To return to our class list of entrees, I cannot too strongly urge you to go in for dishes from class one more than you do. Can anything be more acceptable than a nice juicy little chop from a neck of mutton, on whose sides the marks of the grid-iron are plainly visible, reposing against a circle of really well-mashed potatoes, or of savoury rice, holding in its centre a puree of celery, petits pois, or sauce soubise? The grid-iron is invaluable : the chop comes to table full of gravy, yet not underdone; it has, to use a kitchen phrase, "seen the fire" (browned) in places, and is absolutely free from the grease which so often mars a dish of chops cooked in the frying pan. For the little Club-dinner, this class of entree is always popular. I noticed that a plain cutlet such as I have described, or a plain fillet of beef, figured in almost every Club menu, I had the pleasure of discussing when last at home. Pleasing variety can be secured by the cook if he will change his sauce, or his puree. Choose the neck chops for these entrees.

The fillet of mutton is that tender strip of meat which runs down the inside of the saddle under the kidney. If of sufficient thickness, this delicate morsel, cut into nice pieces, and broiled over a clear fire, is worthy of Lucullus himself. It is the thing for an invalid, or one coming round after an illness.

The fillet of beef is the undercut of the sirloin, which the butcher will cut out for you in the market here if you wish it. But I have found good fillets produced thus :- Buy a really good joint of the ribs of beef, and cut out lengthways the good tender meat near the end of the bone, with any fat there may be attached to it. Bones, and flap, and trimmings can be counted in the allowance of gravy-meat, and the tender meat you have cut out will trim into capital fillets for entrees, or cook whole as a filet de boeuf pique, aux champignons, au puree d'oseille, etc., as a releve.

Fillets of fowls and game are formed by cutting off neatly the whole of the breast meat right down to the wing joint; this you can divide into fillets according to the size you require.

The hare and rabbit fillet is produced by cutting out the long strip of good meat which runs down either side of the back bone. Well larded with fat bacon, and cooked grenadin-fashion, with Espagnole, or sauce soubise, you may do worse than present a dish of these fillets to your best friend.

Whether your entree be a fillet of beef or mutton, of fowl or of game, or the neatly trimmed neck chop to which I have alluded; and whether you intend to grill, to stew, or to fry it, you will find it vastly improved by being set en marinade from early morning until the time draws near for cooking it. I shall use this word frequently in my menus, let me therefore explain its meaning as applied to the process which I now take the opportunity of noticing.

The word marinade, as you all know, really means pickle, but viewed in the light in which we now regard it, it would be better to describe it as a mixture, the component parts of which can be varied at pleasure, in which meat should be soaked for several hours before it is cooked. Its immediate effect is to preserve the outside of the meat which has "felt the knife" moist and juicy, to prevent its "turning," and to lend that subtle flavour to it - so hard to describe - but which just makes the difference between our ordinary cutlet, and that which we remember having eaten at some restaurant abroad, or at the table of a friend who possessed a really well educated cook.

The common form of marinade for beef and mutton is composed of salad oil and vinegar in the proportion of four of the former to one of the latter, with one large Bombay onion sliced, one clove of garlic chopped up, twelve whole peppers, six cloves, a tea-spoonful of salt, a couple of tea-spoonfuls of dried thyme or marjoram, a table-spoonful of minced parsley, and a strip or two of very finely pared lime peel. This mixture can be preserved for daily use, with slight additions from time to time, and the flavour can be modified by changing the sweet herbs, or withdrawing them.

The taste of game can be imparted to cold, cooked mutton by placing the meat in a marinade composed of a wine-glass each of vinegar, portwine, and mushroom ketchup in which a table-spoonful of red currant jelly has been dissolved; with a tea-spoonful of "spiced pepper," some pepper corns, salt, a chopped onion, and a dessertspoonful of marjoram and thyme blended. A hash of cold mutton collops that have lain a few hours in this preparation is very like that of venison, and the fillets of an Indian hare, (a little underdone in the roasting) similarly steeped all day, are really excellent. In this particular instance you must strain the marinade, and add it to the thick gravy in which tho hash or fillets have to be simmered.

Marinade need not be made in extravagant quantities. It should cover the bottom of the dish on which you place the meat, your object being gained by occasional turning, and basting. When wanted, the cook should lift the meat from the dish, let it drain a minute or so, and then proceed to business.

Independently of the method in which you purpose to cook them, a great deal depends upon the careful trimming of a dish of mutton cutlets. How uninviting do these miniature chops look when they have been cut anyhow from the joint to which they belonged? First, saw off the ends of the row of bones level, and cut off the outer flap; now take a very sharp knife, and divide the row of cutlets down to the bone with one clean decided cut between each of them, and, lastly, sever them with a single stroke of the chopper. Now, lay them on your board, and give them a few strokes with your cutlet bat, trim them into shape, and then place them in the marinade. The hungry man may be able, no doubt, to eat the cutlets his cook may send him, "rough hew them as he may," but for an entree, we must study appearance.

Little paper frills placed round the ends of the bones of the cutlets before serving, give a finish to your entree.

A cutlet to be grilled should be dipped at once in a little melted butter, or salad oil, and broiled over a clear fire. If to be stewed, it should be first browned by being turned frequently in a sawte-pan with a little melted butter; the previously prepared gravy and vegetables should then be put into the stew-pan, in which the cutlet should simmer gently till done. The whole success of a stew depends upon simmering. If the cook carelessly allow the gravy in the pan to come to the boil, the cutlets (or anything else) will be done for.

How often are hashes, and rechauffes of cold meat sent to table as hard and tasteless as leather, simply because the cook permitted them to boil? Hashes and salmis of cold meat and game may be defined, properly speaking, as carefully composed sauces in which meat is placed cold, and then gradually heated until sufficiently hot to serve. My own rule with a salmis is to take it off the fire as soon as the steam rises freely from the surface, to turn it immediately into a silver dish heated with scalding water, and send it up.

Hashes and salmis are much improved if the cold meat composing them be soaked in the sauce for some time before cooking.

The process of bread-crumbing a cutlet deserves far more care than a great majority of cooks bestow upon it. To do this really nicely (for an entree), you should proceed in this way. Lift your cutlet from the marinade, drain it a moment, then dip it into the following composition:- two eggs, one dessert-spoonful of salad oil, and one dessertspoonful of water, well beaten together. Then turn it over and over in a plateful of fine, stale bread-crumbs which have been dried in the oven, pounded, and thoroughly sifted. It should then be laid aside for half an hour, after which it should be dipped again, and again rolled in crumbs. Amongst the crumbs may be sprinkled some finely-minced parsley and shallot, with some powdered dried sweet herbs, and grated cheese is sometimes added with marked effect. The frying: should be conducted in abund-ance of boiling: fat, and the colour of the cutlets should be a pale golden brown.

All thrifty cooks should carefully save the scraps of trimmings, the outer flap, and the ends of bone, which were cut off in shaping the cutlets, for from them the basis of the sauce which is to accompany the dish can. with a little assistance, be composed.

Veal is occasionally procurable at Madras. If you succeed in getting a nice dish of cutlets, remember that it is downright necessary to lard them, with strips of fat bacon. Veal is apt to be dry in England where the calf is fattened for the market. In India it is far drier, and if cooked without the assistance of bacon, veal cutlets are positively wooden.

N.B. - Let the sauce prepared for your entree of cutlets be sent round, piping hot, in a, bout. If poured round the cutlets, it makes them sodden, and loses its effect entirely.