soups, etc., during the winter, and appears
to meet with a ready sale, so that perhaps in time the
prejudice may be overcome.
Singularly enough, it would seem that the pumpkin was
very early introduced into England, and was then known
as the melon, the melon itself being called musk melon.
The cucumber, too, is said to have been commonly grown
in England in the reign of Edward III., but was afterwards
neglected and disused until the reign of Henry VIII., and
not generally cultivated till the middle of the seventeenth
century.
There is another plant standing on the borderland
between fruit and vegetables which has lately come into
great request. This is the tomato, long known as the
love-apple. The tomato belongs to a poisonous tribe of
plants, known botanically as solanacece, which includes the
nightshades of deadly fame, and also the well-known and
>TWIXT FRUIT AND VEGETABLE 211
highly-prized potato. The potato and tomato are both
natives of America. Both were introduced about the same
time ; but their history has been very different, for whilst
the potato has found its way into every home, and has been
the chief stay and solace of the poorest, the tomato has,
until quite recently, been cultivated very sparingly, and
more as a curiosity than an article of food. I remember
seeing them grown against a wall as ornamental plants, in
the days when potatoes flourished abundantly, before the
deadly blight had fallen upon them. But although the love-
apple, as it was called, was regarded as a curiosity, and
admired for its beautiful colour, we should no more have
thought of eating it than the seeds of the potato, which
were reputed poisonous, and we believe a similar reputation
was attached at that time to the tomato by the ignorant,
although it was used for making sauce, and the fruit when
green was sometimes pickled.
The name of the tomato, Lycopersicum, signifies ' wolf-
peach,' says Macintosh's 'Book of the Garden,' 'and was
given to it because of the deceptive value of the fruit.'
But that was at a time when, as we said above, it was
regarded as only a semi-poisonous curiosity. Nowadays
the tomato is highly valued, as it deserves to be, for, as a
vegetable, it has found its way at last into English kitchens,
and is recognised by our cooks as an excellent adjunct to
soups, stews, curries, etc., but the poor still despise and
dislike it, and indeed its price would prevent its free use
among them. On the Continent it has long been highly
prized, as well as in America, and its medicinal properties
in cases of liver complaint have been long recognised. Our
market gardeners are beginning to cultivate it largely, and
212 OUR VIANDS
a splendid show of this fruit, or vegetable, of numerous
varieties, all grown in the open, has been held at the
Crystal Palace. We may, therefore, hope soon to have it
abundant in English markets; meanwhile the tinned
tomatoes from America and France answer fairly well for
cooking purposes. The African egg plant belongs to the
same family as the tomato, and is eaten boiled and stewed
in some places, being highly valued in China and the
West Indies.
There is another kind of semi-fruit largely consumed in
tropical countries ; this is the plantain, which, with its near
relation the banana, forms the staple food of innumerable
tribes in Asia, Africa, America, and the oceanic islands of
the Atlantic and Pacific. The plantain and banana grow
in immense clusters, often weighing from seventy to eighty
pounds on a single plant, and they are so easily cultivated,
that even the most savage races understand how to produce
them. The banana is said to bear a crop every three
months, so that a plantation of from thirty to forty roots
will yield more than four thousand pounds of fruit. The
banana is rather smaller than the plantain, but both varieties
are now frequently seen in our fruiterers' shops. The taste
resembles that of a mealy pear, with a little butter added;
the banana is sometimes dried like the fig, and is then
pounded and used as meal.*
Perhaps we may include among those plants which serve
both as fruit and vegetable the date palm, which yields a
farinaceous substance resembling sago (which is the product
of another species of palm), as well as the invaluable date,
* A lady writing from South Africa says they found bananas growing
wild with upwards of 100 pods in a bunch.
'TWIXT FRUIT AND VEGETABLE 213
which, both in its green and dried state, forms the staple
food of the people wherever it grows. The failure of the
crop means famine, and to cut down the date trees is the
first act of an enemy. The dates we buy here are dried in
the sun, or pressed into baskets before they are quite ripe,
as the ripe fruit would not bear transport. The centre or
crown of the date palm is sometimes eaten as a cabbage,
but as this destroys the tree, it is only cut from sterile trees,
and after the removal of this cabbage the sap rises, and palm
wine or toddy flows from the cavity at the rate of about a
gallon a day, continuing for nearly six weeks in diminishing
quantities. From this palm-wine, arrack is made by distilla-
tion, and a spirit is also obtained by soaking the dates in
water, and afterwards distilling it, whilst the stalks are boiled
and used as .food for cattle. A few years ago a company
was formed for the manufacture of date coffee, which was
made from the date stones roasted and ground, but this
spurious coffee has now been nearly, if not quite, abandoned.
That useful plant the rhubarb, may properly find a place
in this chapter, for although chiefly used as a substitute for
fruit, it is only the leaf stalk of a plant which came originally
from the East, but which has apparently been cultivated in
England since the latter part of the sixteenth century, and
seems to grow yearly in popularity, as, when forced, it is
attainable during the winter months when fruits are scarce,
whilst the giant out-door leaf stalks are sold at a very cheap
rate all through the summer and autumn, when it is largely
used for puddings and tarts, and also for stewing, preserving,
and wine-making.
The far-famed legendary lotos must also find a place here.
It is variously described as a lily, and as a shrub bearing a
214 OUR VIANDS
fruit of a sweet taste resembling gingerbread. This last
was probably the lotos of the Lotophagi, which is described
by Polybius as a stiff, thorny shrub, with small green leaves.
The fruit, when green, is said to resemble myrtle berries,
but when ripe they are like round olives of a reddish colour,
and, like olives, contain a hard nut The fruit is gathered,
crushed, and kept in close vessels, and resembles figs or
dates in flavour ; it is reckoned next to the date in value,
and was said to have formed the chief food of man, being
so delicious that whosoever tasted it ceased to desire any
other food, and forgot everything in the pleasure of eating it.
It grows in Egypt and Northern Africa. But although this
was probably the lotos of the poets, it is certain that the
Egyptians eat also the fruit and seeds of the lotos lily, as
well as the root of the arum, which is eaten in many
countries, either roasted or pounded, and precipitated as a
starch, resembling manioc or tapioca.
CHAPTER XVII
ROOTS
IT is hard to realise the fact that three hundred years ago
the potato was unknown in Europe, and we wonder what
our ancestors could have done without a vegetable which
is now regarded as indispensable. Yet, at the date of its
introduction, it was so little thought of, that it is still a
disputed point as to whom belongs the honour of having
brought it over, and whether it came from Chili or Peru,
where it grows wild, or from Virginia. We used to believe
that Sir Walter Raleigh was this benefactor, but Sir John
Hawkins (1565), Sir Francis Drake (1586), and Thomas
Herriott (1585) are also credited with its first introduction;
at any rate, most people are agreed that Ireland was its first
European home, and that the neighbourhood of Cork was
the spot where the earliest potato crop was raised. Never-
theless, a century after its first planting, Houghton, the
botanist, writing in 1681, says : * The potato is a bacciferous
herb with esculent roots, bearing winged leaves and a bell
flower This, I have been informed, was brought
first out of Virginia by Sir Walter Raleigh, and he stopping
at Ireland, some was planted there, where it thrived very
well and to good purpose, for, in their succeeding wars,
215
216 OUR VIANDS
when all the corn above ground was destroyed, this sup-
ported them, for the soldiers, unless they had dug up all
the ground where they grew and almost sifted it, could net
extirpate them. From thence they were brought to
Lancashire, where they are very numerous, and now they
begin to spread all the kingdom over. They are a pleasant
food, boiled or roasted, and eaten with butter and sugar'
Fancy eating sugar with potatoes ! He then goes on to
say, ' There is a sort brought from Spain that are of a longer
form (Convolvulus Batatas), and are much more luscious tnan
ours, for they are much set by, and sold for 6d. or 8d. a
pound.' Sweet potatoes which, by-the-by, are not potatoes
at all are now very little thought of in comparison with the
commoner potato, and, although they are eaten and relished
by the few, would certainly be rejected by the many, whilst
the potato is cultivated everywhere, occupying 512,471 acres
in Great Britain in 1877, and in the same year 7,964,840
cwt. were imported, valued at ^2, 348, 749.
I well remember the terrible time of the first appearance
of the potato blight in 1845, aQ d the great change wrought
by it in this favourite vegetable. Previously great fields of
potatoes grew and flourished abundantly, producing their
white or purple blossom, according to their kind, followed
by green or purplish seed-pods, the haulm, when withered,
being pulled up and burnt, or left to rot as manure, whilst
the tubers were dug and pitted for winter use, the great aim
being to preserve them from frost. The consternation which
took possession of people when they saw the haulm getting
black and dying away, long before it was time for the
blossom, may be imagined, and when it was found that the
tuber was rotting in the ground, a wail went up from one
ROOTS 217
end of the country to the other and no wonder, for it
meant to many in England, and to all in Ireland, a grievous
famine. At first the pigs were fed on the diseased roots,
but they soon got too bad even for pigs to eat ; then it was
found out that, if taken in time, the roots might be grated,
and starch made from them, and so, at every cottage door
sat women and children grating the fast-rotting roots into
pans of water; but little could be gained by that, although
potato starch is still used, and called English arrowroot.
People, however, could not live on that, and soon got tired
of trying, and the potatoes were left to rot in the ground.
Year after year this went on, and no one seemed to know
how to remedy the evil ; but at last the natural history of
the disease came to be known, and now by careful cultiva-
tion of sorts less liable to be attacked by the fungus which
causes the disease, the potato again begins to hold up its
head, and may be seen blossoming and bearing seed as
before. But many of the sorts most prized prior to 1845
have entirely disappeared, and among them one which was
the delight of our childhood, known as the China orange,
which came to table in its skin, just bursting, and showing
a beautiful red under coat, covering a great floury ball of
most delicious flavour. The Irish, who may be supposed
to know the best mode of cooking their favourite vegetable,
always boil them in their skins, and in so doing retain the
full flavour, but they also like them slightly hard in the
middle * with the bones in,' as they say which is not so
much to English taste.
The latest method of preventing the potato blight is that
recommended by Mr. Jensen, namely to disinfect the seed
tubers by storing them for four or five days in a dry-air
218 OUR VIANDS
chamber, at a temperature of 100 to 105 clegs. Fahrenheit;
but others recommend syringing the leaves with a solution
of sulphate of copper and quicklime, which is also said to
increase the growth of the tubers.
Edible roots have always formed a large portion of man's
food, from the most primitive times. Savages in all lands
have their digging sticks, with which they turn up such
things as experience has taught them will prove good to
eat, and the most singular thing is that instinct appears to
act with them as with the lower animals, preventing them
from taking that which is poisonous ; and where they find
poisonous roots, as in many of the lily tribe, they have
learnt to nullify the poison by roasting the root, or by
scraping it and extracting the acrid juice by pressure or
by soaking in water before cooking, as in the manioc, of
which we wrote in a former chapter. But civilised man has
not forsaken the habits of his remote ancestors, and still
delves as Adam did for the produce of the soil, although he
no longer depends upon the chance of finding a supply
when needed, but plants and waters, weeds and watches,
till he may dig the anticipated crop; and then he very
commonly buries the roots again snugly beneath the soil,
carefully covered up with straw and trenched round to keep
the treasure from that which may corrupt, in order that he
may have them sound and good during the frost and snows
of winter, when most needed for the household, and for
those domestic animals which form a large portion of his
wealth, but which in early times had mainly to shift for
themselves, and die of starvation when the grass of the
field failed them.
Next to the potato, the most important root of modern times
ROOTS 219
is undoubtedly the turnip, which in its many varieties keeps
thousands of cattle alive, and is not despised as a vegetable
on the most lordly table ; but we remember a time when it
was not considered right to feed milch cows upon turnips, lest
it should injure the flavour of the milk and butter. Yet we
find that turnips were grown abundantly by the Romans as
food for cattle, and they seem to have devoted themselves
to the cultivation of this vegetable as we do now, for Pliny
speaks of roots weighing 40 Ibs., which far exceeds our
greatest efforts. The beet, we are told, grew in the country
of the Sibines, and was sold in Rome for a sum equal to
2d. each in our money.
The Romans doubtless introduced the cultivation of the
turnip into our country, but it seems to have been neglected
for many centuries, and was probably reintroduced by the
Flemings ; it seems however to have been only used as a
vegetable, for in a book called the 'Haven of Health,'
published in 1597, we are told, 'Although many men love
to eat turnips, yet do swine abhor them.' By which we may
learn that the taste even of pigs may be educated, for at
present piggy will certainly eat his turnip with as much
relish as his master. It would, however, appear that the
turnip was not cultivated in fields until the end of the
seventeenth century.
As food for man, it seems to be more highly esteemed
in foreign countries than here. Linnaeus tells us the
Laplanders are so fond of this root that they will give
a whole cheese in exchange for a single turnip ; and
from Clarke's ' Travels in Russia ' we learn that in Russia,
turnips are used as fruit, and in the houses of the nobility a
raw turnip cut in slices is handed about on a silver salver
220 OUR VIANDS
with brandy, to stimulate the appetite. The Maltese golden
turnip, which is of a beautiful orange colour and quite round,
is frequently eaten as fruit.
The Swedish turnip commonly known as the swede
is principally cultivated for cattle, but there is a small yellow
variety grown in Scotland, which is there much esteemed
as a vegetable, but is never seen in the London market,
although far superior in flavour to the turnip commonly
sold. It is recorded that in the years 1629 and 1630, when
there was a dearth in England, very good, white, lasting,
and wholesome bread was made of boiled turnips deprived
of their moisture by pressure, and then kneaded with an
equal quantity of wheaten flour into what was known as
turnip bread ; and the same substitute for wheat was used
again in Essex in 1693, when there was a scarcity of
corn. At present there is no temptation to adulterate
bread with turnips, but probably bread thus made would
be much more wholesome than that which now makes
its appearance artificially whitened with plaster of Paris
and alum.
Turnip tops are much esteemed as a vegetable, but few
people know that the long, white shoots of turnips or swedes
which have been pitted, may be cooked, and rival sea-kail in
flavour. We remember a use for the swede also not gener-
ally known, which is to cut a swede in slices like a loaf of
bread, sprinkle each slice with brown sugar, placing the
slices again in their order, and allowing them to stand for
some hours. The juice which runs from it is reckoned by
country people an excellent remedy for a cough.
Next to the turnip, the carrot probably ranks highest in
culinary estimation. Although, like the turnip, it seems
ROOTS 221
to have been only introduced into this country by the
Flemings, in the reign of Elizabeth, it made its way into
public favour much more quickly than the turnip, and in
the reign of James the First, the foliage was used by the
ladies to adorn their headdresses. The graceful leaf is
still often seen in bouquets, and we are told this simple
decoration may be obtained even in winter, by cutting off
the thick end of the carrot and placing it in a shallow pan
of water, when a crown of delicate leaves will soon appear.
The carrot is not so extensively cultivated as food for cattle
as the turnip, although eaten by them with much relish, the
horse being extremely fond of it, and its use is said to be
particularly beneficial in preserving and restoring the wind
of horses. Pigs, also, are very fond of carrots, and fatten
very quickly upon them ; nevertheless, the turnip is more
favoured by the agriculturist, perhaps because more pro-
ductive, although we are told that e at Parlington, in
Yorkshire, the stock of a farm, consisting of twenty working
horses, four bullocks, and six milch cows, were fed from
the end of September to the beginning of May on the
carrots produced from three acres of land, with a very
small quantity of hay, and thirty hogs were fattened on the
refuse left by the cattle.' If this account can be relied on,
we wonder that farmers do not cultivate the carrot more
largely, but they seem to prefer beet and mangold wurtzel
which latter is said to produce the largest roots and the
most weighty crop in a given space of land, whilst beetroot
is credited with improving the quantity and quality of milk
in cows. The mangold is never sent to table, but beet is
much esteemed, and is commonly added to salads, although
it requires to be boiled carefully, and not cut or pricked,
222 OUR VIANDS
or it will lose all its colour. It is now usually sold ready
boiled by the greengrocer.
The parsnip, although good and nutritious, is not a
favourite vegetable, except in certain localities. In the
north of Scotland, we are told, parsnips mixed with potatoes
and butter are much esteemed, and to this mess salt fish is
added in Catholic countries, and they certainly eat well
either with salt fish or salt beef, but should always have a
little dripping added to them in boiling. The Dutch cook
them by pouring over them, after they are boiled, a little
butter in which a small quantity of sugar has been dissolved,
and then browning them in the oven.
A root in many respects similar to the parsnip is the
skirret, formerly so highly esteemed by the Romans as to
have been specially imported from the Rhine for the
emperor's table, whilst it served as one of the ingredients
used to garnish the famous Lucanian boar.
' Around him lay whatever could excite,
With pungent force, the jaded appetite ;
Rapes, lettuce, radishes, anchovy brine,
With skirrets, and the lees of Coan wine.'
Skirrets have recently re-appeared in the market, and
perhaps will once more become the fashion, although they
appear to be too sweet to suit modern taste as a vegetable.
Those, however, who enjoy parsnips and sweet potatoes
may probably relish the skirret, as also the scorzonera,
which at one time was highly esteemed, not only as a
vegetable, but as a cure for snake bites. It is still some-
times sent to table in France and Spain.
The yam, that gigantic root extensively cultivated in
Africa, Asia, America, and the West Indies, is never seen
ROOTS 223
in our markets, but is eaten as bread, either roasted or
boiled, by the natives of the countries in which it grows.
The roots sometimes weigh as much as thirty pounds, but
are not relished by Europeans.
The only other root we need notice here is the Jerusalem
artichoke a name corrupted from girasole, which is the
Italian name for sunflower, of which it is a species. It is
very easily grown, and not very readily exterminated when
once introduced into a garden. It is a native of Brazil,
and was Drought over in 1667, being much esteemed before
potatoes became so generally cultivated. It is not much
relished now by the poor, but is frequently found on the
tables of the wealthy, and, when well cooked, is excellent,
especially when sent to table, as in France, with white sauce
and a garnishing of Parmesan cheese lightly browned. It
also makes a capital soup.
But of all vegetables known to us, perhaps the onion
and its allies notwithstanding the suspicion of vulgarity
attaching to them are the most universal and indispensable
in the culinary art, for how insipid would soups, sauces,
hashes, stews, gravies, salads, and seasonings of all kinds be
without the soup^on of the onion, the shalot, or the stronger
and yet more vulgar garlic. Whilst, as a vegetable,
what can be found more grateful to the general palate, and
more wholesome also, than the Spanish onion roasted or
stewed or the leek, the national badge of Wales, and
appreciated by epicures everywhere ?
