Original White House Cookbook

One cup of stale bread crumbs, one onion, two ounces of butter, pepper and salt, a little mace. Cut the onion fine, and boil it in milk till quite soft; then strain the milk on to the stale bread crumbs, and let it stand an hour. Put it in a saucepan with the boiled onion, pepper, salt and mace. Give it a boil, and serve in sauce tureen. This sauce can also be used for grouse, and is very nice. Roast partridges are nice served with bread 152 SAUCES AND DRESSINGS. crumbs, fried brown in butter, with cranberry or currant jelly laid beside them in the platter. TOMATO SAUCE. Take a quart can of tomatoes, put it over the fire in a stewpan, put in one slice of onion and two cloves, a little pepper and salt; boil about twenty minutes; then remove from the fire and strain it through a sieve. Now melt in another pan an ounce of butter, and as it melts, sprinkle in a table- spoonful of fiour; stir it until it browns and froths a little. Mix the tomato pulp with it, and it is ready for the table. Excellent for mutton chops, roast beef, etc. ONION SAUCE. Work together until light a heaping tablespoonful of fiour and half a cupful of butter, and gradually add two cups of boiling milk; stir constantly until it comes to a boil; then stir into that four tender boiled onions that have been chopped fine. Salt and pepper to taste. Serve with boiled veal, poultry or mutton. CHILI SAUCE. Boil together two dozen ripe tomatoes, three small green peppers, or a half teaspoonful of cayenne pepper, one onion cut fine, half a cup of sugar. Boil until thick; then add two cups of vinegar; then strain the whole, set back on the fire and add a tablespoonful of salt, and a teaspoonful each of ginger, allspice, cloves and cinnamon; boil all five minutes, remove and seal in glass bottles. This is very nice. MINT SAUCE. Take fresh young spearmint leaves stripped from the stems; wash and drain them, or dry on a cloth. Chop very fine, put in a gravy boat, and to three tablespoonfuls of mint put two of white sugar; mix and let it stand a few minutes, then pour over it six tablespoonfuls of good cider or white- wine vinegar. The sauce should be made some time before it is to be used, so that the fiavor of the mint may be well extracted. Fine with roast lamb. SHARP BROWN SAUCE. Put in a saucepan one tablespoonful of chopped onion, three table- spoonfuls of good cider vinegar, six tablespoonfuls of water, three of tomato catsup, a little pepper and salt, half a cup of melted butter, in which stii SAUCES AND DRESSINGS. 153 a tablespoonful of sifted flour; put all together and boil until it thickens. This is most excellent with boiled meats, flsh and poultry. BECHAMEL SAUCE. Put three tablespoonfuls of butter in a saucepan; add three table- spoonfuls of sifted flour, quarter of a teaspoonful of nutmeg, ten pepper- corns, a teaspoonful of salt; beat all well together; then add to this three slices of onion, two slices of carrot, two sprigs of parsley, two of thyme, a bay leaf and half a dozen mushrooms cut up. Moisten the whole with a pint of stock or water and a cup of sweet cream. Set it on the stove and cook slowly for half of an hour, watching closely that it does not burn; then strain through a sieve. Most excellent with roast veal, meats and fish. St. Charles Hotel, New Orleans. MAITRE D’HOTEL SAUCE.