Raw tomatoes and cucumbers
Cut off the tops of large, firm tomatoes and carefully remove most of the pulp. Keep pulp and tomatoes in the refrigerator while you peel and cut into small dice ice-cold cucumbers. Mix the cucumber dice with the tomato pulp, fill the tomato shells, set them on crisp lettuce leaves and pour a great spoonful of mayonnaise dressing over each.
Creamed tomatoes
Cut firm tomatoes into thick slices and fry them until tender in a couple of spoonfuls of butter. Have ready a white sauce made by cooking together a tablespoonful, each, of butter and flour to the bubbling point, and then pouring upon them a half-pint of milk—or, better still, a half-pint of mingled milk and cream. Cook, stirring constantly, until the sauce thickens, dish the tomatoes and turn the sauce upon them, after seasoning them suitably with pepper and salt.
Stewed tomatoes
Peel, slice and put a quart of tomatoes over the fire in a nickel-steel-plated or agate saucepan—never in tin. Stew fast twenty minutes. Season with a lump of butter rolled in flour, a teaspoonful of sugar, salt and pepper to taste, and two teaspoonfuls of onion juice. Stew five minutes longer, and serve.
Some cooks substitute fine dry crumbs for the flour. Unless some thickening is used, the tomatoes will be watery and thin.
Raw tomatoes and whipped cream
Pare large, smooth tomatoes carefully, and set on ice until chilled to the heart. Cut each in half when ready to serve, sprinkle lightly with salt and paprika, and heap with whipped cream.
A welcome entrée in summer. Send around heated and buttered crackers and cream cheese with them, or thin slices of buttered graham bread.
Tomato croquettes
These can be made either of fresh or canned tomatoes. Rub through a colander half the contents of a can of tomatoes into a saucepan with a thin slice of onion, salt, pepper, two or three cloves, and one tablespoonful of sugar. Cook for fifteen minutes, thicken with corn-starch—four teaspoonfuls of it rubbed to a cream with a generous lump of butter. Let it boil up and add one egg. Pour the mixture out to cool. When cool, form into croquettes, and dip them, first, in beaten egg, then in fine crumbs; set on ice for two hours before frying in deep, boiling cottolene or other fat.
Stuffed tomatoes (No. 1)
Cut the tops from large, firm tomatoes, and with a small spoon scoop out the insides. To half of this pulp, chopped, add as much minced boiled ham and two tablespoonfuls of bread-crumbs. Season to taste and fill the tomatoes with this mixture. Set in a baking-pan and bake for twenty minutes, covered; then brown.
Stuffed tomatoes (No. 2)
Cut the tops from large tomatoes and scrape out the pulp. Mix with this one part of bread-crumbs to two parts of minced boiled ham. Fill the tomato shells with this mixture, put a bit of butter upon the top of each, and set, side by side, in a bake-pan. Pour a cupful of soup stock over and around the tomatoes, and bake until tender.
Scalloped tomatoes
Grease a pudding-dish and put in the bottom of it a layer of peeled and sliced tomatoes. Cover with a layer of salted and peppered crumbs, sprinkle with bits of butter and a little sugar. Now put in another stratum of tomatoes and more crumbs. When the dish is full pour over all a cupful of well-seasoned soup stock, sprinkle the top with crumbs, and bake, covered, for fifteen minutes. Uncover and brown.
Tomatoes and corn
Put a cupful, each, of stewed tomatoes and boiled corn over the fire together, bring to a boil, add half a teaspoonful of white sugar and, if you like, a dash of onion juice; cook one minute longer and serve.
A good way of using yesterday’s left-overs of these vegetables.
Tomato fritters
Make a batter of a cupful of flour, a cupful of water, a tablespoonful of butter, a saltspoonful of salt and the white of an egg. The water should be just warm enough to melt the butter, but not hot. Stir the two into the sifted and salted flour, mixing carefully, and, lastly, beat in the whipped white of an egg. Into the batter thus made dip rather thick slices of peeled tomatoes, and fry in deep hot fat to a light, delicate brown. The tomatoes may be sprinkled with salt and pepper before dipping them in batter, or the fritters may be seasoned after they are cooked.