The pedigree of the onion family can be traced back to
hoar antiquity so hoary, indeed, that the first parent is
unknown, although supposed to have sprung from Central
Asia, whence it spread north, south, east, and west, branching
224 OUR VIANDS
off as aristocratic families, and even plebeian, are apt to
do and assuming new forms under altered circumstances,
until all our mo Jern varieties have become developed
through the survival of the fittest, and we can now call to
our aid the onion proper, in many different sizes and
varieties of flavour, from the little pickling onion to the
great Spanish bulb weighing half a pound or more ; garlic,
with its root conveniently divided into cloves, that our
cooks may not spoil the dish by too lavish use of that of
which very little suffices ; the eschalot or, shortly, shalot
not quite so pungent in flavour, but equally useful ; chives,
usually eaten green to flavour omelettes, salads, etc.; the
leek, so esteemed by the Emperor Nero that his subjects
gave him the name of Porrophagus (the Latin name for the
leek being Allium porrum\ for he ate them, with oil only,
for several days in every month to clear his voice, abstaining
from bread on these leek-eating days ; and, lastly, there is
a curious tree-onion, which bears the bulbs on the top of
the stem instead of seeds, as in the other species this
is supposed to be a variety of the common onion changed
by transplantation to Canada, whence we derive it.
The Welsh, we are told, plant the bulbs of the tree
onion as they drop off the parent stem, and they grow to
a considerable size. The French call this Vognon d'Egypte,
although it is not supposed to have come originally from
that country. The ancient Egyptians (2000 B.C.) venerated
some say worshipped the common onion, and certainly
possessed several of the varieties, for we are told that the
Israelites in the desert pined for ' the leeks and the onions
and the garlic' they had enjoyed so abundantly in Egypt;
and, if we are to believe travellers, the onions of Egypt
ROOTS 22$
were, and still are, especially good, being larger, softer, and
more delicate in flavour than ours.
We have seen how great was the devotion of the Emperor
Nero to the leek, although according to Pliny they had not
long been introduced in his day, having been brought from
Egypt; but onions were largely used by the Romans much
earlier, for they gave them to their labourers to strengthen
them, and to their soldiers and gamecocks to excite their
courage.
Alphonse Karr, in that charming book ' A Tour round
my Garden,' thus speaks of the yellow garlic, the moly of
Homer : c The yellow garlic is more than it appears to be ;
the yellow garlic has the power of keeping us safe from
enchantments, spells, and evil presages. A crow may fly
by you on your left hand, but you need not entertain any
fear, if you have only the yellow garlic in your garden. You
meet with a spider in the morning, don't be afraid of it ; you
spill the salt, the mischance will not fall to you ; a hare
crosses your path in the morning, be not on that account
apprehensive of the crosses of the world ; the yellow garlic
is cherished by you in your garden and watches over you ;
the yellow garlic will not allow any of these evil omens to
affect you. . . .
' Pliny says that it is one of the most valuable plants to
man. Homer relates that it was to the virtues of the yellow
garlic that Ulysses owed his fortunate escape from being
turned into a pig by Circe as well as his companions, whom
he delivered from this disagreeable transformation.'
Although the Greeks cultivated several of the onion tribe
for culinary purposes, they are said to have regarded onion-
eaters in such abhorrence as to look upon them as profane
P
226 OUR VIANDS
persons. This we might readily infer from the straight
classical nose of the race, to which fastidious organ the rank
smell of raw onions would be peculiarly abhorrent. Even
to ourselve?, the smell of onions or garlic in a public con-
veyance or place of amusement, is intensely disagreeable,
and the strongly-flavoured dishes of the Spaniards and
Portuguese the people of all Europe most given to the
eating of garlic are most unpleasant to the palate of
Englishmen; and yet, if we attempted to give a list of
English dishes into which the onion in some form enters,
we should wellnigh exhaust the cookery book.
Formerly the onion and garlic played an important part
in pharmacopoeias, but at present the doctor has given them
over to the cook; nevertheless, their medicinal value is
known and acknowledged, and the old remedy for cold-
onion broth is still prepared in many household?, whilst
the garlic has recently regained somewhat of its former
reputation as a remedy for bronchial coughs and shortness
of breath.
M'Intosh's ' Book of the Garden ' tells us that ' Palladius,
a Greek physician, recommends the onion to be sown with
savory, in which curious opinion Pliny agrees, observing
that onions prosper better when savory is sown with them.'
' It was,' says the writer, ' a current opinion in those days
that certain plants had an antipathy to, or sympathy with,
each other. However absurd such an idea may appear to
us, we should take into consideration, that the opinions of
the ancients may not have been faithfully handed down to
us, or that their works may admit of a somewhat different
construction. We find Phillips observes that all the plants
which they recommend to be sown or planted together are
ROOTS 227
of very opposite natures, and there may be more reason in
the system pursued by the ancients than is generally
allowed; for plants drawing the same juice from the earth
must naturally weaken each other, whereas those requiring
different nutriment may in some degree assist each other,
each feeding upon juices that are prejudicial to plants of
the other species. In this there is great truth.'
How easy it is to laugh at the wisdom of the ancients ;
yet in most things we have to come round to their opinions
in the long run. Gardeners nowadays are quite alive to
the affinities of plants, and their predilection for certain
soils and situations ; and in planting onions, if they do not
grow savory with them, care should be taken that they have
good rich loamy soil, and are well weeded and watered.
This was probably the secret of their successful cultivation
among the Romans. We do not know when the onion and
its allies were first introduced into this country, but probably
it is one of the benefits we derive from the Roman occupa-
tion of Britain. Garlic is first mentioned in 1548, and the
leek in 1562. Shakespeare makes it the badge of the
Welsh after the Battle of Crecy, and their fondness for the
onion tribe is noticed by Worlidge, who says : * I have
seen the greater part of a garden planted with leeks, and a
part of the remainder with onions and garlic.' Perhaps it
is to this diet that the Welshman owes his pugnacity.
CHAPTER XVIII
PULSE AND CABBAGE
BEANS and peas are familiar to everybody as vegetables,
and are in use all the year round, but few people are aware
that they have been in cultivation perhaps longer than any
other vegetable in Europe, and that many curious notions
regarding both especially beans have been handed down
to us from hoar antiquity. Beans are supposed to have
been brought from Egypt; yet the Egyptian priests regarded
it as a crime even to look at them. Pythagoras commanded
his followers to abstain from them, professing to believe that
man was formed from them; and Lucian introduces a
philosopher in hell, saying that to eat beans and to eat our
father's head were equal crimes. The Romans at one time
believed that the souls of the dead resided in beans ; yet
they had a solemn feast in which beans were offered in
honour of Carna, the consort of Janus, who is said to have
enjoyed a little bacon with them : hence our bean-feasts
date from very remote times. The Athenians used sodden
beans in their feasts to Apollo. Black and white beans
were used to record the votes of the people in choosing
their magistrates, etc. A white bean signified absolution ;
a black, condemnation, which is apparently the origin of
the custom of blackballing an opponent.
Beans and peas are both found among the relics of the
228
PULSE AND CABBAGE 229
Swiss Lake dwellings, and are named among the provision
conveyed to David when he was hiding from his son
Absalom. The botanical name of the bean, Faba> is said
to be derived from phago (to eat), or paba (to feed), and it
has undoubtedly formed a favourite food from time imme-
morial; but notwithstanding the many centuries during
which it has been cultivated, only two species the common
garden or broad bean, and the horse bean are known. The
kidney bean (Phaseolus) so named from phaselus (a little
boat), because of the shape of the pods seems to have
come to us from two widely different sources. The dwarf
kidney bean, commonly known as the French bean, is a
native of India, but is mentioned as being generally culti-
vated in England in 1597, whilst the scarlet runner was
introduced from South America in 1633, and was first
cultivated by the celebrated gardener Tradescant, at
Lambeth ; but for nearly a century it was grown almost
wholly for its flowers, which formed the chief ornament in
all nosegays, and its pods or legumes were only occasionally
used as a vegetable until the eighteenth century, when
they were brought into notice by Miller, of Chelsea. They
are not, however, as nutritious as the broad bean, which
contains 57 per cent, of nutritive matter.*
* The traveller Navarette speaks of a paste of kidney beans eaten
by every one in China from the emperor to the meanest peasant. The
juice is extracted from the beans, which are pressed into cakes like
large cheeses as white as snow. This paste is eaten either raw or fried
with fish, herbs, and other things, or smoked and mixed with carraway
seeds, which is said to be best of all. Navarette marvels at the vast
quantity of this food, known as Teu Fu, and says, ' that Chinese who
has Teu Fu, herbs, and rice, needs no other sustenance. It is a great
help in case of want, and is good for carriage.'
230 OUR VIANDS
The small black beans called fricollis^ which are in such
great demand all over Mexico, are doubtless a kind of
kidney bean. Immense fields of this bean are cultivated,
and they are eaten at every meal, being relished alike by
native and foreigner. There is another sort of bean, called
the snail flower (Phaseolus Caracalla), from a Celtic word
meaning a hood, which was also brought by the Portuguese
from South America. Nor must we omit to mention the
locust bean, supposed to have been the food of John the
Baptist in the wilderness, although, if procurable, the
genuine locusts would be quite as likely to have formed the
diet of the recluse as the bean, seeing they are eaten with
relish by the natives of all the countries which they
devastate, as well as by all domestic animals. The locust
bean, called St. John's bread, is the fruit of the handsome
carob or carouba tree, which grows abundantly in Palestine
and other Eastern countries, where the pods are turned to
many uses, the husks being used for feeding cattle, and are
supposed to be those referred to in the parable of the
Prodigal Son. A juice expressed from the pods after the
beans are taken out, is used, with other ingredients, for
making sherbet ; the pulp is also eaten, and the leaves and
bark of the tree are used for tanning skins. Of late years
the dried pods have been imported into this country and
used for feeding cattle.
Lentils, which are also leguminous plants, have long
formed an article of diet in Egypt, and in many parts of
Europe, but have only recently been introduced into
England as a vegetable; they are, however, now much
esteemed, especially in soups. Lentils were largely used
in Greece, and were reputed to soften the temper and
PULSE AND CABBAGE 231
dispose the mind to study; but the Romans, on the contrary,
said they made men lazy, hence the name from lentus (slow).
Haricot beans, which are much more extensively used on
the Continent than here, are the ripe beans of the white
French bean, but in Italy a dish is frequently served which
at first seemed to us to resemble the haricot bean, although
much smaller : this, however, we found to be the seed of
the white lupin, which is grown in large quantities, and
respecting which a legend is told. It is said that, when
the Holy Family were journeying to Egypt, being pursued,
they hid themselves in a field of lupins, but the seeds
rattled and almost betrayed them, whereupon they cursed
the plant, declaring that henceforth men should eat of them
and not be satisfied ; and they are certainly unsatisfying,
although pleasant eating.
Peas, which are more esteemed than beans at the present
time, have almost as ancient a pedigree, having probably
been brought from Egypt or Syria. Nevertheless, they do
not appear to have been cultivated in England so early as
the bean, for, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, Fuller says,
they were brought from Holland and were fit dainties for
ladies they came so far and cost so dear. There is an
entry in the privy purse expenses of Henry VIII.: "Paied
to a man in rewarde for bringing peascodds to the King's
grace iiiji. viiu/.
The chick pea, which is cultivated in South Europe,
especially in Spain, does not boil soft, but is used to garnish
savoury dishes, and always forms part of the universal
Spanish dish called an olla, which is composed of bacon,
cabbage, pumpkin, and chick peas, called garvanzos. This
pea, when parched, is much esteemed, and is supposed to
232 OUR VIANDS
be that which formed the parched pulse which was the
common provision of the Hebrew soldiers : it was also
probably that which was supplied to Daniel, Shadrach,
Meshech, and Abednego instead of meat. Parched pulse
seems also to have formed a part of the ordinary food of
the common people of ancient Rome.
A curious property is noticed as belonging to the
chickling vetch, a leguminous plant, which in the last
century was used for making bread, until forbidden by the
Government. Mixed with half flour it is good and harmless,
but eaten alone it produces paralysis of the limbs, and
swine fed upon it become very fat, but quite unable to
stand. The Italians, however, still eat it mixed with three-
parts of flour. There is a bean called the chestnut bean, dis-
covered by Mr. Cunningham growing on a tree in New South
Wales, which when roasted, is said to resemble chestnuts.
There is a kind of bean which, although not used in
cookery, must yet be noticed here, it is that known as the
Kuara bean, growing on a beautiful tree in Abyssinia and
many other parts of Africa. This tree, known as Erythrina,
produces a beautiful spike of scarlet flowers, succeeded by
pods containing several little scarlet beans with a black
spot, which vary so little in weight, that under the name of
carats they have been used from time immemorial as the
standard weight for gold and gems, especially diamonds.
A curious fact regarding leguminous plants is mentioned
in Rhind's 'History of the Vegetable Kingdom,' which
is that they generate so much carbonic acid gas, especially
when flowering, that in mining districts the overseers have
to guard against the deadly gas sinking into the pits and
causing the death of the miners, by especial ventilation
PULSE AND CABBAGE 233
during the bean season. We do not remember to have
seen anything of the kind mentioned elsewhere, and it is
perhaps an exploded idea. Of late years green peas tinned,
have been largely imported from France, and are excellent
eating, but some in bottles, preserved in England, are still
better; we also get from America, Boston baked beans, and
succotash, which is Indian com mixed with beans, and very
good as a winter vegetable.
The vegetable which was in universal use before the
potato was known, still holds its place as second in public
estimation ; this is cabbage, which in its wild state appears
to be indigenous in England, as well as on the Continent of
Europe, but in its cultivated form came to us first, we are
told, through the Romans, although the many varieties of
this useful plant which are now sold in our markets and
served on our tables are of later introduction, and come
from various countries. According to Candolle, the wild
cabbage of the Mediterranean is the parent of all our
varieties.
Dr. Lindley divides cabbage into five classes, the first of
which includes kail as grown in Scotch kailyards that is,
cabbage in which the leaves are loose and do not turn into
a head. In the second class we find Brussels sprouts ; in
the third, common cabbage, savoys, etc. ; in the fourth,
cauliflower and brocoli ; in the fifth, kohl-rabi.
According to Columella, cabbage was a favourite food
with Roman freemen, and was sufficiently abundant to be
given also to slaves. Cromwell's soldiers are credited with
its introduction into Scotland, but we can hardly believe
that it was unknown to Scotland at so late a date. The
close-hearted variety was imported from Holland, until Sir
234 OUR VIANDS
Anthony Ashley brought it into cultivation in England. It
is said that a cabbage is sculptured at the feet of this
gentleman on his monument in Wimborne Minster, Dorset,
but according to all accounts he was not altogether an
admirable personage, although he rendered a great benefit
to the gardeners of this country by the introduction of the
cabbage, which in some form serves as food for rich and
poor all the year round.
Sir Anthony Ashley brought his cabbage, it is said, in
more forms than one, from Cales (Cadiz), where he held a
command and grew rich by t iking unlawful possession of
other men's goods, and especially by appropriating some
jewels entrusted to him by a lady; hence he is said to have
got more by Cales (Cadiz) than by Cale (cabbage). This,
perhaps, may be the origin of our term to cabbage. A curious
cabbage is found in the Channel Islands. It grows to 8 or
even 16 feet in height, and throws out branches from the
central stem, which is so hard and woody that walking-
sticks are made of it, and it is used as rafters for cottage
roofs. Then there is the Portugal cabbage, the mid-ribs of
which are cooked like seakale.*
Among the curious kinds of cabbage must also be
reckoned the kohl-rabi, which is something between or,
rather, a combination of the cabbage and the turnip, the
stem of the cabbage swelling out just above the roots, and
forming a round, turnip-like mass, which in this country is
only grown and that very sparingly as food for cattle ;
but which, among the Dutch at the Cape, as well as on the
* The staple food of Russian peasants consists of black rye-bread
and cabbage broth thickened with oatmeal, to which salt fish is some-
times added,
PULSE AND CABBAGE 235
Continent of Europe, especially in Germany, is greatly
esteemed as a vegetable, and, when properly cooked, is
very delicious. Both parts are used : the green leaves are
cooked like spinach, and put round the dish, whilst the
turnip part is cut into strips, boiled tender, and placed in
the centre, thus forming an ornamental and very appetising
addition to the dinner-table, which might be advantageously
introduced into England; but the prejudices of our cooks
are not easily overcome. It is hard to convince them that
what 'furriners' and cattle eat, can be good for Englishmen,
although we are glad to see in the greengrocers' shops
everywhere now, the large and very delicious cow cabbage,
one of which is sufficient for a dozen men. Perhaps, some
day the kohl-rabi also may appear on the market, instead
of being, as at present, occasionally exhibited at agricultural
shows as good food for cattle, in which exhibits, size is the
great recommendation j whereas for cooking purposes, the
smaller plants are preferable, and they should, of course, be
taken when both leaves and bulb are young and tender.
Next to ordinary cabbage, the savoy ranks as a favourite
for winter use, and is best when seen with frost shining on
its outer wrinkled leaves : whilst the different varieties of
cauliflower and brocoli now appear in the market all the
year round, the latter being sent up to Covent Garden
during the winter from Cornwall, where it has become a
great source of profit since the railway has allowed of its
rapid transmission to London. The favourite manure
employed for the brocoli fields is old rags, which are sent
over by the shipload from Ireland, and stacked for use,
being spread over the fields as required, without further
manipulation a practice which appears open to objection
236 OUR VIANDS
on sanitary grounds, although we have never heard any
complaint on that score. Certainly the brocoli seems to
thrive luxuriantly amidst the old coats of 'Paddy from
Cork.'
Seakale (Crambe maritime?) grows wild on our sea coasts,
and we are told in Rhind's * History of the Vegetable
Kingdom ' that bundles of it were seen in the Chichester
market in 1753. Since that time it has been cultivated
with care, and has now become one of the most delicate
and highly-prized of our winter vegetables. Grown in
darkness under pots made for the purpose, and covered
up warmly, it comes to table white and tender, just at the
time most needed ; but its price makes it a luxury, so that
it can never become a poor man's vegetable. A very good
substitute for it may, however, be found in the sprouting
brocoli, the tender stems and purple flowers of which in
the early spring are almost equal in flavour to asparagus.
Cabbage of all kinds is highly nutritious and wholesome,
and was prescribed by Hippocrates in cases of colic, but
unless cooked fresh it is indigestible, and the smell of the
water in which it is boiled is very offensive : this, however,
may be obviated by boiling a crust of bread with it.
