Virginia Cookery-book

a butter-boat. This is a favorite Virginia dish, and was sometimes made richer by the addition of four more eggs to the batter, another spoonful of butter, and a few thin slices of ham to the chicken. The above proportions we deemed sufficient to suit the tastes and larder of most persons. Stewed Ducks. See that the ducks are nicely picked, and stuff them with bread-and-butter flavored with onions, pepper, and a few celery-seeds ; flour them, then brown them in lard in a frying-pan. Have ready an iron stewpot, put in a few slices of ham, two chopped onions, water, pepper, and salt, with a few blades of mace ; put in the ducks and let them stew gently but constantly for two hours; flour the ducks each time that you turn them in the pot ; thicken the gravy with butter rolled in flour. Stewed Chicken. Two onions browned in flour or lard ; cut the chicken into pieces, and put in a little pepper, salt, pot-marjoram. thyme, and a pinch of ginger, with a large spoonful of butter ; cover with water, and let it stew closely covered. When sufficiently done to dish take the yolks of two eggs, mixed with a little parsley and flour, and put into the gravy. The above recipe was furnished by a famous housekeeper, but for our own part we prefer, instead of so many seasonings, plain butter, pepper, and salt, with the addition of some one herb, such as parsley or celery -leaves. Brown Gravy for Ducks. Make a spider quite hot ; keep it on the fire ; put into it a table-spoonful of butter ; let it boil up ; throw into it a dessert-spoonful of brown sugar ; stir them together as they boil till brown ; dredge in flour sufficient to thicken them; continue to stir; add your dripping and as much boiled water — in which, however, you should have first boiled sweet herbs, such as onion and celery — as will make enough gravy for your dish, not forgetting to add pepper, and cautiously of salt as well. Stew your giblets also with the onions and a bunch of sweet herbs, adding them to the gravy instead of plain water. Keep it stewing until ready to dish. To Drbss a Calf's Head. Take the head before it is skinned, parboil it, and take out the bones ; cut the flesh into small pieces ; take also some of the liver, heart, and tongue ; cut them up and put them in an oven with enough water to cover them ; then add to them a flavoring of salt, pepper, thyme, a few cloves, and blades of mace, with parsley and a spoonful of butter ; then dredge well with flour, and put it on to stew. For force-meat balls take a pound and a half of meat cut from the leg of a veal, if ready cooked and cold all the better ; add to this the brains that have been boiled, tied up in a thin piece of linen ; season as you did the rest of the dish ; chop up fine ; mix it up with egg into small balls, which must be rolled in bread-crumbs, and fried in lard. Arrange the stew in the middle of a rather deep meat-dish, and garnish with these force-meat ' balls, and, if you would have the dish yet handsomer, garnish also with hard-boiled eggs sliced in rings. A Pie of Green Corn and Chickens. Take eighteen ears of com and cut off the grains, so as to get the sweet part next the cob ; season them with pepper and salt; have three spring chickens cut into quarters and parboiled, with their gizzards and livers, as you would for any other pie ; have a baking-dish ready, cover the bottom of it with com, then put in the chicken, dotted over with pieces of butter; then put in the water in which the chicken was parboiled ; sprinkle with pepper and salt, then add the rest of the corn, and set in the stove to bake for about an hour, or until set and brown. Fathbb Adam.