Tomatoes stuffed with meat
Select large, firm tomatoes, cut off the tops and scoop out the inside pulp. Do not peel. Chop fine a cupful of cold meat—it may be fowl, tongue or ham, or even lamb, mutton or beef, if the latter are well seasoned. With the meat put a half cupful of fine bread-crumbs, a tablespoonful of butter, and salt, pepper, parsley and onion juice. The quantity of these to be used must be determined by the amount of seasoning there is already in the meat. After sprinkling the inside of the tomato shells with a very little salt and pepper fill them with the mixture of meat, crumbs, etc. If this seems too dry it may be moistened with a small quantity of gravy or soup stock, or even with milk or cream. Arrange the tomatoes in a pudding-dish, replace the tops, lay a cover over them and bake half an hour. Serve in the dish in which they were cooked.
Tomatoes stuffed with corn
Prepare the tomatoes as in the preceding recipe, place them in the bake-dish and fill them with a mixture of a cupful of grated green corn, half a cupful of bread-crumbs, a tablespoonful, each, of milk and butter, a teaspoonful of white sugar, and salt and pepper to taste.
Tomatoes stuffed with rice
Fill tomato shells prepared as above directed with cold boiled rice, to which have been added two tablespoonfuls of melted butter, half a teaspoonful of onion juice, salt and paprika. When the shells are filled strew the contents of each thickly with grated cheese before laying on the tops. Bake, covered, half an hour.
Tomatoes stuffed with macaroni
Prepare as in last recipe, substituting cold, boiled macaroni, chopped, for the rice, and mixing cheese with the filling, besides strewing it on the top.
Tomatoes à la créme
Cut unpeeled tomatoes into thick slices. Put into a frying-pan three tablespoonfuls of butter, and fry the tomatoes for three minutes in this, or until they are tender. Remove carefully and keep hot on a platter set in an open oven. Into the butter in the pan stir a tablespoonful of flour and cook until thoroughly blended; then pour in gradually a half-pint of rich milk in which a pinch of soda has been dissolved. Stir all to a smooth sauce, season and pour over the fried tomatoes.
Tomatoes and poached eggs
Cook tomatoes by either of the preceding recipes, or stew them until tender. If you do the latter, strain off the thin, watery liquor that comes from them in cooking, and set it aside for sauces or for seasoning. Make of the thick portion of the tomato a layer in the bottom of a platter, seasoning to taste with pepper and salt, and, if desired, with a few drops of onion juice; make all very hot and lay on the bed thus prepared carefully poached eggs. If fried eggs are preferred, they may be substituted. Dust them with a little salt and pepper and serve at once.
Tomato omelet
Peel and chop four tomatoes. Soak a cupful of bread-crumbs in a cup of milk and stir them into five beaten eggs. Add the chopped tomatoes, season to taste and turn into a frying-pan in which two tablespoonfuls of butter have been melted. Cook until set, turn upon a hot platter, pour tomato sauce about the omelet, and send at once to the table.
Curried tomatoes
Put into a frying-pan a heaping tablespoonful of butter and half a small onion, grated. Cook until the latter begins to brown—about two minutes—and stir in a scant teaspoonful of curry powder. In this fry thick slices of tomato until tender, sprinkle with salt and serve.
Another method of preparing curried tomatoes is to cook them by the recipe given for creamed tomatoes, adding a teaspoonful of curry powder to the cream sauce and pouring this over the fried tomatoes.
Curried green tomatoes
Cut large green tomatoes into very thick slices. Melt in a frying-pan three tablespoonfuls of butter and fry in this a small onion, sliced. At the end of two or three minutes stir into the melted butter a teaspoonful of curry powder. Lay the tomatoes in this mixture and fry them on both sides. When done, drain, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and serve.
TURNIPS
Mashed turnips
Peel, lay in cold water for an hour; boil tender in hot, salted water; throw this off and fill up the pot with boiling water, slightly salted. Cook five minutes in this, drain well and rub through a colander or vegetable-press. Beat in a lump of butter rolled in a little flour, salt and pepper to taste; return to the saucepan and cook one minute, stirring all the time.
Turnips boiled, plain
Pare and quarter. Cook tender in two waters; drain, dish; pour a little melted butter, seasoned with pepper and salt, over them, and serve hot.