Sauerkraut, which may be looked upon as a German
national dish, is made by pressing layers of cabbage and
salt in a vessel. An acid fermentation ensues, which is
completed in a few days; the vessel is then covered
tightly, and the sauerkraut kept for use as required.
Spinach as a vegetable is more eaten and esteemed in
London than in the provinces, but it has been known for
centuries, and was cultivated by the monks as early as
1351. Its name is supposed to denote the country from
PULSE AND CABBAGE 237
which it was derived, that is hispanach, or Spanish plant.
Two sorts appear in the market, a summer and a winter
spinach ; but there is a wild plant known as Good King
Henry, which both here and on the Continent is frequently
eaten as spinach, which it much resembles, although rather
coarser and tougher. It is, however, an excellent substitute,
especially in mountainous regions where the cultivated
plant is unattainable. Nettles used also to be boiled
and eaten in the spring as a substitute for spinach,
and are even now sometimes used medicinally by our
peasantry.
There are two other favourite vegetables which must be
mentioned, although they do not belong to the cabbage
tribe.' These are asparagus and artichokes, both maritime
plants, and both supposed to have come to us from the
shores of the Mediterranean, where they grow wild. The
wild asparagus is still often served at table in Venice, but
it is strong in flavour and less succulent than the cultivated
plant. There are two sorts of this delicious vegetable, one
pinkish-white and the other green ; the latter is certainly to
be preferred, although the pink is earliest in the market,
being often forced. It is grown largely in France and the
Channel Islands as well as in Cornwall, and is ready for table
long before the green variety which is that chiefly grown
in England can be produced, which is a great advantage,
as it prolongs the season of a vegetable almost universally
esteemed, but which was formerly unattainable before the
middle of April or beginning of May. Some of the
asparagus now cultivated is of immense size, but hardly
equals that grown by the ancient Romans, of which,
according to Pliny, three stalks would weigh a pound.
238 OUR VIANDS
Roman cooks dried asparagus, and when wanted threw
them into hot water and boiled them for a few minutes,
when they became fresh and green.
Artichokes, unlike asparagus, have rather declined in
public estimation of late years, although they are still
largely cultivated on the Continent. The flavour is excellent,
but the price at which they are sold renders them unfit for
the tables of the people, who scarcely know them, and
generally look upon the underground, or Jerusalem arti-
choke, as the only plant of the name. Artichokes appear
to have been highly esteemed during the reign of Henry VIII.,
in whose privy purse expenses the following entry occurs :
' Paied to a servant of Maister Tresorer in rewarde for
bringing archecokks to the king's grace to Yorke place
iiijj. \\\}d.
Mushrooms, which have always been so highly esteemed,
were formerly known only in the wild state, but of late
years their cultivation has been attempted with great success,
and they are becoming every year more abundant, tons
being sent to market that have been grown in prepared
beds.
In France and Germany many strange and highly-
coloured mushrooms, which we should reject, are freely eaten,
but they are always inspected before being allowed to be
offered for sale, and I am informed that an onion is always
boiled with them, and if this becomes black, the whole
contents of the pot is thrown away as poisonous. It is
certain that we often reject as unwholesome and dangerous
many varieties of mushroom which might be eaten with
impunity, but the frequent illnesses and sometimes fatal cases
of poisoning which have from time to time occurred through
PULSE AND CABBAGE 239
deleterious fungi, render people over-cautious in eating
those which are really wholesome and highly nutritious.
Among these may be reckoned the puff-balls, which were
formerly regarded as very poisonous, but are now known to
be delicious and wholesome when gathered young, cut into
slices and fried, but when they are at all yellow inside they
should not be eaten. It was formerly believed that all
mushrooms grown under a fig-tree, well manured and
watered, were wholesome.
Truffles, so highly belauded by all cooks for their
excellent flavour, are underground mushrooms, found by
the help of dogs or pigs. They grow principally under
elms, and were as much prized by the Romans as by
modern cooks. Anciently they were served with meat,
gravy, wine, skirrets, pepper, and honey, but Avicenna says
they were peeled, cut in pieces, cooked in salt and water,
and dished up with oil, benzoin, and spices. Leo Africanus
says the Arabs cook them in milk. They are now chiefly
used as a flavouring in various dishes. The giant mushroom,
known as the vegetable beefsteak, is by many looked upon
as equal in flavour to real beefsteak.
CHAPTER XIX
SALADS AND SEASONINGS
HAVING now passed in review most of the vegetables
commonly seen on an English dinner-table, it remains only
to mention two or three plants grown chiefly for salads,
which on the Continent form an indispensable adjunct to
the dinner-table, and although less commonly used in
England, are still in great request during the summer
months.
First and foremost among salad plants is the lettuce, of
which there are two principal varieties, the cabbage and
the cos ; of these the latter is the crispest and best, but the
little tender cabbage lettuce is the first to appear in the
market, and was doubtless that earliest cultivated in
England, as the name of cos applied to the other variety
shows that it came to us originally from Cos or some of
the neighbouring Greek islands. There is a variety called
Bath cos, which is perhaps best of all, and is distinguished
by a brownish tinge on the leaves and stalks.
When lettuces are scarce and almost unattainable, their
place is supplied by endive, of which also two varieties
appear in the market, one with very much divided feathery
leaves, and the other, in which the leaves are longer and
plain. Both these are bleached for the table, and, with the
addition of what is known as small salad, that is, mustard
240
SALADS AND SEASONINGS 241
and cress, and that very wholesome plant the watercress,
compose an excellent salad during the winter and spring
months. During this time also the delicious celery is in
season, and forms a very appetising addition to the
luncheon or dinner-table, being especially esteemed as an
adjunct to bread and cheese. Radishes also and beetroot
frequently form ingredients in a winter salad, which abroad
is often composed of sliced potato dressed like cucumber,
with oil and vinegar.
Celery is sometimes stewed as a vegetable, and of late
has been much recommended as a cure for rheumatism, and
a variety known as celeriac, of which the root only is eaten,
has long been cultivated in Germany for stewing. This
has recently been introduced into England, but is still only
rarely used.
The composition of a salad is a matter of great nicety,
and is seldom left to the taste of an ordinary cook. Abroad
the great bowl is set before the mistress of the house, who
proceeds to dress it with oil and vinegar, salt, pepper, and
mustard. In England less oil and a greater variety of
condiment is used, such as is well expressed in the poetical
recipe of Sidney Smith,
' Two large potatoes, pass'd through kitchen sieve,
Smoothness and softness to the salad give;
Of mordent mustard add a single spoon,
Distrust the condiment that bites too soon ;
But deem it not, thou man of herbs, a fault
To add a double quantity of salt :
Four times the spoon with oil of Lucca crown,
And twice with vinegar procured from " town " ;
True flavour needs it, and your poet begs
The pounded yellow of two well-boiled eggs.
242 OUR VIANDS
Let onion's atoms lurk within the bowl,
And scarce suspected, animate the whole ;
And lastly, in the flavour'd compound toss
A magic spoonful of anchovy sauce.
Oh ! great and glorious, and herbaceous treat,
'Twould tempt the dying anchorite to eat.
Back to the world he'd turn his weary soul,
And plunge his fingers in the salad-bowl.'
Truly an excellent dressing; but curiously enough the
salad itself is omitted altogether. And here I would hint to
those not much accustomed to continental fashions, that
whenever the salad makes its appearance, whether at hotel
or private table, they may be sure that the feast, as far as
meats are concerned, is ended, and if they have not already
satisfied their appetite, they must content themselves with
the dish (usually roast fowl) which accompanies the salad,
for they will get nothing afterwards excepting pastry and
dessert.
Of the numerous useful pot-herbs known to cooks, each
deserves a special notice, for most of them have medicinal
as well as culinary virtues ; but it is impossible to do more
than name two or three of the principal. Parsley is perhaps
that in most universal use, for not only is it employed in
numerous seasonings and soups, but it is also largely used
in garnishing. It was used by the Greeks, and is said to
have been introduced into England in the sixteenth
century, but was probably known much earlier.
Sage, known now chiefly in association with onions as a
seasoning for ducks, geese, and roast pork, was formerly
much in vogue as a medicine in the form of tea, and the
leaves were also pressed in curd, which, under the name of
sage-cheese, was highly esteemed, as well as another cheese,
SALADS AND SEASONINGS 243
that in which lemon-thyme took the place of sage. Herb-
cheese was a Roman delicacy, and one flavoured with
parsley seeds is said to have been greatly relished later
by Charlemagne, who had first been regaled upon it by
a bishop on a fast-day, and enjoyed it so much that he
afterwards ordered a supply of these cheeses to be sent to
him annually; and, lest the cheesemonger should send them
without the due proportion of seeds, he commanded that
they should be cut in two and afterwards skewered
together.
Thyme is perhaps best known by name from Shake-
speare's song, ' I know a bank whereon the wild thyme
grows,' but it is highly esteemed for its flavour in seasoning,
although a very small quantity suffices.
Mint, so much associated in the popular idea with lamb, is
one of a large variety of plants of the ame species, most of
which are highly valued in many countries for their medicinal
virtues. Peppermint is known everywhere, and the menthol,
which of late has been so much used for neuralgia, is pre-
pared from a mint, but that which we use in sauce for lamb,
is the spearmint.
Marjoram, chervil, basil, and marigold were much used
formerly in seasonings, but, like the sorrels, burnet, and
garden rocket, which were salad plants in the last
century, are seldom seen now. Fennel, also, is little used
except as a garnishing, and occasionally as a flavouring in
fish sauces, for fashion reigns in food as much as in dress,
and the epicures of to-day would turn up their noses at some
of the most highly esteemed delicacies of Apicius, whilst the
latter would probably scorn the cookery of the most renowned
French chef of to-day. We may, however, be thankful that
244 OUR VIANDS
the gluttony of Rome and of ancient Egypt is no longer the
fashion. We eat, it is true, often more than hunger requires,
but certainly do not indulge in the excesses recorded by
ancient historians, although in Russia and Scandinavia
it is still the custom to introduce a variety of dishes as
a preliminary stimulant to the appetite before dinner.
In Russia salt fish, cheese, and brandy serve this purpose ;
but in Norway and Sweden a greater variety is introduced.
Among ourselves, perhaps, oysters may be considered in the
same light ; and even soups are regarded as a preparation
for more solid food. Oysters, however, must now be classed
among luxuries, and soups in England are far too rare. We
know nothing of the excellent bouillons and vegetable soups
which form the invariable prelude to more substantial dishes
on the Continent. If an English housewife wants soup she
buys an ox-tail, or a pound or two of lean beef, or a calf s
head, and the soup thus produced is of course too strong
and expensive for family consumption ; whereas abroad a
very small piece of meat, or none at all, and plenty of
vegetables, compose a wholesome and appetising soup at a
very small cost.
Our national culinary tastes at present are perhaps too
simple. The tables of the wealthy are, of course, supplied
with delicacies ; but among the middle classes and poor
there is a tendency to fancy the plainest of food the most
wholesome and economical. A leg of mutton roasted on
Sunday, and perhaps only half done, appears on the table
cold the greater part of the week, and is finished up on
Friday or Saturday in a watery and repellant hash; whereas
the same amount of meat, well cooked, with plenty of
vegetables, or made into pies or pasties, would make many
SALADS AND SEASONINGS 245
savoury, appetising, and wholesome dishes, acceptable alike
to the elders and children of the household ; and the bone
crushed and boiled, with the addition of sundry vegetables,
peas, lentils, or a tin of tomatoes, would make a splendid
soup. Certainly we have much to learn in the way of
economical, wholesome, and savoury cookery; and it is
sincerely to be hoped that the various schools of cookery,
which seem to be slowly arousing an interest among
mistresses, will succeed also in inducing servants to study
cooking as an art far more worthy of study for them than
the piano, French, or embroidery, an art which, when they
get married, will enable them to draw their husbands and
sons from the public-house and club, for however cynical
the saying may appear, it is yet true that ' a man's heart lies
in the region of the stomach.'
I have not attempted in this little book to lay down any
hygienic rules as to diet, for I am convinced that in the
present day too much attention is paid to what is called the
digestibility of food. A healthy stomach ought to be able
to eat with relish, of any well-cooked meat in moderation,
and the extreme care now taken to give children everything
wholesome and nutritious, is tending to produce a nation of
valetudinarians in the near future. Sir Henry Thompson
has well said : ' The wholesomeness of a food consists solely
in its adaptability to the individual, and this relation is
governed mainly by the influences of his age, activity,
surroundings, and temperament or personal peculiarities.'
I have known people to experience indigestion and nausea
after eating boiled mutton, who could eat roast pork with
impunity.
Whilst carefully avoiding the gluttony and extravagance
246 OUR VIANDS
of the ancients, we need not fall into the opposite extreme,
and deem meagreness and bad cooking, household virtues.
We need not live to eat, but since we must eat to live, we
may as well see that our necessary food is good and
appetising.
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW
' 33s resting tfjat fofjicfj our jForefatfjcrs botleo,
$no boiling fofyat tfjfg rosteo muclj i
til Cooftc cannot licke ^is obinc fingers.'
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW
THE old recipes which follow are taken chiefly from family
recipe-books dating back to the last century, and also from
two old books without date or title page, but known as
' The Experienced English Housekeeper,' and * The Frugal
Housewife.' The frugality of the latter may be doubted,
if we are to judge by the quantity and quality of the
comestibles recommended, as an instance of which I would
refer to the Battaglia Pie (p. 267), but even this is eclipsed by
some in the other old book, as for instance, a goose pie which
is to be made by stuffing a good fat goose with a large fowl,
and that again with an ox tongue; and for a turkey pie
it is recommended to have two large capons to fill up the
corners. Certainly both the family parties and family
appetites of the last century, must have been much larger
than those of the present day.
It may be of interest also to notice that in a list of things
in season appended to the old cookery-book referred to,
' The Experienced English Housekeeper,' we find mention
made of hothouse cucumbers in January, forced straw-
berries in March, cherries and apricots in April, whilst
among the fruits and vegetables are many scarcely known
now, such as services, which are the fruit of the service tree,
and under the name of sorbes, are still eaten in Italy, but
never appear now upon English tables.
Then, among vegetables we get cardoons, chervil, tarra-
goons, scorzonera, skerrits, salsify, sorrel, chard-beet,
burner, tansey, tarragonel mint, butnet, hyssop, tragopogon,
249
250 OUR VIANDS
purslane, recombole, finscha, corn salad, etc., etc., a great
many of which will read as Greek to modern ears, although
we have some others in their places which, if not new, are
more abundant than in the days of our great-grandmothers.
To the old recipes I have added others of more modern
date, supplied by friends who have tried and found them
good. Some of these come from the Cape of Good Hope
and from Scotland, and a few are culled from the very
excellent 'Domestic Cookery/ by a lady, published in
1810, and also two or three Portuguese dishes from Mrs.
Addison's * Economical Cookery Book,' which is not so
well known as it deserves to be.
BREAD, CAKES, PASTRY.
Whole-meal Bread. To 5 Ibs. of meal take i oz.
carbonate of soda, f oz. tartaric acid, 3 pints water.
Dissolve the soda in 2 J pints of water, and mix thoroughly
with the meal in a glazed pan ; let it stand an hour or so ;
then dissolve the tartaric acid in the remaining \ pint of
water, and mix as quickly as possible ; put on and under
tins, and into the oven immediately oven rather sharp
heat. We have been favoured with the above recipe by a
London baker.
Unfermented Bread. Take fine flour 5 Ibs., bicarbonate
of soda i oz., pure tartaric acid i oz., water i quart,
salt \ oz. Mix the bicarbonate of soda and salt with the
flour, and put the tartaric acid into the -water, and then
blend the whole in the usual way of making dough ; bake
in tins, or without. Bread thus made has an agreeable
taste, keeps much longer than fermented bread, is more
digestible, and less liable to turn sour or mouldy.
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 251
French Bread. With a quartern of fine flour mix the
yolks of 3 and whites of 2 eggs beaten and strained, a little
salt, \ pint of good yeast (not bitter), and as much milk
made a little warm as will work into a thin light dough ;
stir it about, but don't knead it. Have ready three quart
wooden dishes, divide the dough among them, set to rise,
then turn them out into the oven, which must be quick.
Rasp when done.
Rolls and Muffins, or any sort of bread, may be made to
taste new when two or three days old, by dipping them into
water and baking afresh ; or a stale loaf may be pulled to
pieces, dipped a moment into milk, and the pieces baked
a light brown. This is called pulled bread; in French,
croutons.
Baking Powder. An equal quantity in bulk of tartaric
acid, carbonate of soda, and ground rice or cornflour.
Mix thoroughly, and rub through a wire sieve. One
teaspoonful to be used to each pound of dry ingredients
used in your cake, pudding, etc.
The most primitive of bread is still made and eaten by
young travellers and colonists remote from civilisation.
Apropos of which bread, I have seen a letter from the
Transvaal, in which the writer says : ' We all know plum-
duff (minus the plums) is better 1000 miles off than on
the table, and rosterkook of mealie meal is a thing to
contemplate something to dwell upon, when so heavy
that G took one in his hand and wanted to know if
anyone wanted a dog killed : he knew he could brain him
with it, leave alone the choking. For anyone suffering
from indigestion, I could recommend our fare. It would
be kill or cure ! ' Transvaal rosterkook would seem to be
252 OUR VIANDS
even worse than Australian damper; but I have been assured
by another traveller that if made of wheat-meal, with a
small quantity of sheep's-tail fat or dripping, the rostcrkook,
i.e., gridiron cake, is not to be despised. It is also good
cooked on hot stones.
Scone Loaf (Scotch recipe). 2 teacupfuls of flour,
1 teaspoonful of salt, i teaspoonful of cream of tartar,
\ teaspoonful of carbonate of soda, a little milk. Mix all
well with a spoon, not touching it with the hand, and bake
in a moderately quick oven for half an hour.
Tea Cakes. i Ib. flour, 2 teaspoonfuls of baking powder,
3 oz. butter, pinch of salt. Mix; cut with glass or tin
shap?, and bake twenty minutes in a quick oven.
Cornish Heavy Cake. 2 Ibs. flour, \ Ib. lard, i Ib.
currants, \ Ib. candied peel, a pinch of salt. Mix well
all together, and roll out to the thickness of an inch, slash
it into squares on the top, and bake in a very quick oven
for ten minutes, or longer if required.
Loaf Cake. 3 Ibs. of flour, 2 Ibs. of butter, 2 Ibs. of
sugar, white of 9 eggs, small pint of yeast, some citron,
2 nutmegs, i Ib. of raisins, and a scant half-teaspoonful of
soda. Rub the flour and butter together, then add warm
milk, enough to make a soft dough. This should be done
at night. In the morning early add the whites of the eggs
and sugar beaten together, the fruit, soda dissolved, and let
it rise again. When risen, put it in the pans and let it stand
about twenty minutes before baking.
