Cassell's dictionary of cookery

Really, hashed mutton, especially the remains of a haunch or saddle, nicely served the way we have described, makes an entree that no one need be ashamed of sending to table. Small crayfish make one of the very nicest-looking garnishes. If the entree, therefore, was hashed venison, a small crayfish could be placed at the four corners of the dish, and a small one on the top of the pyramid. To ornament hashed mutton with crayfish would, I think, be going a little too far. We will now take another form of ornamenting entrees, viz., fried parsley. Probably cooks are more indebted to parsley than to anything else for ornamenting their dishes. The great secret of fried parsley is, first, it must be freshcut double parsley, and rather dark in colour; secondly, it must be perfectly dry before it is fried. Again, the fat must be boiling, and the greatest care exercised in draining the parsley so as not to break it more than possible. The best method of frying parsley is in a little wire basket in a small deep stewpan. This basket can be easily made at home out of two-pennyworth of wire, by a very little exercise of ingenuity. The advantage of the basket is that it can be fitted to the stewpan, and the parsley can be lifted out bodily, thereby rendering the risk of breaking very small. Fried parsley can be used to ornament or garnish various kinds of patties, the dark green contrasting well with the light-brown pastry. Fried parsley should also be served with kromeskies, croquettes, fried sweetbreads, fried oysters, lobster cutlets, and a variety of other light entrees. To continue the idea of entries made from remains of joints, we will next consider the number of nice dishes made from boiled turkey, boiled fowl, etc. Suppose, for instance, the dinner, has consisted of one of these, with that very usual accompaniment — a boiled tongue. An exceedingly pretty-looking entree can be made as follows : — Cut off the best pieces of the white meat that has been left, and make a strong white stock with the bones, which may be thickened with a little white roux, and, if possible, two or three-pennyworth of cream. Warm up the meat in some of this sauce, and pile it up as before in a pyramid shape on the dish, and pour the remainder of the thick white sauce over it, the sauce being made sufiiciently thick to what is called " mask " the surface. Sprinkle over this white pyramid, sparingly and lightly, a little rather coarsely chopped dark-green parsley, and ornament the base of the pyramid as follows : — In cuttmg up the Ix cassell's dictionary op cookery,