Young turnips stewed with cream
Pare, lay in cold water one hour; cook tender in two waters; drain and cover with hot cream (heated with a pinch of soda) or hot milk, if you have no cream. Simmer gently for five minutes; stir in a white roux made by cooking together a tablespoonful of butter and one of flour, salt and pepper, and serve very hot.
Young turnips with white sauce
Peel, lay in cold water for an hour; boil for ten minutes in fresh water, cover with boiling, slightly salted water, and cook tender. Drain, dish, season and pour over them a good white sauce of drawn butter.
Fried turnips
Peel and slice young turnips, dropping them into cold water as you do so. Turn into a pot of boiling water, and cook for twenty minutes. Drain carefully, so as not to break the slices. When cold, dip each slice in beaten egg, then in salted cracker dust, and spread all upon a platter. Let them stand for an hour and fry in deep, boiling fat to a golden brown.
Turnips and carrots sautés
Peel and cut into dice of uniform size enough cold boiled turnips and carrots to make a cupful of each. Mix and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Melt two tablespoonfuls of butter in a frying-pan and turn the vegetable dice into this. Toss and turn in the hissing butter for five or ten minutes; drain in a hot colander and dish.
Kohlrabi turnips
Separate the turnip of the vegetable from the leaves that surround it and wash thoroughly. Cut into quarters and boil for twenty minutes in salted water. Drain; sprinkle with salt and pepper, and serve hot with melted butter.
Kohlrabi with leaves
Remove the outer leaves from the swelled stalk, or turnip; wash thoroughly and throw into cold water. Drain both and put them on to boil in separate vessels of salted water. When the turnips have cooked for ten minutes, drain and pour over them fresh boiling water, to which a tablespoonful of vinegar has been added. Boil for ten minutes longer; drain, scrape and slice. Dip the slices, one by one, in melted butter and lay about the edge of a hot platter. Drain the leaves which have been cooked tender, turn into a chopping-bowl and chop very fine. Return to the fire with two tablespoonfuls of butter, pepper and salt to taste. Beat to a smoking mass, and heap in the center of the heated platter, about the edge of which you have laid the sliced vegetable.
A WORD ABOUT NUTS
Nuts of all kinds are gaining in favor as articles of diet, and are at their best in the autumn and winter. They may be bought, shelled and packed in boxes, so that they are ready for immediate use. The housekeeper of moderate means, with an abundance of time at her disposal, will find that it is cheaper to buy the nuts in their shells and crack them herself. If she is so fortunate as to be able to despise the petty economies she will rejoice in the prepared nuts. They will save her much tedious labor.
If Spanish chestnuts are not to be procured when wanted, large domestic chestnuts may be boiled and used in their stead.
Chestnut croquettes
Boil a quart of Spanish chestnuts in salted water. While still hot, remove the shells and skins and rub the nuts through a colander. With a wooden spoon work to a smooth paste, adding, as you do so, a tablespoonful of butter, a saltspoonful of salt, a dash of paprika, a quarter of a teaspoonful of onion juice, a handful of fine bread-crumbs, and the unbeaten yolk of an egg. Put the paste in a double boiler over the fire and heat through. With floured hands form into croquettes, dip in beaten egg, then in cracker dust, and lay on a platter in the refrigerator for two hours. Fry in deep, boiling cottolene or other fat; drain in a colander, and serve very hot.
English walnut croquettes
Crack, extract the kernels, blanch by pouring boiling water over them, stripping off the loosened skins and dropping into cold water. Leave there for ten minutes; take out, dry between two soft towels and, when crisp and perfectly dry, proceed as with chestnuts in last recipe.
Peanut stuffing for roast duck
Prepare the ducks for roasting and make a stuffing of bread-crumbs seasoned with butter, pepper and salt. Chop a cupful of roasted and shelled peanuts to a powder and rub them into the bread-crumbs. Stuff the ducks with this mixture and roast, basting frequently.
Savory chestnuts
Boil and shell and skin large Spanish chestnuts; break each in half and cover with a thin giblet gravy. Or you may make a gravy of the legs and necks of a pair of fowls, and thicken it with browned flour rolled in butter. The gravy must be brown. Cook the chestnuts in it for ten minutes. This is a pleasing accompaniment to roast poultry of any kind, particularly roast turkey.