Excellent Sponge Cake. Take 7 eggs, the weight of 6 in
sugar and of 4 in flour, half the rind of i lemon chopped
very fine. The eggs to be well beaten, the yolks and whites
separately ; the sugar must be mixed in first, and then the
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 253
flour to be well stirred till put into the oven, and baked
about an hour. The oven must not be too hot.
Aberdeen Shortbread. i Ib. flour, 8 oz. sifted sugar,
12 oz. butter, 4 oz. ground rice, 4 oz. candied orange or
citron. Work the butter and sugar to a cream with the
hand, add the ground rice and peel, then the flour ; knead
it smooth and roll it out J inch thick. Cut the peel very
fine, and the paste into rounds or oblongs. Bake in a slow
oven till pale brown.
Cornflour Cake. Beat 2 oz. of butter to a cream, add 2
to 4 oz. (according to taste) of pounded loaf-sugar, and mix
well j break in 2 eggs and beat all well together ; stir in
lightly \ Ib. cornflour and i teaspoonful baking powder,
and beat well together for five minutes; then pour the
mixture into a greased cake tin, and put it into the oven
immediately ; bake for half an hour the heat should rise to
240 degrees. When done, turn the cake out of the tin and
slant it against a plate until cold.
Almond Cakes. The whites of 2 eggs well beaten, 2 oz.
of sweet almonds and i oz. of bitter, blanched and pounded,
i Ib. loaf sugar ; mix all together and pound in a mortar ;
roll into small balls, and prick each in three places with a
feather. Place the balls on paper far apart, and bake in a
slow oven.
Rye Muffins. With sweet milk f of a cup of rye meal,
f of a cup of flour, \ teaspoonful of soda, i teaspoonful of
cream of tartar, i teaspoonful of sugar, i saltspoon of salt,
i egg beaten and mixed with \ cup of sweet milk. Put the
ingredients together in the order mentioned, and then drop
small spoonfuls into hot fat. Cook until done when tried
with a fork. With sour milk i pint of sour milk, \ cup of
254 OUR VIANDS
molasses, i saltspoonful of salt, the same of cinnamon, i
teaspoonful of soda, and 2 eggs. Add enough rye flour to
make a batter that will drop well from the spoon, and then
fry in hot lard. These muffins are good eaten plain with
an acid jelly or strong apple sauce ; the old-fashioned way
was to eat them with cider, but the apple sauce is the best
accompaniment.
Doughnuts. This is an old Dutch recipe, which has been
in use for more than a hundred years. Beat a cup of butter
into 2 cups of sugar. Add { teaspoonful of salt, 2 eggs well
beaten, and 2 cups of milk. Put in flour enough to make a
stiff batter. Now add a cup of yeast, and continue stirring
in flour till the dough is as stiff as you can stir it. Lay the
mass over, sprinkle it with flour, and set it to rise. It will
take from fifteen to eighteen hours. Then turn on a
moulding board and roll out Cut in balls i inch in
diameter. Slip a raisin in the centre of each one as you
cut it out make a sharp gash with a knife for the purpose,
closing the edges by wetting them, otherwise the raisin will
fry out in the fat. Let the cut-out nuts stand for half an
hour, then fry in hot fat for ten minutes. When they are
fried, drain them from all fat and roll them in powdered
sugar. Epicures soak them in Santa Cruz rum, and heap
them with ice cream for a dessert dish.
Buns (old recipe). Take 2 Ibs. flour, i pint of ale-yeast
with a little sack, and 3 eggs beaten; knead all together
with a little warm milk, nutmeg, and salt. Lay it before
the fire till it rise very light. Then knead into it a pound
of fresh butter and a pound of round carraway comfits, and
bake them in a quick oven on floured papers, in what shape
you please.
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 255
Queencakes (old recipe). Take i Ib. of sugar sifted, pour
in yolks and whites of 2 eggs, \ Ib. of butter, a little
rose water, 6 spoonfuls of warm cream, i Ib. of currants,
and as much flour as will make it up. Stir well
together, and put in your patty-pans, being well buttered.
Bake them in an oven almost as hot as for bread for half
an hour ; then take them out and glaze them, and let them
stand but a little after the glazing is on, to rise.
A Spanish Cake (old recipe). Take 12 eggs, f Ib. of
the best moist sugar, mill them in a chocolate-mill till they
are all of a lather; then mix in i Ib. of flour, J Ib. of
pounded almonds, 2 oz. of candied orange-peel, 2 oz. of
citron, 4 large spoonfuls of orange or rose water, \ oz. of
cinnamon, and a glass of sack. It is best baked in a slow
oven.
Fine Almond Cakes (old recipe). Take i Ib. of Jordan
almonds, blanch them, beat them very fine with a little
orange-flower water, to keep them from oiling ; then take
i J Ib. of fine sugar, boil it to a high candy, and put in your
almonds. Then take 2 fresh lemons, grate off the rind
very thin, and put as much juice as to make it of a quick
taste; put this mixture into glasses, set it in a stove,
stirring often that it may not candy ; so when it is a little
dry, part it into small cakes upon sheets of paper or tin
to harden.
Saffron Cakes (old recipe). Take J peck of the finest
flour, i Ib. of butter, and i pint of cream or good milk ;
set the milk on the fire, put in the butter and a good
deal of sugar ; then strain saffron to your taste and liking
into the milk ; take 7 or 8 eggs, with 2 yolks (?), and
7 or 8 spoonfuls of yeast; put the milk to it when
256 OUR VIANDS
almost cold, with salt and coriander seeds; knead all
together, make up in reasonable sized cakes, and bake in a
quick oven.
Maccaroons (old recipe). Take i Ib. of almonds, let
them be scalded, blanched, and thrown into cold water,
then dry them in a cloth and pound them in a mortar;
moisten them with orange-flower water, or the white of an
egg, lest they turn to an oil ; then take an equal quantity
of fine powdered sugar, with 3 or 4 whites of eggs ;
beat all well together, and shape them on wafer paper with
a spoon. Bake on tin plates in a gentle oven.
Gingerbread Nuts. Dissolve over the fire i Ib. of treacle,
J Ib. of sugar, and \ Ib. of butter. When the butter
is melted let it stand till nearly cold, then add ij Ib. of
flour, \ oz. of ginger, some carraways, and any other spice
you please. Mix the ingredients well together, and bake
them on tins in an oven of moderate heat.
Jumballs (old recipe). J Ib. of butter, the same
quantity of white sugar, i Ib. of flour, 3 oz. of almonds,
3 eggs, and a little lemon peel. Melt the butter in a pan,
beat the sugar into it, break the yolks of the eggs into it,
pound the almonds after they are blanched, and put with
the flour and lemon peel into the pan, mix together, and
make of the mixture coiled snakes, which bake. From
' Out in the Forty-five,' a tale of the last century. N.B.
The rolled ginger cakes called jumballs in London are not
the old English sweetmeat of that name.
Gumballs (another old recipe). Take i Ib. of butter,
lay it all night in rosewater. When you use it take it
out and rub it in i Ib. of flour, then take 3 eggs with 2 of
the whites and a good spoonful of barm. Mix it into
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 257
a paste. Roule it up in sugar, and tye it up in knots to your
fancy. Go bake it on tin pans.
Almond Jumballs (old recipe). Blanch \ Ib. of almonds,
and beat them with a spoonfull of rosewater. Then take
i Ib. of sugar finely beaten, and sift a spoonfull of flower and
the whites of 2 eggs, beat in by degrees to your almonds,
and when 'tis well mixt, put it on your fire in a skillett; lett
it boyle, but be sure you keep stirring it all the while or else
it will burn. Then take it off and put it in a mortar again,
and beat it till it comes to a perfect paste. Then rowl it
out in long rowls and turn it in what formes you please.
Bake them on wafer-paper in your oven, and when they rise
take them out and lett them stand a little while, then putt
them in again and lett them stand till they are enough.
Lett not the oven be too hott. You must put in some
coriander seed ; put the flower in last.
Jumballs of Apricocks or Plums (old recipe). Bruise
the fairest apricocks in a dish and sett it on your fire, turn
it and stirr it till it is as stiff as dow (dough). Then rowl it
in balls and lett it lie all night. Then work some sifted
sugar with your apricock paste, then lay it out in pretty
fanceys and dry them on paper in a stove.
A Rich Currant Cake (old recipe). To a quartern and a
half of fine flour add 6 Ibs. of currants well picked, washed,
and dried, i oz. of cloves and mace, a little cinnamon, 2
grated nutmegs, i Ib. of white sugar, some candied lemon,
orange, and citron cut in thin pieces ; i pint of sweet wine,
a little orange-flower or rosewater, i pint of yeast, i quart
of cream, 2 Ibs. of butter melted, and poured into the
middle of the flour. Then strew some flour over the butter
and let it stand half an hour before the fire. After which
R
258 OUR VIANDS
knead it well together, and put it before the fire to make it
rise. Work it up very well ; put the mixture into a round
tin, and bake two hours and a half in a gentle oven.
A Lenten Dish: Furmity, Frumenty ', or Fromenty (old
recipe and excellent). 3 pints of prepared wheat boiled
in 6 quarts of milk, together with i Ib. of raisins and i Ib.
of currants, until the fruit is a little tender ; meanwhile beat
up 5 eggs and make a stiff batter of flour and milk ; pour
this batter gradually into the saucepan and stir till it begins
to thicken, then take off the fire and add a pinch of salt,
half a nutmeg (grated), and sweeten to taste; pour into
dishes, and eat cold. N.B. Do not stone the raisins.
To prepare the wheat, take a pint of wheat, thoroughly
cleaned, soak it all night in water, then put it in a large
basin filled with cold water; tie a cloth over; put it in a
pot of boiling water up to the rim of the basin, and let it
boil many hours, till the wheat swells and forms a white
pudding in the basin.
Oatmeal Flummery (very old recipe). Put oatmeal (as
much as you want) into a broad deep pan, cover it with
water, stir it together and let it stand twelve hours ; then
pour off that water clear, and put on a good deal of fresh ;
shift it again in twelve hours, and so on in twelve more.
Then pour off that water clear, and strain the oatmeal
through a coarse hair sieve, pour it into a saucepan, keeping
it stirring all the time with a stick till it boils and becomes
very thick. Then pour it into dishes. When cold, turn it
into plates, and eat it with what you please, either wine
and sugar, or milk. It eats very well with cyder and sugar.
You may observe to put a great deal of water to the oat-
meal, and when you pour off the last water, put on just
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 259
enough fresh to strain the oatmeal well. Some let it stand
forty-eight hours, some three days, shifting the water every
twelve hours; but that is as you like it for sweetness or
tartness. Groats once cut do better than oatmeal. Mind
to stir it together when you put in fresh water.
Plumb Pottage (old recipe). Take a leg of beef and a
neck of mutton; put it into a gallon of water; let it boyle
till all the goodness is out. Then take it off the fire and
strain it, and when 'tis cold take off all the fat. The next
day grate the crumb of a sixpenny loaf and let it steep in a
little of your liquor. Set your liquor on the fire and put in
2 nutmegs cut into quarters, with a pretty deal of whole
mace, 3 or 4 cloves, and a little cinnamon. Put in 2 Ibs. of
currants picked and washed, 2 Ibs. of raisins of the sun, 2 Ibs.
of prunes, and J Ib. of dates stoned. Put in the bread with
your fruit, and when they are well boy Id together take it off the
fire. Sweeten to your taste and put in it a bottle of claret, a
pint of sack or vinegar. Garnish with grated bread crumbs
browned, and a heap of plumped raisins here and there.*
Quaking Pudding (old recipe). Put on your fire i pint
of milk and i pint of cream, mix i spoonfull of milk to
3 spoonfulls of flower, 6 eggs yolk and white, a little
grated nutmeg, a little mace with some suet ; beat it well
together, pour your boyling cream and milk into it; stir
it together, then butter your dish, fill him to the brim and
tye a cloth close over him, boyle him an hour and quarter,
then take him out, and pour over him melted butter and
sack, strew sugar over him, serve him to the table.
* This is probably the plum-porridge with which the "Man in the
South" is reported to have "burnt his mouth," and may also be
regarded as the origin of our famous Christmas plum-pudding.
260 OUR VIANDS
To make a Tansie (old recipe). Break 18 eggs and put
away the white ; put to them i quart of cream, i pint of
the juice of spinage, i spoonfull of the juice of tansie, the
crumbs of a penny loaf; mix it together, and put a piece
of butter in your skillet, put your tansie into it, keep stirring
it over the fire till it is as thick as hasty pudding, then put
a piece of butter in a frying-pan, and put in your tansie with
a spoon, spread it abroad handsome, and turn it with a pye-
plate once or twice, frying him crimpr,.but not burn him; let
it be an inch thick. If the colour be not to your mind, heate
a fire-shovel, hold it over it, and make it what colour you
will, and serve it to the table with sweet oranges and sugar.
To make Cheesecakes (old recipe). Take i quart of
cream and i gallon of milk, run it tender as you do cold
cheese (i.e., make of it a light curd with rennet), when 'tis
come, brake it and draw the whey clean from it; work
your curd with a spoon through a hair sieve, put to it f Ib.
of butter, and as much sugar as will sweeten it, with the
yolk of 6 eggs, and a little grated nutmeg and a drop of
rosewater : work it well, and mix i Ib. of currants, washed
and picked, amongst it ; put it into your paste, bake it half
an hour, then take them out and serve them to the table.
To make Rice Cheesecakes (old recipe). Boil 2 quarts of
cream or milk with a little whole mace and cinnamon, then
take off the fire, remove the spice, and put in \ Ib. of rice
flour, and place it on the fire again to boil, stirring it together ;
then take it off, and beat the yolks of 24 eggs, set it on the
fire again, and keep stirring till it is as thick as curds ; add
| Ib. of blanched almonds pounded, and sweeten to your
palate ; or, if you chuse, you may put in \ Ib. of currants,
well picked, and rubbed in a clean cloth.
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 261
Lemon Cheesecakes (old recipe). Take 2 large lemon peels,
boil and pound them well together in a mortar, with about
6 oz. of loaf-sugar and the yolks of 6 eggs ; mix all well
together, and fill your patty-pans about half full. Orange
cheesecakes you may do the same way, but be careful to boil
the peels in two or three waters to get out the bitterness.
To make a Custard (Q\& recipe). Boil i quart of cream or
milk, with a stick of cinnamon, a large mace, and a quartered
nutmeg ; when half cold, mix with it the yolks of 8 eggs and
4 whites beaten well, some sack, sugar, and orange-flower
water. Set it on the fire, and stir it till a white froth rises ;
skim that off, then strain it, and fill your custard cups, and
let them just boil up in the oven, or if you boil the eggs
in the cream all together, then you may put it in your
custard cups overnight, and they will be fit for use.
To make Oatmeal Pudding (old recipe). To J pint of
oatmeal, bruised, put \ pint of milk, boyling hot. Let
it stand all night, put to it i Ib. of suet, \ Ib. of raisins,
and as many currants, 5 eggs, three of the whites, a handful
of grated bread, a little nutmeg, some salt, a little sugar, and
a glass of white wine. Boyle it three hours.
Our Own Plum Pudding. i Ib. of best beef suet chopped
very fine, i Ib. best raisins stoned and cut in half, i Ib. of
currants well washed and dried, J Ib, of flour, \ Ib. of finely-
crumbled bread crumbs, \ Ib. mixed candied peel finely
shred, \ Ib. of white sugar pounded and sifted, a little lemon
peel grated, small teaspoonful of mixed spice and half a
nutmeg, the juice of half a lemon, 3 eggs well beaten, and
a \ pint of brandy. Mix all the dry materials together
thoroughly with a wooden spoon, then add the eggs, brandy,
and lemon, with enough cold water to make a rather stiff
262 OUR VIANDS
compound. Pat into well - buttered basins, cover with
buttered paper and a well-floured cloth, and boil for eight
or nine hours. We generally make a treble quantity at
Christmas, boiling all the puddings the same time nine
hours, hang the basins in the kitchen (not to touch the
wall), and they will keep for months. When wanted for
use, boil an hour, taking care not to allow the water to rise
to the top of the basin, or covering the basin with another
well-wetted and floured cloth.
Norfolk or Hard Dumpling. Take i Ib. flour and mix
it with cold water by degrees till it is a stiff dough, putting
in a pinch of salt. Knead it well for at least five minutes,
then cut it into pieces about the size of an orange. It
should be stiff enough to shrink up when cut, as dough
does when it is risen. Work each piece round in the
hollow of the hand till it forms a smooth ball, cutting off
the small knob it is worked up with. Put the dumplings
into plenty of boiling water, and boil for twenty minutes.
Serve with well-dredged and brown dripping, or with butter
or treacle.
Light or Suffjlk Dumplings. Take a portion of bread
dough which is ready for baking ; cut it into pieces the size
of an orange ; knead or work them up into smooth round
balls and boil from twenty to thirty minutes ; or they may
be made by adding a teaspoonful of baking powder and a
pinch of salt to i Ib. of flour worked into balls and boiled
as above. The gravy to be served with them is made of
the dripping from a well-basted and dredged joint, to which
more flour is added, boiling it till well browned ; it must be
served very hot.
Good Fritters (old recipe). Mix \ pint of good cream
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 263
very thick with flour, beat 6 eggs, leaving out 4 whites ; add
6 spoonfuls of sack, and strain them into the cream ; put
in a little grated nutmeg, ginger, cinnamon, and salt ; then
put in another J pint of cream, and beat the batter near an
hour ; pare and slice your apples thin ; dip every piece in
the batter, and throw them into a pan with boiling lard.
Pancakes (old recipe). Take i pint of thick cream, 6
spoonfuls of sack, and \ pint of fine flour, 6 eggs (but only
3 whites), i grated nutmeg, \ Ib. melted butter, a very
little salt, and some sugar ; fry them thin in a dry pan.
Crumply Pudding. i quart of milk, 4 tablespoonfuls of
flour, 2 eggs, \ Ib. of moist sugar, and a little finely-chopped
suet. Grease a mould, stick it with raisins, orange and
lemon peel, and citron ; make the flour into a smooth paste
with the milk, and add the sugar. Pour this into the mould,
and on the top place sufficient chopped suet to cover it.
Bake in the oven until the suet looks brown and set. Turn
out of the mould, and serve very hot. Mrs. Addison.
