Worldwide Cookbooks

The Consumer Viewpoint

SIMPLE ITALIAN COOKERY

American Woman's Home

Art of Living in Australia

Cooking Eggs

Elegant Art of Dining

Guide to Marketing and Cooking

Italian Recipes

Meal Preparation

School and Home Cooking

Physiology of Taste

Tried and True Recipes

Library of Cookery

Hans Christian Andersen . American Fairy Tales . Grimm's Fairy Tales

Aesop's Fables - Tales with Morals . Mother Goose . Mother Goose in Prose

CHAPTER XV.



THE STOCK POT.


The stock pot is indispensable to good cooking, and although many soups
and sauces can be made with water as a foundation, nearly all of them
are improved by using stock, and no cook who desires to achieve good
results should be without a basin of stock when she commences
operations in the morning. There are saucepans now called digesters,
which are most useful as stock pots, but any good-sized saucepan or
boiler will do very well indeed. This should be put on fresh every
morning with everything the larder contains that is suitable--such,
for instance, as the bones of fresh or cooked meat, poultry, or
rabbits. Never put in fat, as this can be rendered down for pastry and
frying, and only makes the stock greasy; always cover the bones with
cold water, but regulate the quantity by the material used. Put in cold
water with a teaspoonful of salt, and when it boils up, skim well; when
skimming, take an iron spoon and a basin of water, and dip the spoon in
the water each time the scum is removed; then put in the peppercorns
and vegetables. In very hot weather put peppercorns and a fagot of
herbs only, as the vegetables cause the stock to turn sour very soon;
peppercorns should always be used, as they impart a much pleasanter
flavour to soup than pepper. A fagot of herbs is made with a bay or
peach leaf, a sprig each of parsley, thyme, and marjoram tied together
with a piece of cotton. These herbs can be grown so easily if one has a
small garden, or even in a box, with very little care; they impart such
a pleasant flavour to soups and gravies. Leeks cut up with the green
tops and put into the stock pot instead of onions are very good.
Part of the onion skin left on makes a good colour, but it can
be coloured by burning half a teaspoonful of sugar in an old spoon, or
by a few drops of caramel--the recipe for which is given elsewhere.
All fresh meat and bones should be carefully trimmed and wiped with a
warm damp cloth before putting into the pot; when the stock has boiled,
stand the saucepan at the back of the stove and simmer slowly for at
least five or six hours. If strong stock is desired, leave the lid off
the saucepan for the last hour; the water will then evaporate and make
the stock richer. The stock should be strained through a hair sieve or
a colander, and should stand in a cool place till the next day. If it
has been carefully made it will be in a jelly; the fat can very easily
be removed with a spoon. It should finally be wiped with a damp cloth.
Removing the fat thoroughly is a most important item, for greasy soups
and sauces are most indigestible and unwholesome. If the stock has to
be used at once, remove the fat first with a spoon, and then pass
pieces of this paper lightly across the surface; these will absorb the
fat. A small piece of charcoal laid on top of the stock will prevent it
turning sour in the hot weather. With this basin of stock to work on,
many dainty tit-bits are possible which could not be made without it.
How often has the cookery book been searched for "something nice" and
laid down with a sigh when half a pint of gravy has been found
necessary to concoct the desired dainty! But with a basin of stock on
hand, all these things are procurable, and it certainly does not take
more than ten minutes to break up the bones, skim the pot, and strain
it, and last of all it costs nothing. In cases of sudden emergency,
when stock is wanted and is not to be had, the recipe for Quick Beef
Tea answers very well, using one quart of water instead of one pint,
and by adding a few vegetables; this is made in five minutes.
White soup is looked upon as quite a high-class soup, but it is just as
easy to make as any other kind. A piece of stewed veal or mutton, or a
boiled chicken, gives the stock at once, or the bones of mutton, veal,
or pork alone will form the foundation. Never throw away the water in
which carrots, parsnips, celery, or even cauliflowers have been boiled.
Vegetables contain a great deal of potash, which is a valuable food for
the blood. A great deal of this potash comes out in the water during
the process of cooking; if this liquor is used as a foundation for
soup, we utilize this. For this reason vegetable soups, and stews
containing plenty of vegetables, are such a good diet for anyone
suffering from or subject to diseases of the blood and bones. These
simple facts seem to be overlooked; but if Australia is to become in
the future, as we all hope it may, a power in the world second to none,
the wives and mothers of her husbands and sons must understand the
necessity of providing them with a diet which shall make them strong
and brave, and root out what now seems to be the curse of the land--
dyspepsia--brought on in a great measure by badly cooked and therefore
indigestible food. The remedy for this is in the hands of the women of
Australia, and if they will rise to their position and importance and
do their work with a high and holy motive, they will not find it the
drudgery it is often supposed to be. What does Owen Meredith say?--


"We may live without poetry, music, and art,
We may live without conscience, and live without heart,
We may live without friends, we may live without books,
But civilised man cannot live without cooks.
He may live without books--what is knowledge but grieving?
He may live without hope--what is hope but deceiving?
He may live without love--what is passion but pining?
But where is the man that can live without dining?"