Part 28 (1/2)

A New Method of Curing Beef.

Take six gallons of water, nine pounds of salt, (fine and coa.r.s.e mixed,) three pounds of sugar, one quart of mola.s.ses, three ounces of saltpetre, and one ounce of pearl ash or salaeratus, boil and skim it well, and let it stand till entirely cold, when pour it on beef that has been sprinkled with salt for several days. You can boil of this beef from the brine all winter, or hang it up, and smoke it with your bacon.

To Cure a Dozen Tongues.

Soak the tongues an hour in a tub of cold water to extract the blood, and cut off most of the root, mix together a quarter of a pound of saltpetre, finely powdered, one pound of brown sugar, and a pint of salt, rub the tongues with this, and put them in a tight barrel; then make a pickle that will bear an egg, which pour over them, turn them every three days, and let them stay in the pickle two weeks, then smoke them two days, and hang them up in a dry place; boil and skim the pickle that the tongues have been in, and it will do for a round of beef.

Pickle for Two Rounds of Beef.

Cut the rounds in a suitable shape for drying, mix together two pints of salt, one of mola.s.ses, or a pound of sugar, and half a pound of saltpetre, rub them with this, and pack them in a tight vessel, make a pickle that will bear an egg, and pour it over, put a weight on the top, and let it lay for ten days, when take it out, and smoke it two days, hang it up in a dry place, it will be fit to slice and broil in a week, or cut it very thin, and stew or fry it with b.u.t.ter and cream. Legs of mutton may be salted as rounds of beef, and will resemble venison, when dried and chipped.

In preparing pickle for any kind of meat, observe that one gallon of water will hold, in solution, a quart of salt and two ounces of saltpetre.

To Corn Beef, Pork or Mutton.

Rub the meat well with salt, and pack it in a tub. If the weather is warm, it will require a good deal of salt, but no saltpetre.

To Restore Meat that has been kept too long.

When meat has been kept too long in summer, it may be improved by putting it in sour milk for several hours, or was.h.i.+ng it in vinegar is good, some hours before it is cooked, you must wash it well in cold water several times, if it lays all night in sour milk, or salt and vinegar, it should be put in soak early in the morning in cold water. In very hot weather, when you have fresh meat, fowls, or fish left at dinner, sprinkle them with strong vinegar, salt and pepper, warm this up the next day, either as a fry or stew, the vinegar will evaporate, and not injure the taste. Cold rock fish is good, seasoned with salt, pepper and vinegar, to use as a relish for breakfast or tea.

To Keep Meat Fresh.

Where persons live a distance from market, and have no fresh meat but what they kill, it is important to know how to keep it fresh. In winter, if it is hung up in an out-house, it will keep very well for six weeks, or more, when it has once frozen, it is safe till a thaw comes on, when rub it with salt. In the summer, if you have an ice-house, you can keep it without trouble. If rubbed with salt, and pinned in a cloth, it will keep in the cellar two days, or by lowering it down your well, attached to a rope, and changing the cloth every other day, it will keep good a week in hot weather.

To Put up Herring and Shad.

Those that put up their own fish should be careful to have the barrels tight and well cleaned, if the pickle leaks from them, they are liable to spoil. Scale the fish and wash them, as it will save much time, when you prepare them for cooking, take out the gills, but leave on the heads of herrings.

The heads should be taken off the shad, and split them down the back, put a layer of fish, then a layer of ground alum salt,--and after they are packed, put on a weight to keep them down. If herring are well cured, they will be good at the end of two years.

To Put up Herring, _According to the Harford Mode_.

First put the herring into the brine left from curing bacon, or, if you have none of that description, make a brine that will bear an egg, and let them remain in it thirty or forty hours; then, if for pickled herring, change them into new brine, which must also bear an egg, and head them up to keep. If for red herring, hang them up, and smoke them thoroughly. A little saltpetre, added to the brine, is an improvement.

It is better to take out the roe.

b.u.t.tER, CHEESE, COFFEE, TEA, &c.

b.u.t.ter.

It is of the first importance that every thing connected with milk and b.u.t.ter should be kept clean; if the milk acquires an unpleasant taste, it communicates it to the b.u.t.ter. Tin pans are best to keep milk in, and they should be painted on the outside to keep them from rusting when they are put in water.

In summer, milk should be kept as cool as possible; before it is strained, the pans and strainer should be rinsed with cold water, and the milk not covered until it is cold, as soon as the cream rises sufficiently, it should be skimmed, and put in a large tin bucket with a lid that fits down tight, and stirred every day. b.u.t.ter will be spoiled by neglecting to stir the cream, a yellow sc.u.m will form on it, which gives it an unpleasant taste. And if you leave a pan of milk till the cream is covered with spots of mould, you had better throw it away than put it in, as it will spoil the taste of a whole churning.