Sicilian Pudding. Melt J Ib. of fresh butter and let it
cool gradually, then pour it on the yolks of 2 eggs and the
white of i ; add \ Ib. pounded sugar, and flavour with
almond. Then line a dish with good puff paste, and put a
layer of one or two kinds of preserves in it, pouring the
above mixture over all, and bake it; when it is just baked,
spread over it the whites of 2 eggs, whipped to a solid froth,
and sift some finely-powdered sugar over it till it looks quite
white ; let it stand for a few minutes in a cool oven or before
a fire to harden, and then stick spikes of blanched almonds
all over it. Weekly Scotsman.
Alderman's Pudding. 6 oz. bread crumbs, 4 oz. sugar,
4 oz. suet, i lemon rind, i egg, i tablespoonful brandy.
264 OUR VIANDS
Chop the suet finely, add the bread crumbs and sugar, grate
over the lemon rind. In a separate basin beat the egg till
very light, add it to the mixture in the basin. Pour over
the brandy, and mix all well together. Grease a mould with
butter, pour in the mixture, cover the mould with a sheet of
paper. Place the mould in a saucepan half full of boiling
water, and let the water boil for one hour and twenty
minutes. Turn out the pudding on to a hot dish, and pour
round a jam or wine sauce. Weekly Scotsman.
Scotch Pudding. i teacupful of suet, and the same
quantity of sugar and currants, i \ teacupful each of flour
and milk, ij tablespoonful of ground rice, i teaspoonful of
soda, and the same quantity of spice. Mix well together,
and put in a basin with a plate on the top, in boiling water,
not to cover the basin. Boil two hours. Cape Recipe.
Brown Betty. Fill a pie-dish with alternate layers of
bread crumbs dotted with butter and slightly sprinkled
with spice, and sharp-flavoured apples cut thin and strewn
with sugar. Let the top layer be of crumbs, and then
bake a nice light brown.
Brentwood Pudding. 3 oz. bread crumbs, 3 oz. butter,
3 oz. sugar, the yolks of 3 eggs, the juice of a lemon
and half the peel grated. Put a layer of jam or marmalade
at the bottom of a pie-dish, over which pour the above
ingredients well mixed. Bake forty minutes. Take it out
at the end of thirty minutes and pour over it the whites of
the eggs beaten to a stiff froth with lump-sugar, and then
return it to the oven for ten minutes. Good hot or
cold.
On Paste making. The art of paste making is a mystery
to which some cooks never attain : they have, as it is termed,
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 265
a heavy hand, and, do what thay will, their pastry is never
light. The varieties of paste and modes of making are
numerous. There is short paste, flaky or puff paste, French
paste, and the raised crust used for pork and other meat
and game pies. Sifted sugar is generally used in short
crust, which, of course, renders it unfit for use with meat.
The ingredients for a good crust are, J Ib. of butter to
i Ib. of flour, i tablespoonful of sifted sugar, and J pint
of water; or less butter may be used, with the addition of
the yolks of 2 eggs and J pint of milk instead of water.
For the best puff paste equal parts of flour and butter are
used, part of the butter being rubbed into the flour and the
rest spread in layers on the crust, which should be rolled
out several times, a very slight sprinkling of flour being put
over the butter as spread, which, when rolled out, serves to
separate the layers and make it light and flaky. Some
cooks beat the paste with a rolling pin; some set it
aside for some hours in a cold cellar, or on a marble
slab; whilst others roll it out quickly and put it in the
oven at once. We have tasted excellent pastry made
in all these ways, and also when clarified dripping,
or half butter half lard has been used instead of all butter.
For common household pastry, 8 oz. of butter and lard, or
clarified dripping, to i Ib. of flour is quite sufficient. To
make raised crust, boil J Ib. of lard, or clarified dripping,
in ij gills of water, and pour it hot on to i Ib. of flour, to
which a good pinch of salt has been added. Mix into a
stiff paste, pinch off enough of it to make the lid, and keep
it hot. Flour your board and work the paste into a ball,
then with the knuckles of your right hand press a hole in
the centre, and mould the paste into a round or oval shape,
266 OUR VIANDS
taking care to keep it a proper thickness. Having put in
the meat, well seasoned, join the lid to the pie, which raise
lightly with both hands so as to keep it a good high shape,
cut round the edge of the lid with a sharp knife, and make
the trimmings into leaves to ornament the pie ; and having
placed these on, with a rose in the centre, put the pie on a
floured baking-sheet, and brush it over with yolk of egg.
The crust of the pie should be cool and set, before putting
it into the oven, which should be a moderate heat. Some
people use a tin mould, but it is much better raised by the
hand ; in order to succeed, the crust must be moulded
whilst hot, and it also requires quick manipulation.
Paste for Venison Pasties (old recipe). Take 4 Ibs. of
butter to \ peck of flour ; rub it all into your flour, but not
too small; then make it into a paste, and beat it with a
rolling-pin for an hour before you use it. If you please
you may beat 3 or 4 eggs, and put them in your paste when
you mix it.
An Umble Pie (old recipe). Take the umbles of a buck,
boil them and chop them as small as meat for minced pies,
put to them as much beef suet, 8 apples, J Ib. of sugar,
1 1 Ib. of currants, a little salt, some mace, cloves, nutmeg,
and a little pepper ; then mix them together, and put it into
a paste; add J pint of sack, the juce of i lemon and
orange, close the pie, and when it is baked serve it up.
A Lumber Pie (old recipe). Take ij Ib. of fillet of veal,
mince it with the same quantity of beef suet, season it with
sweet spice, 5 pippins, i handful of spinach, a hard lettuce,
thyme, and parsley ; mix it with a penny loaf grated, and
the yolks of 2 or 3 eggs, sack and orange-flower water,
ij Ib. of currants and preserves, with a caudle.
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 267
A Battaglia Pie (old recipe). Take 4 small chickens,
squab pigeons, and 4 sucking rabbits, cut them in pieces,
and season them with savoury spice j lay them in the pie
with 4 sweetbreads sliced, as many sheep's tongues and
shivered palates, 2 pair of lamb sweetbreads, 20 or 30
cocks' combs, with savoury balls and oysters ; lay on butter,
and close the pie with a lear.
Minced Pie (old recipe). Shred i Ib. of neat's tongue
parboiled, with 2 Ibs. of beef suet, 5 pippins, and a green
lemon peel ; season it with i oz. of spice, a little salt, i Ib.
of sugar, 2 Ibs. of currants, J pint of sack, a little brandy,
the juice of a lemon, J Ib. of citron, lemon, and orange
peel ; mix these together, and fill the pie.
A Lamb Pie with Currants (old recipe). Take a leg
and a loin of lamb, cut the flesh into small pieces, and
season with a little salt, cloves, mace, and nutmeg ; then
lay the lamb in your paste, with as many currants as you
think proper, and some Lisbon sugar ; a few raisins, stoned
and chopped small, and some forced meat balls, yolks of
hard eggs, with artichoke bottoms, or potatoes boiled and
cut in dice, with candied orange and lemon peel in slices ;
put butter on the top, and a little water ; then close your
pie. Bake it gently ; when it is baked, take off the top and
put in your caudle, made of gravy from the bones, some
white wine and juice of lemon ; thicken it with the yolks
of 2 eggs and a bit of butter. When you pour in your
caudle, let it be hot, and shake it well in the pie; then serve
it, having laid on the cover.
Note. If you observe too much fat swimming on the
liquor of your pie, take it off before you pour in your
caudle.
268 OUR VIANDS
Eel Pie (old recipe). Cut, wash, and season them with
sweet seasoning and a handful of currants ; butter and close
it. Some omit the currants.
MEATS, ETC. OLD RECIPES.
For Roasting Beef. If a sirloin or rump, you must not
salt it, but lay it a good way from the fire ; baste it once or
twice with water and salt, then with butter ; flour it, and
keep basting it with its own dripping. When the smoak of
it draws to the fire it is near enough done. If the ribs,
sprinkle them with a little salt half an hour before you lay
it down ; dry and flour it, then butter a piece of paper
very thick, and fasten it on to the beef; put the buttered
side next the meat.
For Roasting Lamb or Mutton. The loin and the saddle
must be done as the beef, but the skin should be raised
and skewered on again to prevent it from scorching. A
quarter of an hour before you take it up, take off the skin,
dust on some flour, baste with butter, and sprinkle on a
little salt. Garnish with scraped horse radish, and serve
with potatoes, brocoli, French beans, watercresses, pickled
cabbage, etc. The shoulder requires onion sauce.
To Roast Mutton, Venison Fashion. Take a hind quarter
of fat mutton, and cut it like a haunch ; lay it in a pan with
the back side down ; pour a bottle of red wine over it, and
let it lie twenty-four hours ; then spit it and baste it with
the same liquor, and butter all the time it is roasting at
a good quick fire; two hours and a half will do it.
Have a little good gravy in a boat, and currant jelly in
another. A good fat neck of mutton eats finely done
thus.
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 269
A Shoulder or Leg of Mutton Stuffed. Stuff with mutton
suet, salt, pepper, nutmeg, grated bread, and yolks of eggs ;
then stick it all over with cloves and roast it. When about
half done, cut off some of the under side of the fleshy end
in little bits ; put these into a pipkin with a pint of oysters,
liquor and all, a little salt and mace, and J pint of hot
water; stew them till half the liquor is wasted, then put in
a piece of butter rolled in flour, shake all together, and
when the mutton is done take it up ; pour the sauce over
it and send to table.
To Roll a Breast of Mutton. First bone the mutton,
then make a savoury forced meat for it, and wash it over
with the batter of eggs, then spread the forced meat on if,
roll it in a collar, and bind it with packthread, then roast
it ; put under it a regalia of cucumbers.
To Roast Veal. Paper the udder of the fillet, and the
back of the loin to prevent scorching; lay the meat at
some distance from the fire at first, baste it well with
butter and dust it with flour, then draw it nearer the fire,
and a little before you take it up baste it again. The
breast must be roasted with the caul on, and the sweet
bread skewered on the back side. It is proper to have a
toast nicely baked laid in the dish with the loin. Garnish
with lemon and barberries. Most people stuff the fillet
and shoulder thus : Take about i Ib. of grated bread, J Ib.
of suet, some parsley shred fine, thyme, marjoram or savory,
a small onion, a little grated nutmeg, lemon peel, pepper
and salt, and mix well together with whites and yolks of
eggs ; put half in the udder, and the rest in the holes from
which the bones were taken.
To Roast Pork. Pork requires more cooking than other
270 OUR VIANDS
meat, and it is best to sprinkle it with a little salt the night
before you use it, except on the rind, which must never be
salted. The best way to roast a leg is to parboil, then take
off the skin and lay it down ; baste it with butter; then take
a little pepper and salt, a little sage shred fine, bread
crumbs, and a little nutmeg. Throw these all over it whilst
it is roasting ; then put a little drawn gravy into the dish
with the crumbs that drop from it. Some stuff the knuckle
with sage and onions, and serve with apple sauce. This is
called a mock goose.
To Roast a Pig. Spit your pig, and lay it down to a clear
fire. Put into the belly a few sage leaves, a little pepper
and salt, a small crust of bread, and a bit of butter ; sew it
up, and flour well. When the skin is crisp put two plates
into the dripping-pan to save the gravy which comes from
it. Put J Ib. of butter in a clean coarse cloth, and rub all
over till the flour is quite taken off; then take it up into
your dish, take the sage, etc., out of the belly, and chop it
small. Cut off the head, open it, and take out the brains,
which chop, and put the sage and brains into \ pint of good
gravy, with a piece of butter rolled in flour ; then cut your
pig down the back, and lay it flat on the dish. Cut off the
two ears, and lay one on each shoulder; put the head
between the shoulders, pour the gravy out of the plates into
your sauce and then into the dish; garnish with lemon, and
if you please, pap sauce in a basin.
To Roast a Hare. Truss your hare, and then make a
pudding thus : \ Ib. of beef suet minced fine, as much bread
crumbs, the liver chopped fine, parsley and lemon peel shred
fine, seasoned with pepper, salt, and nutmeg. Moisten with
an egg, and put it into the hare's belly. Let your dripping-
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 271
pan be very clean ; put into it i quart of milk and 6 oz. of
butter, and baste it with this till the whole is used. About
five minutes before you take it up dust on a little flour, and
baste with fresh butter that it may be well frothed. Put a
little gravy in the dish and the rest in a boat ; garnish with
lemon.
To Roast a Green Goose with Green Sauce. Roast your
goose nicely ; in the meantime make your sauce thus : Take
J pint of the juice of sorrel, i spoonful of white wine, a little
grated nutmeg, and some grated bread. Boil this over a
gentle fire, and sweeten with pounded sugar to your taste ;
garnish with lemon.
The German Way of Dressing Fowls. Take a turkey or
fowl, stuff the breast with what forcemeat you like, fill the
body with roasted chestnuts peeled, and lay it down to
roast. Take \ pint of good gravy, with a little piece of
butter rolled in flour ; boil these together with some small
turnips and sausages, cut in slices, and fried or boiled ;
garnish with chestnuts. You may dress ducks the same way.
To Roast Quails. Truss them, and stuff with beef suet
and sweet herbs shred very fine, and seasoned with a little
spice. When warm baste with salt and water, then dredge
them, and baste with butter. For sauce, dissolve an anchovy
in good gravy, with 2 or 3 shallots shred very fine, and the
juice of a Seville orange. Dish them up in this sauce, and
garnish with fried bread crumbs and lemon.
To Roast Plovers. Green plovers are roasted as you do
woodcocks. Lay them upon toast, and put good gravy
sauce in the dish. Grey plovers are roasted or stewed thus :
Make a forcemeat of artichoke bottoms cut small, seasoned
with pepper, salt, and nutmeg. Stuff and put the birds into
272 OUR VIANDS
a saucepan with a good gravy just to cover them, a glass of
white wine, and a blade of mace; cover them close, and
stew them softly till they are tender; then take up your
plovers into a dish, put in a piece of butter rolled in flour
to thicken your sauce ; let it boil till smooth, squeeze in a
little lemon, scum it clean, and pour over the birds ; garnish
with orange.
To Roast Calf s Liver. Lard it well with large slices of
bacon, fasten it on a spit, roast it at a gentle fire, and serve
with good gravy or melted butter.
To Roast an Eel. Scour the eel well with salt ; skin him
almost to the tail; then gut, wash, and dry him. Take
J Ib. of suet shred fine, sweet herbs, and a shallot ; mix
together with salt, pepper, and nutmeg ; scotch your eel on
both sides, wash it with yolks of eggs, lay some seasoning
over it, and stuff the belly with it, then draw the skin over it,
and tie it to the spit ; baste with butter, and make a sauce
of anchovies and melted butter. Any other river or sea
fish that are large enough may be dressed in the same way.
For Boiling Meats we need not give old recipes, as they
are the same as the modern, but this mode of cooking
seems to have been extended to things which we should
not dream of boiling nowadays, such as geese and ducks,
woodcocks and snipes, pheasants and partridges, the latter
being served with celery or mushroom sauce, or with melted
butter, flavoured with parsley, lemon, and the livers of the
birds.
To Fry Beefsteaks. Take rump steaks, beat them very
well with a roller, fry them in \ pint of ale that is not
bitter, and whilst they are frying, for your sauce, cut a large
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 273
onion small, a very little thyme, some parsley shred small,
some grated nutmeg, and a little pepper and salt ; roll all
together in a piece of butter, and then in a little flour, put
this into the stew-pan, and shake all together. When the
steaks are tender, and the sauce of a fine thickness, dish
them up.
To Fry Sausages with Apples. Take J Ib. of sausages
and 6 apples, slice 4 about as thick as a crown, cut the
other 2 in quarters, fry them with the sausages of a fine
light brown, and lay the sausages in the middle of the dish,
with the apples round ; garnish with the quartered apples.
Stewed cabbage and sausages fried is a good dish; then
heat cold peas pudding in the pan, when it is quite hot,
heap it in the middle of the dish, and lay the sausages all
round edgeways and one in the middle at length.
To make Scotch Collops. Dip slices of lean veal in the
yolks of eggs that have been beaten up with melted butter,
a little salt, some grated nutmeg, and grated lemon peel.
Fry them quick, shake them all the time to keep the butter
from oiling. Then put to them some beef gravy and some
mushrooms, or forced meat balls. Garnish with sausages
and sliced lemon, and slices of fried bacon.
To Stew Beef Collops. Cut raw beef, as veal is cut for
Scotch collops. Put the collops into a stew-pan with a
little water, a glass of white wine, a shallot, a little dried
marjoram rubbed to powder, some salt and pepper, and a
slice or two of fat bacon. Set this over a quick fire till the
pan be full of gravy, which will be in a little time, add to
it a little mushroom juice; serve it up hot, garnished with
sliced lemon or small pickles and red cabbage.
To Stew a Hare. Beat it well with a rolling-pin in its
S
274 OUR VIANDS
own blood, cut it into little bits and fry them. Then put
the hare into the stew-pan with a quart of strong gravy,
pepper and salt, and let it stew till tender. Thicken it
with butter and flour. Serve it up in its gravy, with sippets
and lemon sliced for garnish.
To Jug a Hare. Having skinned your hare, turn the
blood into a jug; then cut the hare in pieces, but do not
wash it ; cut f Ib. of fat bacon into thin slices ; pour upon
the blood about i pint of strong old pale beer ; put into the
jug i middling-sized onion, stuck with 3 or 4 cloves and
i bunch of sweet herbs, and having seasoned the hare with
pepper, salt, nutmeg, and lemon peel grated, put in the
meat, a layer of hare and a layer of bacon ; then stop the
jug close, so that the steam be kept in entirely ; put the jug
into a kettle of water over the fire, and let it stew three
hours, then strain off the liquor, and having thickened it
with burnt butter, serve it up hot, garnished with lemon juice.
To Stew Ducks. Draw and clean your ducks well, and
put them into a stew-pan with strong beef gravy, a glass of
red wine, a little whole pepper, an onion, an anchovy, and
some lemon peel ; when well stewed, thicken the gravy with
butter and flour, and serve all up together, garnished with
shallots.
To Spitchcock Eels. You must split a large eel down the
back, and joint the bones, cut it in two or three pieces,
melt a little butter, put in a little vinegar and salt ; let your
eel lay in it two or three minutes, then take the pieces out,
roll them in bread crumbs, and broil them of a fine brown.
Let your sauce be plain butter, with the juice of a lemon,
or good gravy with an anchovy in it.
To Broil Eggs. First put your salamander into the fire,
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 275
then cut a slice round a quartern loaf, toast it brown and
butter it, lay it on a dish, and set it before the fire j poach
7 eggs just enough to set the whites, take them out care-
fully and lay them on your toast, brown them with the
salamander, grate some nutmeg over them, and squeeze
Seville orange over all. Garnish with orange cut in slices.
To Hash Mutton. Take mutton half roasted, and cut it
in pieces as big as half a crown ; then put into a sauce-pan
\ pint of red wine, as much strong broth or gravy, i
anchovy, i shallot, a little whole pepper, some nutmeg
grated, and salt to taste ; let these stew a little, then put in
the meat and a few capers and samphire shred ; when it is
hot through, thicken it up with a piece of butter rolled in
flour ; have toasted sippets ready to lay on the dish, and
pour the meat on them. Garnish with lemon.
To Mince Veal. Take underdone veal and shred as fine
as possible, then take some beef gravy, dissolve in it the
quantity of a hazel nut of cavear to J Ib. of meat ; put into
the gravy the minced veal, and let it boil not above a
minute, pour it into a soup plate or dish upon sippets of
toasted bread, and garnish with pickled cucumbers, or with
slices of broiled bacon.
To Dress a Mock Turtle. Take a calf's head with the
skin on, cut off the horny part in thin slices, put in the
brains and the giblets of a goose well boiled ; have ready
between i quart and 3 pints of strong mutton or veal gravy,
with i pint of Madeira wine, i large teaspoonful of cayenne
pepper, half the peel of a large lemon shred very fine, a
little salt, the juice of 2 lemons ; stew all these together
till the meat is very tender, which will be in about an hour
and a half; then have ready the shell of a turtle edged with
276 OUR VIANDS
a paste of flour and water hardened in the oven ; put in
the ingredients, and set it in the oven to brown, and when
that is done garnish the top with yolks of hard-boiled eggs
and forced meat balls.
To Hash Cold Fowl. Cut up your fowl into small pieces,
put them in a stew-pan with a blade or two of mace, and a
little shred lemon peel ; dredge on a little flour and throw
in some gravy ; when it begins to simmer, put in a few
pickled mushrooms, and a lump of butter rolled in flour ;
when it boils give it a toss or two, and pour into the dish.
Garnish with sliced lemon and barberries.
To Fricassee Pigeons. Prepare some pigeons, quarter and
fry them; take some green pease and fry them also till
they be like to burst, then pour boiling water upon them,
and season the liquor with pepper, salt, onions, garlic,
parsley, and vinegar ; thicken with yolks of eggs.
For Stewing Ducks whole. Wash your ducks, then put
them in a stew-pan, with strong broth, anchovy, lemon peel,
whole pepper, an onion, mace, and red wine ; when well
stewed put in a piece of butter and some grated bread to
thicken it; lay forcemeat balls and crisped bacon round
them. Garnish with shallots.
To Fricassee Cold Roast Beef. Cut your beef into very
thin slices, then shred a handful of parsley very small, cut
an onion into pieces, and put them together into a stew-pan
with a piece of butter and a good quantity of strong broth ;
season with pepper and salt and let it stew gently a quarter
of an hour ; and beat the yolks of 4 eggs in some claret,
and a spoonful of vinegar, and put it to your meat, stirring
it till it grows thick ; rub your meat with a shallot before
you serve it up.
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 277
Ragoo of Cock's Combs, Cock's Kidneys, and Fat Livers.
Take a stew-pan, put in some butter, a bunch of sweet
herbs, some mushrooms and truffles, put it for a minute
over the fire, flour it, moisten it with broth, season with salt
and pepper, let it stew a little, then put in the cock's
combs, kidneys, fat livers, and sweet herbs ; let your ragoo
be palatable, thicken it with the yolks of eggs, serve it for
a dainty dish.
To make a fine White Soup. Take a leg of beef and a
knuckle of veal, and let them boil at least four hours, then
beat i Ib. of sweet almonds very fine and mix them with
some of the broth, then serve with the almonds in it, and
sippets of fried bread.
Gravy Soup. Cut i Ib. of mutton, i Ib. of veal, and i
Ib. of beef into little pieces, put it into 7 or 8 quarts ot
water, with an old fowl beat to pieces, i onion, i carrot,
some white pepper and salt, a little bunch of herbs, 2 blades
of mace, and 3 or 4 cloves, some celery, cabbage, endive,
turnip, and lettuce. Let it stew over a slow fire till half is
wasted, then strain it off for use.
for making Veal Rolls. Lay some slices of veal on
some slices of bacon of the same size, then lay some green
forcemeat upon that. Roll them, tie them, and roast them,
rub them with the yolks of eggs, flour them and baste them
with butter. When done enough lay them in a dish, and
have ready some gravy, morels, truffles, and mushrooms ;
garnish with lemon.
A FEW MODERN RECIPES TRIED AND APPROVED.
To Dress Springbok. Take the leg, lard it well with
strips of bacon or salted tail of the Africander sheep
278 OUR VIANDS
(which has a tail sometimes 25 Ibs. in weight), put butter
on it and dredge with flour, roast it well, basting frequently.
Serve with it quince or guava jelly.
The South African Hunter's Greatest Delicacy while
Camping Out. The liver of the bok just killed, either
grilled on a gridiron or roasted on large flat stones made
red hot in a wood fire. Eaten with hunter s sauce, and a
little pepper and salt if obtainable.
Stewed Springbok. Take the chine only, sever the bones
at each joint, put into a camp-kettle with water and some
butter or dripping, simmer gently till all the water has
evaporated, then keep stirring it well in the rich gravy,
dredge in a little flour, and add pepper and salt. To be
served with quince jelly and a dish of rice or stamped
maize.
This mode of cooking would be equally applicable to
chamois, and in the Tyrol they serve with it Verona fruits,
which consist of all kinds of fruit partly pickled and partly
preserved, so as to be very hot and very sweet. Dried
peaches stewed make an excellent condiment to eat with
springbok or other game.
FrehkedeL Mince any kind of meat, take some stale
bread that has been soaked in milk, and mix with 2 or
3 eggs, flavour with spices and salt, make into balls ; keep
the white of i egg and roll the balls in it, then strew over
them grated bread or biscuit crumbs, and fry a light brown.
Garlic Pork (Portuguese Christmas Dish). Cut up fresh
streaky pork into small pieces, rub them with salt, pound a
few cloves of garlic, a bunch of sweet herbs, and some
Chili peppers. Pack closely in a stone jar, adding sufficient
vinegar to cover them. This should be done a week before
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 279
required for use, but will keep for months. When wanted,
take as much meat as may be necessary, drain it and fry
a light brown. Serve each piece on toast. A cut orange
is always sent to table with this dish, a few drops of the
juice being a great improvement. Mrs. Addison.
Fricasseed Calves' Feet. Soak them three hours, simmer
them in equal proportions of milk and water until they are
sufficiently tender to remove the meat from the bones ; cut
into good-sized pieces, dip them in yolk of egg, cover with
fine bread crumbs, pepper and salt them, fry a beautiful
brown, and serve with white sauce.
A Fricandelle. Chop some remains of veal or any other
cold meat, fat and lean together; season it with pepper
and salt to your taste. Put grated bread crumbs to it in
proportion to the quantity of meat about i teacupful
generally suffices ; add i oz. of butter, i egg, and a little
good gravy. Mix these ingredients well together, and
press them firmly into a basin or mould, which must be
previously buttered. Boil for half an hour, turn it out of the
mould, and send it to table with a little brown gravy over it.
Minced Collops. Fresh meat chopped very fine and put
into a pan in which a piece of suet has been allowed to
melt to a brown gravy. Let the whole stew gently for
about ten minutes, turning the meat occasionally; then
cover the meat with boiling water (not cold), and let it stew
for an hour longer, adding salt and pepper just before dishing.
Garnish with hard-boiled eggs and bits of brown toast.
Hashed Venison. The meat should be cut in slices.
Have ready some good, well-flavoured gravy ; place in the
stew-pan a little butter and flour, and simmer and stir till
brown ; add to this the gravy strained, and a little Harvey
280 OUR VIANDS
sauce or port wine. Let the venison be placed in the
gravy only long enough to be thoroughly hot, as if boiled :t
will be spoiled.
Meat Omelette. A very small piece of cold steak will
make, with 3 eggs, a meat omelette which will be sufficient
for four persons. The meat must be carefully trimmed of
all stringy portions, and chopped very fine. Crumb a slice
of bread into a teacup, and fill it with milk. Beat the
yolks and whites of the eggs separately ; add to the yolks
the soaked crumbs, then the whites ; season the meat well
with salt and pepper; put a good lump of butter in the
pan, and fry a light brown as with other omelettes.
Ham and Potatoes. Beat the yolks of 2 eggs into a
little melted butter (about 2 oz.), cut some thin slices of
cooked ham, dip them in it ; butter a dish or pan, and lay
in it a layer of cold boiled and sliced potatoes, sprinkle
them with pepper and salt, then put a layer of the pieces of
ham, another of potatoes, and so on till the dish be full,
finishing with the potatoes. Pour over this \ pint of
cream ; stand the dish in the oven and bake quickly.
Poached Eggs (French). Put into a saucepan some
minced ham, butter, a little stock, the juice of a lemon,
and bind all with a little flour; add salt and pepper to
taste; when the mixture is on the boil, and just before
serving, break the eggs into it, taking care not to break the
yolks. Serve on buttered toast.
Cock-a-Leekie. Take an old cock and a gallon of good
stock ; a good bunch or two of leeks cut into lengths of
about i inch; simmer the fowl and half the leeks in the
stock gently for half an hour, then add the rest of the leeks
and simmer for three or four hours. Skim and season to
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 281
taste. Take out the fowl, carve it in joints, placing them
in the tureen, then pour the soup which should be quite
thick of leeks over, and serve. When possible, make
your cock-a-leekie ot an old grouse or blackcock.
To Dress a Haggis. Get a butcher to send you the
stomach of a sheep, and the liver, heart, and lungs; see
that the bag, or paunch as it is called, is well cleaned,
scald it, and put it to soak all night in a weak brine. The
day you get it boil the liver, etc., for an hour and a half.
Next day cut away all superfluities, and put all the rest
through a mincing machine, with \ Ib. of suet j put these in
a basin and mix with them \ Ib. of oatmeal, pepper and salt
to taste, a good deal of the former being used. An onion
or two finely cut is by many considered an improvement.
A pint of the liquor in which the heart, etc., was boiled is
added, and the whole well mixed. Take the bag out 01
soak and put in the above mixture, which should leave
sufficient space in the bag for the expansion of the
ingredients ; sew up the opening. Have ready a large pot
of boiling water, into which plunge the haggis ; as it swells
prick it here and there to prevent bursting. Boil for
three hours, then serve very hot.
tl Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face,
Great chieftain o' the puddin race !
Aboon them a' ye tak' your place,
Painch, tripe, or thairm :
Weel are ye worthy o' a grace
As lang's my arm." Burns.
Hot-Pot. Hot-pot is made of mutton chops placed in a
deep dish (known as a hot-pot dish), with a good layer of
potatoes cut in pieces, some onion chopped fine, pepper,
282 OUR VIANDS
and salt ; then another layer of chops, and more potatoes.
The potatoes at the top are left whole. Add a little water,
and bake in a moderate oven for three or four hours.
Kidneys, oysters, and anchovies are a great improvement.
It may be made of cooked meat, but it is not quite so good.
Calfs Head Hashed (a la Pouktte).Cut the remnants of
a boiled head into uniform pieces the size of half an apple.
Melt in a sauce-pan i oz. or 2 oz. of butter, according to the
quantity of meat to be hashed ; amalgamate with it i or 2
tablespoonfuls of flour, then stir in J pint, more or less, of
white stock. Stir well, then add a few button mushrooms,
white pepper and salt to taste, and let the sauce boil for ten
minutes. Put the sauce-pan by the side of the fire, and lay
the pieces of calf's head in it ; let them get hot slowly, but
not boil. Just before serving stir in, off the fire, the yolks
of 2 eggs, beaten up with the juice of a lemon, and strained;
also a small quantity of either tarragon or parsley very finely
minced.
Eel Pie. Skin and wash i Ib. of eels, cut them into
pieces, make a seasoning of bread crumbs, shallot, chopped
parsley, a little sauce, pepper, salt, and nutmeg, with the
juice of half a lemon; place some of this at the bottom of
the dish, then the eels, then the remainder of the seasoning,
adding a little butter ; cover with good puff paste, and bake
for an hour.
Curried Lobster. Take a tin of lobster, strain off the
liquor, cut the lobster in small pieces ; mix 2 tablespoonfuls
of curry powder, i dessertspoonful of flour, and a pinch of
salt ; add this to a sliced onion fried in butter until brown,
then stir in a wineglassful of milk, the juice of a lemon, and
the lobster, and let all simmer gently for a few minutes.
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 283
Oyster Patties. Make some rich puff paste, and bake a
light brown in patty-pans, keeping an opening in the centre
by inserting a piece of bread, which remove when done ;
take as many oysters as required, remove the beards, and
cut each into four pieces; just scald them in their own
liquor, and make a sauce of 2 oz. of butter, 3 tablespoonfuls
of cream, a little flour, lemon juice, pounded mace, and
cayenne ; warm, but do not let it boil. Place a little of the
mixture in each patty, put on the cover, and return to the
oven to make very hot before serving.
To make a Devil. Cut up thin slices of any cold meat,
fowl, or kidney, lay them in a shallow dish, and pour over
them the following : i tablespoonful of powdered mustard,
2 teaspoonfuls of Worcestershire sauce and mushroom
ketchup, i teaspoonful of Chili vinegar, \ teaspoonful of
cayenne, i teaspoonful of salad oil, or a small piece of
butter if there is no fat in the meat, i teaspoonful of lemon
juice, and i wineglassful of claret. Set the dish in the oven
and stir the meat about in the same for a quarter of an hour.
Egg alls for Soups. Procure some hard-boiled yolks of
eggs, then moisten with some raw yolk, till you can roll the
mixture into a ball. Roll up into balls the size of small
marbles, dip into flour, and throw into boiling water till set,
then drain and throw them into the soup before serving.
Some chopped parsley can be mixed with the egg.
Bredie (a South African Dish). Take about i Ib. of
small ribs of mutton, fry with onion, put in a few bits of
chili and salt, then add your vegetables, either cauliflower,
cabbage, green beans, or anything you may fancy. These
must be chopped fine, and allowed to steam with the meat
till done. It must be eaten with rice, as it is too rich without.
284 OUR VIANDS
Cabbage Bredie (a Cape Dish). Take a fine white drum-
head cabbage; scoop out in the centre as much as will
leave a space as large as a good sized shaddock ; fill this
with a mixture of fresh meat (not cooked) minced fine, a
tomato peeled, a little lemon peel chopped fine, a small
onion or a few shallots, some bread crumbs, pepper, salt,
and a teaspoonful of butter, adding also a portion of the
cabbage taken out ; tie it up in a cloth, and boil gently for
an hour ; serve hot.
Bean Bredie (African Dish). Stew fresh meat cut small
with green French beans till all the water is evaporated, or
nearly, adding a little pepper and salt, and serve very hot.
Soles au gratin (a French Dish). Put into a buttered
stew-pan some gravy or butter, mushrooms, a little shallot,
garlic, and parsley, all chopped fine, a little salt and pepper,
half a glass of white wine, and some raspings. All must boil
together for five minutes. Place the filleted soles in a pie-
dish ; pour all the above upon them, and cook them in the
oven for three-quarters of an hour; serve in the dish as
they are. Mushrooms may be dispensed with, and onions
used instead of garlic.
Veal Balls (a French Dish). Take some small and thin
bits of tender veal cutlet ; lay on each piece a little finely-
chopped parsley, onion, or shallot, pepper and salt, and a
little sausage-meat ; roll up each, and tie with small string ;
then roll each ball lightly in flour ; fry them in hot butter
or lard until they are a nice brown, then add a little gravy
or water, and some mushrooms ; stew gently for fully hah
an hour.
Roman Pudding. Boil a rabbit till quite tender; take
the meat off the bones and cut it rather small ; mix with it
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 285
2 oz. boiled maccaroni, 2 oz. grated cheese, i small onion
chopped fine, J pint of milk, pepper and salt. Place
in a pie-dish, and bake with a little butter on the top for
an hour. Mrs. Addis on.
Maccaroni Pie. Any kind of cold meat minced, pepper,
salt, and a little Worcester sauce, an onion cut small, and
half a cupful of stock. Place all at the bottom of a pie-dish,
fill it up with boiled maccaroni, strew the top with grated
cheese or bread crumbs and some little dabs of butter.
Bake in a brisk oven till the maccaroni begins to turn colour.
Portuguese Stewed Chicken. Cut into small joints a nice
fowl, put it in a pan of cold water for an hour, dry well on
a cloth. Flour each piece, and fry in a frying-pan a nice
brown. Cut up some Spanish onions and tomatoes and fry
them in a sauce-pan, add the fowl, a little water, pepper
and salt, spice and sweet herbs. Simmer gently until
cooked. Serve with toasted sippets round the dish.
Stewed Rabbit. Joint and wash an Ostend rabbit, drain
it ; slice two Spanish onions, take a sauce-pan, place a layer
of onions at the bottom, then a layer of rabbit, sprinkle
over the rabbit a seasoning of flour, pepper, and salt ; then
put another layer of onions and another of rabbit, finishing
up with onions. Place the sauce-pan over the fire, and
when hot draw it aside and let it simmer gently for two
hours or more. Or the rabbit, etc., may be placed in a
covered jar and allowed to cook in the oven.
Potted Eggs. The yolks of 3 eggs boiled hard, i oz. of
butter, i tablespoonful of anchovy sauce. Mix together,
braid it well; flavour to taste with nutmeg, cayenne, and
pepper.
Cheese Puddings. \ Ib. of cheese grated and nearly \ gill
286 OUR VIANDS
of cream, 2 eggs, \ oz. of oiled butter. Mix all together
as for a pudding, and bake in a quick oven for a quarter of
an hour or twenty minutes. It may be baked in small tins
or pans.
Cheese Straws. Equal quantities of grated cheese, butter,
and flour. Mix butter and flour together in a bowl with a
little cayenne and salt. Add the cheese. When well
mixed, roll it out thin and cut into strips, which place on a
tin and bake in a moderate oven till pale brown.
Parmesan Omelette. Beat up 3 eggs, with pepper and
salt to taste, and a tablespoonful of Parmesan cheese grated.
Put a piece of butter the size of an egg into an omelet pan.
As soon as it is melted pour in the eggs, etc., and holding
the handle of the pan with one hand, stir the omelet with
the other by means of a flat spoon. The moment the
omelet begins to set, cease stirring, but keep shaking the
pan for a moment or so, and then with the spoon double
up the omelet ; keep on shaking the pan until the underside
is of a good colour. Turn on a hot dish, coloured side
uppermost, and serve quickly.
Savoury Dish. 3 kidneys, 7 or more mushrooms, 3 eggs,
2 rashers of bacon, potatoes. Skin the kidneys, sprinkle
them with seed onions, stew the mushrooms, boil the eggs
hard. When ready place them each in the dish, the kidneys
in the centre, and between each a piece of the bacon, the
mushrooms round the kidneys. Peel the potatoes, and
between each put a slice of egg. Pour some gravy with the
liquor from the mushrooms over the kidneys, warm in the
oven, and serve hot.
Scotch Woodcock. Take 2 slices of toasted bread J-inch
thick, butter on both sides; 4 or 5 anchovies, washed, scraped,
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 287
and chopped fine, put them between the toast. The yolks
of 2 eggs beaten up and \ pint of cream, which put over
the fire to thicken, but not boil; pour it over the toast,
which must be kept hot and sent to table quickly.
Welsh Cheese. The inside of a roll to be soaked in
boiled milk. Add Ib. of grated cheese (Cheddar best),
the yolks of 2 eggs, the whites to be beaten separately and
added just before putting in the oven. Bake twenty
minutes in a tin dish in a quick oven.
Babotie (a Cape Dish). Take a leg of mutton and mince
it very fine, add to the bones and sinews a pint of water,
and let it simmer slowly for half an hour, then soak a thick
slice of white bread in the hot broth, and when cool mix it
with the meat, to which add 6 eggs well beaten; take 2
large white onions, chop them very fine with 3 or 4 slices
of garlic and some salt, fry them in butter until nice and
brown, then stir in a tablespoonful of good Indian curry
powder. Mix the whole well together, put into a pie-dish
or cups, putting a lemon leaf and a small lump of butter
into each mug ; then put in the meat mixture, and rub over
the top an egg beaten up with a little milk, then cover the
top with some lemon leaves, and let it bake for an hour.
3 eggs will do, and dripping may be substituted for butter.
Serve with rice.
To Cure Hams. i Ib. of bay salt, J Ib. of common salt,
2 oz. saltpetre, i oz. black pepper ground ; mix and pound
these together. Rub the hams with it and let them lie four
days, then put ij Ib. of treacle over them, turning them
every day for three weeks for a small ham, or a month if
large ; then soak twenty-four hours in cold water and hang
up to dry.
288 OUR VIANDS
This is sufficient for hams of 20 Ibs. weight, and they will
be fit to cook at any time without further soaking, unless
kept for a year, when they should be soaked a day.
I regret that I cannot give any French or Italian recipes
for the cooking of frogs and snails. In England snails are
considered best soaked in salt and water and then cooked,
being pulled out with a pin like periwinkles, and eaten with
pepper and vinegar. The Romans preferred them grilled ;
but for the cure of consumption they should be boiled in
milk. I have found one curious old English recipe, which
I subjoin, for
Syrrop of Snailes. Putt house snailes in a baskett, put
fennell in the bottom, middle, and top of them, cover them
very close; lett them stand twenty-four hours, wipe them
very cleane with a coarse cloath, prick them with a bodkin,
and stop their mouths with Lisbon sugar, put them in a
sieve with their mouths downwards, and sprinkle a little
rosewater all over them. Let them stand till the sugar is
dissolved and the syrrop drops clear in a dish ; take it off
for present use without boyleing. For to keep, putt it on
the fire, lett it just boyl, scum it very clean, take if off the
fire, and keep it till the next day, then bottle it.
VEGETABLES, FRUIT, ETC., ETC.
Tomato Soup. i pint tin of tomatoes, or 4 large raw
ones cut up fine, add i quart of boiling water, and let
them boil a quarter of an hour ; then add i teaspoonful of
carbonate of soda, when it will foam immediately; add
i pint of sweet milk, with salt and pepper, and about i oz. of
butter ; when this boils, add a few plain biscuits rolled fine.
An enamelled sauce-pan must be used.
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 289
Scotch Kail or Greens, as eaten in Scotland, are first
boiled in slightly salted water; when they are tender
the .water is drained away, and the kail left in the pot ;
this is mashed with a potato masher; a good sprinkling
of pepper is put in, and then half a cupful of good cream
is added and the whole stirred well, allowed to heat up
over the fire, and served hot with some crisp oatcakes, and
a delicious dish it is.
To Dress Kohl-Rabi (Dutch recipe). Cut off the green
leaves and boil till quite tender, chop up and rub through a
sieve; add a little butter, and put back into the stewing-pan,
which allow to stand on the side of the stove to keep hot;
then slice the kohl-rabi, boil it, and add a little butter, put it
into a dish, the white in the centre, and the green round it.
Fricassee of Parsnips. Boil in milk till they are soft, then
cut them lengthways into pieces 2 or 3 inches long, and
simmer in a white sauce, made of 2 spoonfuls of broth, a
little mace, J cupful of cream, a bit of butter, and some
flour, pepper, and salt.
Mushroom Powder (old recipe). Take i peck of good
mushrooms, wash them very clean, and rub them with a
flanel cloath ; then put them into a stew-pan, with i hand-
full of salt, 2 or 3 onions, and \ oz. of cloves, J oz. of whole
pepper, 2 nutmegs cut, \ oz. of mace, a sprigg of rosemary,
7 or 8 bay leaves, 3 oz. of fresh butter ; let all these stew
together till the liquor be dried up, then put them into a
broad pan, and set them in the oven after household bread,
which done three or four times will dry them enough to
rub them to powder or to pound them ; keep in a bottle
close stopt. Broad mushrooms is best, but scrape out the
inside or red.
T
290 OUR VIANDS
To Dress Artichokes (French fashion). Boil them till
tender, then put them in a dish, cover with white sauce,
adding a thick layer of Parmesan cheese ; brown lightly in
the oven, or with a salamander, and serve.
To Preserve Oranges (old and tried recipe). Pare them
very thin and rub them with salt, lay them in water for
twenty-four hours; then boil till they are very tender,
and put them in fresh cold water for two days. For
6 oranges, take 3 Ibs. of loaf-sugar and 3 pints of water,
boil and scum it well, and when cold put in the oranges,
and set them by for four or five days, then boil them till
they are clear; keep them a few days, and then boil
them again, and be sure to have syrup enough to cover
them.
Orange Preserve (Cape recipe). Rasp the outer rind, and
make incisions lengthways with a knife at equal distances
round the orange ; put the oranges into a dish and cover
them with water; change the water every day for three
or four days, squeezing the oranges a little to get out
as many of the pips as possible ; boil in fresh water until
tender, and press them ; make a syrup of equal weight of
fruit, water, and sugar, and boil till it becomes almost a
jelly; let the syrup cover the fruit. If it becomes thin, boil
again.
To make Lemon Pickle. Cut 6 lemons into 8 pieces
each, put on them i Ib. of salt, 6 cloves of garlic, 2 oz. of
horse-radish sliced, of cloves, mace, nutmeg, and cayenne
\ oz. each, and 2 oz. of flour of mustard ; put to them
2 quarts of vinegar ; boil a quarter of an hour in a well-
tinned sauce-pan ; set it by in a closely covered jar and stir
daily for six weeks ; then put it in small bottles.
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 291
Orange Marmalade Pudding. J Ib. finely chopped suet,
J Ib. grated bread crumbs, Ib. moist sugar, 2 table-
spoonfuls marmalade, 2 eggs well beaten; mix all well
together, put into a buttered basin, and boil five hours.
Serve with wine or lemon sauce.
Quickly Made Jelly. Soak i oz. gelatine in J pint of
cold water for ten minutes ; add J pint of boiling water,
stir until the gelatine is dissolved, add 2 glasses of sherry,
ij Ib. sugar, lemon, and lemon peel; boil all together for
five minutes, take off the fire, stir in a few drops of cochineal,
and pour into a wetted mould.
Small Cocoanut Puddings. Dissolve 2 oz. of butter, add
to it 2 oz. of grated cocoanut, 4 oz. of moist sugar, the
grated rind of J lemon, and 2 eggs ; beat this mixture well
together, then add the juice of \ lemon ; put the mixture
in patty-pans, and bake for half an hour.
To make an Apple Tansey (old recipe). Cut 3 or 4
pippins into thin slices, and fry them in good butter, then
beat 4 eggs with 6 spoonfuls of cream, a little rosewater,
sugar and nutmeg, stir them together, and pour it over the
apples ; let it fry a little, and turn with a pie-plate. Garnish
with lemon, and sugar strewed over it.
For making a Gooseberry Tansey (old recipe). Fry i quart
of gooseberries till tender in fresh butter, mash them, then
beat 7 or 8 eggs, 4 or 5 whites, i Ib. of sugar, 3 spoonfuls of
sack, as much cream, a penny loaf grated, and 3 spoonfuls
of flour ; mix all these together, and put the gooseberries
out of the pan to them ; stir all well together, and put
them into a sauce-pan to thicken, then put fresh butter into
the frying-pan, fry them brown, and strew sugar on the
top.
292 OUR VIANDS
Quince Cakes (old recipe). Take i Ib. of the best
yellow quince. Pare, quarter, and boyle till they are very
tender, then bruise them in a mortar, and put them in a
broad dish, and sett them on a chafing dish of coles. Put
to them their weight in sugar, and keep them stirring till
the sugar is dissolved, lay them on plates in what shape
you please, and strew some sugar over them in your stove,
turning them as they dry. Grate sugar over them paper
and box them.
To make a Jelly of Pippins and Codlins (old recipe). Take
6 pippins and codlins, pare and slice them in a quart of
spring water, boil till it comes to a pint, strain and add to
the clear i Ib. of sugar, boil it till it will jelly, skim it clean
as it boils ; this jelly is proper to put a little on the top
of any red or white preserve.
To Candy Cherries. Get them before they are full ripe,
stone them, and having boiled your fine sugar to a height,
pour it on them, gently moving them, and so let them stand
till almost cold, then take them out and dry them by the
fire.
To Candy Barberries and Grapes. Take preserved
barberries, wash off the syrup in water, and sift fine sugar
on them, and let them be dried in the stove, turning them
from time to time till they are dry enough. Preserved
grapes may also be candied the same way.
To Candy Apricots. You must slit them on the side of
the stone, and put fine sugar on them, then lay them one
by one in a dish, and bake them in a pretty hot oven ;
then take them out of the dish, and dry them on glass
plates in an oven for three or four days.
To Preserve Cherries, with leaves and stalks green.
RECIPES, OLD AND NEW 293
Take morel cherries, dip the stalks and leaves in the best
vinegar boiling hot, stick the sprigs upright in a sieve till
they are dry; in the meantime boil some double-refined
sugar to syrup, and dip the cherries, stalks, and leaves
into the syrup, and just let them scald; lay them on a
sieve, and boil the syrup to candy height, then dip the
cherries, leaves, stalks, and all ; then stick the branches in
sieves, and dry them as you do other sweetmeats. They
are pretty in a dessert.
To Preserve Fruit Green all the year. Gather your fruit
when three-parts ripe, on a very dry day, when the sun
shines on them ; then take earthen pots and put them in,
cover the pots with corks, or bung them up that no air can
get in ; dig a place in the earth a yard deep, set the pots
therein, and cover them with the earth very close, and keep
them for use. When you take any out, cover them as
at first.
To Pickle Cucumbers to resemble Mangoes. Peel, cut them
in halves, throw away the seeds, and lay the cucumbers in
salt for a day. Then wipe them dry, fill them with mustard
seed, peeled shallots, garlic, small slips of horse-radish and
mace, and tie them round with twine ; put them into jars,
pour boiling vinegar over, and cover up close till cold, then
tie them down with leather, and a bladder over that.
To keep Lettuce Green all the year. Put them into a pot
with vinegar, salt, pepper, and bay leaves ; keep them very
closely covered, and when required they may be used either
in salads or soups.
To Pickle Mushrooms (old recipe). Take button mush-
rooms and throw them in a pan of salt and water, wipe
them with flannel, then boyle them quickly for a quarter of
294 OUR VIANDS
an hour ; let them drain in a sieve till cold. Make a pickle
of best white wine vinegar, some Rhenish wine, whole
pepper and ginger cut in slices, boyle and let stand till
cold, then put your mushrooms in with a little mace ; tye
them down close, and pour over them a little of the best
oyle.
INDEX
INDEX
ACORN bread, 31, 177.
Africa, the hunter's paradise, 96.
African pigmies, skill of, 95.
Almond, 174.
AlphonseKarr on yellow garlic, 225.
Anchovies, 167.
Angling, 181.
Animals cooked in their skins, 99.
Aniseed in bread, 165.
Apicius, Digestive salts of, 12.
Apples : their great value, 177.
foreign importation of, 178.
good season in three years,
178.
of Eden, according to General
Gordon, 179.
alligator, 179.
Apricot (Moor Park), 193.
preparations of, from Cape,
194.
abundant in China and Japan,
196.
Aquarium, Soles in, 130.
Arctic climate in South of France,
95-
Areca nut chewed with lime, 157.
Arrowroot, 49.
Arum-lily root, 46.
Artichoke, 223.
two kinds of, 237*
Ashley, Sir Anthony, 233.
Asparagus, 237.
immense in Ancient Rome,
237-
dried by Roman cooks, 237.
Athenian national dish, 65.
Aurelias of silk-worm, eaten by
Chinese, 153.
Australian cannibals, 7.
BACON, mild cured, 88.
Banana, 212.
Barberry, 203.
Bath founded, 87.
Beans, 228-230.
found in Swiss Lake dwel-
lings, 229.
Beef, Baron of, 69.
sirloin of, 69.
mode of cooking among Mata-
bele, 73-
Christmas, of sacrificial origin,
72.
Beetroot, 221.
Berries as food, 199.
Bifsteak abroad, 75.
Bilberries, 202.
Birds eaten in Italy, 100.
Blackberries, 202.
Bladud in Bath, 87.
Boar's head, 69, 76.
at Queen's College, Oxford, 78.
298 INDEX
Boiling in skins, 9.
Bones as food, 154.
Book of Days, 56, 78, 160.
Borcherds, African traveller, 8.
Bread of barley, 28.
in England, 28.
in Egypt, 24.
in India, 24.
of oats, 29.
of rye, 30.
in Germany, 30.
in Norway, 30.
in Russia, 30.
of wheat, 26.
in Europe, 26.
Great Britain, 26.
France, 26.
Spain, 26.
Italy, 26.
Germany, 27.
of kidney beans, 51.
of Ancient Greece, 28.
of Romans, 28.
of Swiss Lake dwellers, 24.
of Herculaneum and Pompeii,
25-
Bread-fruit, 49.
mode of cooking, 49.
eaten raw in Sandwich Is-
lands, 50.
Brazil nuts, 175.
Broiling bones, 7.
Buckwheat, 43.
Buns, Bath, 61.
consecrated cakes, 57.
in China, 57.
in Egypt, 57.
in Mexico, 57.
hot cross, 57.
Butter, 119.
in Irish bogs, 120.
made by machinery, 120.
Butter made by burying cream, 120.
of Hebrews, 119.
of Brittany, 121.
melted, 127.
Buttermilk : its uses, 120.
CABBAGE, 233.
favourite food of Roman freed-
men, 233.
introduced into Scotland, 233.
prescribed by Hippocrates,
236.
varieties of, 234-5.
Cabbage-leaf rolls, 9.
Cakes, 52.
Biddenden, 59.
Burying, 52.
of Cornwall, 60.
of Hebrews, 66.
pane dei morte, 52.
Simnels, 53-56.
Twelfth, 59.
Calf, fatted, 85.
Carthagenian pudding, 65.
Carraways, 165.
Carrots, 220.
introduced by Flemings, 221.
Casareep, 165.
Cashew nut, 176.
Catsups, 167.
Cave men's diet, 95.
Caviare, 136.
Cayenne pepper, 157.
Celery and celeriac, 241.
Charcoal stoves, II.
Charlemagne : his fondness for
parsley-seed cheese, 243.
Chamois-hunters, 97.
Cheese, English, 122.
Cheddar, 122.
Cheshire, 122.
Dorset, 122.
INDEX
299
Cheese, double Gloucester, 123.
flavoured with herbs, 243.
of cream, Dr. Jenner's recipe,
125.
Stilton, 122.
foreign, 124.
Dutch, 123.
Gorgonzola, 124.
Gruyere, 124.
Ricotta, 125.
Parmesan, 124.
Cheese-making, 121.
Chelsea bun-houses, 58.
Cherry-ripe, 193.
orchards of Kent, 197.
The Morella, 197.
Chestnut, 173.
Chinese dainties, 146.
dinner, 9.
Spring custom, in.
Choosing a bride, 123.
Chutney, 165.
Citron, 191.
Clean broth, 64.
Cloudberries, 202.
Co 9 a, 157.
Cochlearia in Rome, 148.
Cock as sacrifice, 106.
Cocoa nut, 175.
Colocynth, 206.
Coriander seed, 157.
Cornish pasties, 151.
Thunder and lightning, 127.
Cow, golden, 72.
Crab apple, 177.
Cranberries, 202.
Cream, Cornish, 126.
Devonshire, 126.
Creams and ice creams, 128.
Cream separator, 121.
Crustacea, 140.
Cucumbers, 209.
Curious Scotch custom, 128.
Currants, 199.
Curry-powder, 165.
Cuscosco, 63.
Custard, 127.
Custard apple, 179.
DEEMSTER, oath of, 132.
Deer and antelopes in Africa, 96.
Deer forests, 89.
Deer sinews as thread, 92.
Devonshire cream, 126.
Junket, 126.
Digestive salts, 12.
Dinornis or Moa, 116.
Dormouse sausages, 152.
Dourah in Egypt, 42.
Ducks, 105.
their intelligence, 105.
Durham tansy cakes, 59.
mustard, 158.
EARLIEST hunters, 94.
^Esop, the actor, 100.
Easter cakes, 58.
eggs, no.
Egg dance, 113.
Eggs in Brit. Mus., 109.
in Persia, 112.
feast of, in China, in.
enormous importation of, 114.
foreign bodies in, 116.
with chicks, eaten in China
and Australia, 118.
lavish use of, in cookery, 114.
painted in tombs, no.
shell porous, 115.
sacred, no.
universal food, 108.
Egyptian feast, 12.
pastry, 65.
in Brit. Mus., 66.
INDEX
Elagabalus, 99.
Eland, attempt to acclimatise, 96.
Elderberry, 203.
wine, 203.
Electric eel, 139.
Elephant's foot, a tit-bit, 145.
Escargotieres near Ulm, 149.
Eskimos, 145.
FEAST at Tetuan, 156.
of Elagabalus, 99.
Fermity at Christmas, 63.
at Midlent, 63.
Figs, 185.
two crops a year, 186.
green, preserved, 187.
not much used in cookery, 186.
used as food by Greeks, 186.
Fig trees in London, 185.
Fish, 130.
common food anciently, 130.
culture of, in Rome, 142.
made pets of, 142.
the cod, 134.
eels, 137.
Finnon haddies, 135.
Gurnard, 135.
herrings, 132.
curious oath, 132.
John Dory, 136.
kippers, 132.
lampreys, 139.
mackerel, 134.
pilchards, 133.
pet eels, 139.
red mullet, highly esteemed in
Rome, 134.
red herrings, 133.
salmon and char, 136.
salt cod on Ash Wednesday
and Good Friday, 134.
Snoek in S. Africa,
38.
Fish, soles, dearness of, 134.
sturgeon, 136.
trout, 137.
- turbot, 134.
Emperor Domitian and
the Senate, 134.
whiting, 133.
Yarmouth bloaters, 133.
Fladbrod of Norway, 31.
Flat peach of China, 196.
Forks of Anglo Saxons, 1 1.
of our grandmothers, n.
of Lo Bengula, 12.
Fowls, breeds of, 107.
frozen from Russia, 106.
Frederick the Great, his fondness
for melons, 208.
French bread, called puffe or
cocket, 31.
partridge, 97.
Frith's reminiscences, 77.
Fried white ants, 150.
Fricollis (Black Beans), 229.
Frogs in France, 147.
Fruits found wild in Africa, 195.
Fuegians eat raw meat, 7.
GARLIC in Spain and Portugal,
226.
yellow, its virtues, 225.
Garum, famous Roman sauce, 163.
Gloucester lampreys, 139.
Simnels, 56.
Grapes as fruit, 183.
as wine producers, 183.
cheapness of foreign, 184.
Grape cure, the, 185.
Great Auk's egg, 117.
Grease, the delight of savages, 154.
Greely, feeds on shrimps, 132.
Green gooseberries, 200.
Grubs eaten, 153.
INDEX
301
Goat's flesh, staple food of Jews,
92.
much eaten in Italy and
at the Cape, 92.
in Wales, 93.
kept in stables, 93.
leaders of sheep, 93.
in Italian paintings, 92.
Goose, sacred in Egypt and India,
103.
at Michaelmas, 103.
Gooseberries, 199.
Cape, 200.
Guinea corn, 42.
Guinea fowls, 102.
probably the meleagrides of
ancients, 103.
HALLOWEEN, apples at, 181.
Haricot beans, 230.
Harris's bacon, 88.
Hazel nuts at Halloween, 172.
in Swiss Lake dwellings, 171.
Hedgehog, eaten by gipsies, 145.
Herbs for seasoning, 158.
Herb cheese, 243.
Herby-pie, Cornwall, 151.
Herrings, 132.
Hickory nut, 176.
Honey, 162.
ofMt. Hymettus, 162.
used for embalming, 163.
Honey-cakes offered to serpent, 58.
Horseflesh in London, 144.
in Paris, 144.
in Tartary, 144.
Horse bean, 229.
bread, 31.
Horns of deer as implements, 91.
Horace, 104, 163, 164.
Hortensius weeps at death of
turbot, 142.
Hot cross buns, enormous con-
sumption of, 57.
Humboldt on water-melons, 206.
Hump of beef, 75.
Hyaena, eaten by Bushmen, 145.
INCUBATORS in Egypt, 106.
Isle of Man, May Day customs, 57.
herrings in, 57.
Jatropha manihot (manioc), 46.
Juvenal on Oysters, 142.
KADJERA, porridge, in Australia,
177.
Kangaroo, to roast native fashion,
99, note.
Kidney beans, 225.
dwarf or French, 225.
grown for blossom, 225.
used for bread in China,
225.
King of the bean, 59.
Knack in Devonshire, 37.
Kohl-rabi, 234.
Kuara-bean (carats), 232.
LAMB-TAIL pie, 82.
Lamprey pie, 139.
in Severn, 139.
in Thames, 139.
Leaven of Romans, 28.
of Jews, 24.
Leek, badge of Wales, 227.
Nero's fondness for, 224.
Lemon, indispensable, 191.
legend of, in Mentone, 191.
Lentils, 230.
Lettuce, 240.
Limes, 191.
Livingstone on water-melons, 207.
Loaves sealed, 33.
Locusts as food, 150.
302
INDEX
Locust bean, 230.
London, foreign imports of butter
and cheese, 121.
Loquat, Japanese medlar, 205.
Lotos, 213.
Lumholt?, 89, 153.
Lupin, legend of, 231.
MACARONI, 27, 124.
Maggots eaten in Ancient Rome
and in Australia, 152-3.
Maize, 34.
its supposed American origin,
34-
American legends of, 36.
called Turkey corn, 36.
cultivation of, in China, 37.
known as mealies in South
Africa, 40.
Longfellow's description of,
35-
said to have been found in
cultivation at Cape, 36.
Tortillas made of, 42.
varieties grown in America, 41.
use of dried leaves of, 42.
used in Italy for polenda, 46.
Maiden Feast, 39.
Manchets, 27.
Mandarin orange or nartje, 102.
Mango, 206.
Manioc, 45.
Mamniee apple, 180.
Marco Polo, 180.
Marigold, 243.
Marjoram, 243.
Mastich, 165.
Mayonnaise, 1 66.
Melons, 206.
called musk melons, 210.
water, great use of, 206.
Melted butter, 127.
Menu of Roman supper, 155.
Michaelmas goose, 103.
Mince pie, 64.
obnoxious to Puritans, 64.
Miller of Chelsea, 225.
Millet, 42.
food of Egyptians, 42.
Kaffirs, 42.
two kinds grown in China, 42.
Mint as condiment, 243.
in medicine, 243.
Mothering Sunday, 56.
Mouflon in Sardinia and Corsica,
80.
Mouldy cheesen, 123.
Mulberry, 203,
white, 204.
Mushrooms, 238.
strange varieties eaten in Ger-
many, 238.
Mustard, Durham, 158.
French, 158.
Mutton, 79.
in Colonies, 79.
poor on Continent, 81.
Southdown and Welsh, 81.
NARDU in Australia, 51.
Nets made by savages, 130.
New Zealanders as cooks, 9.
Niebuhr, on melons in Arabia, 207.
Noble game hunted by early man,
94.
Norway, game from, 99.
Nut of poisonous palm eaten in
Australia, 177.
Nuts, their importance as food, 171.
OCTOPUS eaten in Italy and South
of France, 147.
Offerings of eggs and bacon on Good
Friday, 113.
INDEX
303
Olive oil used in fifteenth century,
Ida
in ancient cookery, 163.
Olive trees of great age in South of
France, 204.
Oliver Cromwell's favourite dish, 86.
Olla Podrida, 152.
Onion broth, 226.
Onion : its varieties garlic, leek,
shalot, 223.
disliked by Greeks, 225.
lament of Israelites for, 224.
Oranges, 187.
apparently unknown to Pliny,
192.
eight species of, 190.
indigenous in Asia, 189.
inferior sorts in market, 188.
in South of France, 189.
importation of, in 1846, 189.
St. Michael's, brought from
China, 190.
sweet and bitter, 189.
wild in America and South
Africa, 190.
Orange trees live 300 years, 192.
Ostrich eggs, 116.
Otaheite, pet eel in, 139.
Ovens, of Egypt, 9.
of Africa, 9.
Oxen as sacrifices, 71.
in adoration, 71.
in the plough, 71.
roasted whole, 70.
Oysters, 141.
British, in Ancient Rome, 142.
first eaten in Britain by Ro-
mans, 142.
foreign beds of, 141.
Frank Buckland's efforts at
culture of, 141.
natives, 141.
Oysters, pearl, 141.
PANCAKES, 61.
at Westminster, 62.
Pane dei Morte, 52.
di zappa, 58.
Parched pulse, 231.
of chick pea in Spain, 231.
ordinary food of Romans,
231.
said to be that eaten by
Shadrach, Meshech, and Abed-
nego, 231.
Parsnip, 222.
Passover cakes, 59.
Pate de foie gras in Ancient Rome,
104.
Peaches brought from Persia, 195.
cultivated in England since
sixteenth century, 195.
pigs fed on, 193.
Peacock at feasts, 100.
pie, 101.
Pea-nut bread, 50.
Pears, 180.
introduced by Romans, 181.
known to Homer, 181.
varieties of, 180.
Peas brought from Holland, 231.
Pigs introduced everywhere, 88.
Pilchards in Cornwall, 133.
Pilez or pellas, 47.
Pine apple, 179.
Pistachio nut, 176.
Plantain, 212.
Pliny, 28, 161, 177, 192, 237, 258.
Plum, 300.
varieties of, 197.
the bullace and sloe, 197.
greengage, 197.
porridge, 64.
Porcupine in South Africa, 145.
304
INDEX
Pork tabooed, 87.
Porpoise and grampus sold as fish,
142.
Portuguese bring oranges from
China, 190.
Potatoes, 215.
brought from America by Sir
Walter Raleigh, 215.
method of preventing blight
in, 218.
planted in Ireland, 216.
unknown till sixteenth century,
215-
value of crop in 1877, 216.
Puff-balls wholesome, 238.
PufTe or cocket, 31.
Pumpkins, 2 1 1.
Pythagoras on beans, 228.
his diet, 163.
QUETZALCOATL, 36.
Quince, 180.
eaten raw in South Africa, 180.
RABBITS from Australia and New
Zealand, 98.
Raisins of Spain, 184.
of Australia, 184.
of Cape Colony, 184.
of Natal, 184.
Raleigh, Sir Walter, 215.
Raspberry, 201.
wild, 202.
Ratafia, 196.
Rebecca's cookery, 92.
Reindeer in France, 92.
Rhubarb, 213.
Rice, 48.
indigenous in Asia, 48.
Robin Hood, 89.
Roman supper, 155-
Rotten eggs in China, 118.
SACRED Bull of Egypt, 72.
in India, 72.
Sacrifice of Lo Benguela, 73.
of Hebrews, 74.
Saffron, 164.
Sage, 242.
in cheese, 242.
as tea, 242.
Sago, 48.
Salads, 240.
in fifteenth century, 160.
Sidney Smith's dressing for,
241.
Salmon fishing in Ireland, 131.
Salt, not used by all races, 156.
Sauce of Apicius, 163.
Sauces, various, 159.
Sauerkraut, 236.
Scarlet runners, 229.
Scotch haggis, 151.
Seal equal to hare, 146.
Seakale, 235.
Sea-urchins eaten in France and
Italy, 147.
Shaddock, 191.
Sheep, earliest domesticated animal,
79-
millions now in Australia, 79.
fat tailed, 80.
varieties of, 81.
horned and hornless, 80.
merino, 83.
wild, of Rocky Mountains,
80.
Shepherd's dog, 83.
Shortbread, 61.
Singing-bread, 58.
Sir Henry Thompson, 245.
Skirrets, 222.
Smoke Jack, 70.
Snails, eaten in Ancient Rome, 149.
in Austria, 149.
INDEX
305
Snails in England, 148.
in France, 147.
in Spain, 147.
rejected by Teutons, 148.
Snakes eaten in Africa, 153.
in Australia, 153.
formerly as charm, in
Europe and Asia, 153-4.
Spearing fish in Tyrol, 137.
Spices, 161.
Spiders eaten, 150.
Spinach, 236.
Souari or butter nut, 176.
Soyer's History of Food, 28, 65,
155-
Star-apple, 180.
Store-closet requisites, 167.
Strange viands in Paris, 98.
Strawberries, 201.
grown in London, 201.
wild on the Continent, 202.
Sucking-puppies eaten in Ancient
Rome, 152.
Sugar, 161.
called Indian salt, 161.
introduced into England, 162.
present importation of, 161.
spoken of by Pliny, 161.
sweet cane of Israel, 161.'
Swans at Queen's table, 101.
Swedish turnip, 220,
Syllabub, 126.
TABLEof Solomon,how supplied, 74.
Talegalla or brush-turkey, 102.
Tamarind, 205.
Taro, 50.
Tax of herrings levied by early
kings, 132.
Teff-bread, 50.
disgusting custom, 51.
Thyme and lemon thyme, 243.
Tinned beef of Chicago, 75.
Tisane of cherry stalks, 198.
Tomato or love-apple, 211.
Tradescant, 229.
Trained stags, 90.
Trepang, 147.
Troglodytes, 8.
Truffles, 239.
Turkey introduced by Jesuits, 102.
Turnip, 219.
varieties of, 219.
eaten as fruit in Russia, 219.
Turnspit, 70.
Turtle-eggs, 117.
Twelfth-cake, 59.
Tyndale's ' Sardinia,' 31.
UNLAWFUL to eat hare and goose,
103.
Uses of eggs, 115.
of horse-chestnuts, 173.
VANILLA, 165.
Vegetable marrow, 21 1.
Veddahs eat mongoose, rats, bats,
etc., 145.
Venison, 89.
Vetch, chickling, curious properties
of, 232.
Vinegar, 164.
as a beverage, 164.
used to dissolve pearls, 164.
WALNUT, 174.
Whale and seal eaten by Eskimo,
145-
Wild-boar in Ancient Rome, 77.
bones of, in kitchen middens,
89.
in Modern Italy, 77.
food of Scandinavian heroes,
77-
U
306
Wool necessary, 84.
INDEX
GARLIC-PORK, 278.
YARMOUTH bloaters, 133.
Yellow garlic or Moly, 225.
Youghal in Ireland, potatoes
planted there, 215.
RECEIPES MODERN.
ABERDEEN shortbread, 253.
Almond cakes, 253.
Artichokes, to dress, 290.
BABOTIE (Cape), 287.
Baking-powder, 251.
Bredie (Cape), 283.
bean, 284.
cabbage, 284.
Bread, French, 250.
unfermented, 250.
whole meal, 250.
CALF'S head hashed, 282.
Calves' feet fricasseed, 279.
Cheese puddings, 285.
straws, 286.
Welsh, 287.
Cock-a-leekie, 280.
Cornflour cake, 253.
Cornish heavy cake, 252.
Curried lobster, 282.
DEVIL, to make a, 283.
Dumplings, Norfolk, 262.
Suffolk, 262.
EEL pie, 282.
Egg balls for soups, 283.
Eggs potted, 285.
FRICANDELLE, 279.
Frekkedel (Cape), 278.
Fricassee of Parsnips, 289.
HAGGIS, to dress, 281.
Ham and potatoes, 280.
Hams, to cure, 287.
Hot-pot, 281.
Hunter's dainty, 277.
KOHL-RABI (Dutch), 289.
LOAF cake, 252.
Lobster, curried, 282.
MACARONI pie, 285.
Meat omelette, 280.
Minced collops, 279.
ON paste making, 264.
Oranges to preserve (Cape), 290.
Oyster patties, 283.
PARMESAN omelette, 286.
Poached eggs, 280.
Portuguese stewed chicken, 285.
Pudding, Alderman's, 263.
Brentwood, 264.
Brown Betty, 264.
Crumply, 263.
Orange marmalade, 291.
Plum (our own), 261.
Roman, 284.
Scotch (Cape), 264.
Sicilian, 263.
small cocoa nut, 291.
QUICKLY made jelly, 291.
RABBIT, stewed, 285.
Rolls and muffins, 251.
Rosterkook (Cape), 251.
Rye Muffins, 253.
INDEX
307
SAVOURY dish, 286.
Scone, loaf (Scotch), 251.
Scotch kail, 289.
Scotch woodcock, 286.
Sponge-cake, excellent, 252.
Springbok, to dress (Cape), 277.
stewed (Cape), 278.
Soles, au gratin, 284.
TEA-CAKES, 251.
Tomato soup, 288.
VEAL balls, 284.
Venison (hashed), 279.
RECIPES OLD.
ALMOND cakes (fine), 255.
jumballs, 257.
Apple tansy, 291.
Apricots, to candy, 292.
BARBERRIES, to candy, 292.
Battaglia pie, 267.
Beef, cold roast to fricassee, 276.
collops, to stew, 273.
for roasting, 268.
Beefsteaks to fry, 272.
Buns, 254.
CAKE, a rich currant, 257.
a Spanish, 255.
Cakes, fine almond, 255.
queen, 254.
quince, 292.
saffron, 255.
Calf's liver, to roast, 272.
Cheese cakes, 260.
lemon, 260.
rice, 260.
Cherries, to candy, 292.
Cherries, to preserve with leaves,
etc., 292.
Cock's combs, ragoo of, 277.
Cold fowl, to hash, 276.
Cucumbers, to pickle, to resemble
mangoes, 293.
Custard, to make, 261.
DOUGH nuts, 254.
Ducks, to stew whole, 276.
EEL pie, 268.
Eels, to roast, 272.
to spitchcock, 273.
Eggs, to broil, 274.
FLUMMERY, oatmeal, 258.
Fowl, cold, to hash, 276.
Fowls, German way of dressing,
271.
Fritters (good), 262.
Fruit, to preserve green, 293.
Furmity, a Lenten dish, 258.
GINGERBREAD nuts, 256.
Gumballs, 256.
Green goose with green sauce, 271.
HARE, to jug, 274.
to roast, 270.
to stew, 273.
JELLY of pippins and codlins, 292.
Jumballs, 256.
almond, 257.
apricock or plum, 25
LEMON pickle, 290.
Lettuce, to keep green all the year,
293-
MACCAROONS, 256.
38
IXDEX
Minced pie, 267.
Mock turtle, to dress, 275.
Mutton, to hash, 275.
a leg or shoulder stuffed, 269.
breast to roll, 269.
venison fashion, 268.
Mushrooms, to pickle, 293.
powder, 289.
ORANGES to preserve, 290.
PANCAKES, 263.
Paste for venison pasties, 266.
Pie, battaglia, 267.
an humble, 266.
a lumber, 266.
lamb with currants, 267.
Pig, to roast, 270.
Pigeons, to fricassee, 276.
Pork, to roast, 269.
Plovers, to roast, 271.
Plumb pottage, 259.
Pudding, oatmeal, 261.
quaking, 259
QUAILS, to roast, 271.
Quince cakes, 292.
SAUSAGES, to fry with apples, 273.
Scotch collops, 273,
Soup gravy, 277.
fine white, 277.
Syrrop of snailes, 288.
Syllabub, 126.
TANSIE, 259.
apple, 291.
gooseberry, 291.
VEAL, to mince, 275.
to roast, 269.
rolls to make, 277.
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at the Edinburgh University Press.
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