For a party of eight.

Consomme de becassines.

Darnes de seer a la Peg Woffington.

Cotelettes de mouton a la Moscovite,

Kramouskys aux huitres.

Chapon a la Francaise.

Canards sanvages, sauce bigarade.

Petits pois au beurre.

Pain de pruneaux.

"Pudding" glace aux fraises.

Fromage, hors d'oeuvres.

Dessert.

1. - Prepare a bright clear consomme for your eight covers. Slightly roast six snipes ; let them get cold, divide them into convenient pieces, mash them in a mortar and throw the whole, with the exception of the livers of the birds, into the consomme; let it come to the boil, skimming carefully, and then remain simmering all the afternoon : towards evening, strain the liquor from the bones, and set it to cool; pick from the remnants of the snipe sufficient meat to form a dozen tiny quenelles the size of an olive : pound this meat in a mortar with the saved livers, a pinch of salt, some chopped parsley, a little thyme, and a dust of Nepaul pepper, or spiced pepper; stir in a very little red currant jelly and a few drops of portwine; stiffen this with a little bread-crumb soaked in stock, and bind the whole with two eggs; let it get cold, roll it out, and divide it into little portions, form them between two tea-spoons, and poach till done just before serving the soup, into which they should be put at the last minute : the consomme itself having been meanwhile clarified, assisted by half a glass of Madeira, and again heated almost to boiling point.

Clear snipe soup.

2. - Divide a cut of seer fish into eight nice collops about half an inch thick ; flatten them on a board, butter a pie-dish, pour into it half a pint of broth made from the fish trimmings, and a glass of chablis or hock and lay them therein; pepper and salt them, sprinkle them with some minced parsley, and a little shallot, and spread a sheet of buttered paper over them: bake for about ten minutes in a quick oven, and when done, remove the paper, and arrange the slices neatly in a hot dish.

For the sauce : - To the liquor from the pie-dish add a quarter of a pint of cream, a table-spoonful of walnut catsup, and half one of anchovy sauce ; boil these together, and just before you remove the sauce-pan from the fire, stir in well a bit of butter the size of a walnut rolled in flour, with a thought of red pepper.

3. - For this dish select the nicest choplets you can from a neck of mutton ; trim them very neatly, lard them with fat bacon, and introduce some pieces of truffle judiciously here and there by making incisions with a sharp, pointed, root knife.

Pieces of tongue may also be inserted in this manner : they should be cut square at the head and tapering to a point like nails. Meat treated by this process is called cloute by French cooks.

Seer slices with Peg Woffington sauce.

Mutton cutlets in the Russian manner.

When ready, stew the cutlets very tenderly in gravy made from the bones, flap, and trimmings; take them out, and set them to get cold with a weight above them; when cold, mask the cutlets on one side only with reduced bechamel, or Espagnole sauce. When this mask or glaze has set, trim the edges neatly, and the cutlet is ready.

You must now prepare the socle or stand upon which to arrange your cutlets. This is made of ground rice, and is not intended to be eaten. Wash a pound of rice, and boil it gently with a little salt. When soft, pound it in a mortar, and mould it to the shape required. In this case we want a circle about three inches high with a hollow centre for a salad, and sloped gently on its outer rim to admit of the cutlets being laid upon it securely. When formed satisfactorily, the socle should be coated with butter or white sauce, and the cutlets arranged round its outer face. They should have their masked sides outwards. The hollow centre of the socle should be filled with a salade cuite of mixed cold cooked peas, flageolets, French beans cut in diamonds, stars of carrot, etc. The top of the socle may be formed sufficiently wide to admit of a garnish of white of egg, turned carrots, etc., being laid upon it.

When completed, this entree should be kept in the ice box till wanted. With the exception of the mayonnaise dressing, which should be separately made, and poured over the salad just before serving, it can be made early in the day, and is consequently so much off the cook's hands as the dinner hour arrives. It will be found vastly better than the everlasting pate' de foie gras en aspic. Iced cream may be used instead of mayonnaise dressing, and the salade may be composed of flageolets, pointes d'asperges, etc., alone.

4. - The difficulty in this dish is the batter which should be most carefully considered.

Beat up the yolks only of three eggs, with a table-spoonful of brandy, one of olive oil, and three or four of cold water : mix into this three table-spoonfuls of flour, and a salt-spoonful of salt; beat this to a paste for ten minutes, preparing a rather thicker batter than you would for ordinary fritters : at the time of using, stir in the whites of the three eggs whipped to a stiff froth.

Wash your oysters (about a dozen and a half good ones) early in the day. Parboil them, if fresh, beard them, and put them to marinade for two hours in the juice of three or four limes, a sliced onion, some whole pepper and a few cloves. Lift them out of this when wanted, cut them up, bind the mince together with a liaison of yolks of eggs and thick white sauce, and let it get cold and firm. Then divide it into six portions, each the size of an ordinary wine cork, and place them on six slices of previously boiled bacon ; roll up your bacon fillets, and fix them with white of egg ; dip them now into the batter, and lay them, ever so gently, in your frying basket, plunge this into a seething bath of fat, and fry a golden yellow. Serve prettily garnished with curly parsley.

Instead of bacon, very thin water-like pancakes may be used cut into pieces the required size : and cow's udder is recommended by some authors.

5. - The capon in this receipt should be braised, with a pint of good stock round it, an onion and two carrots, sliced, half a glass of sherry, and pepper and salt to taste : a few slices of fat bacon should be pinned over the breast, and the larding needle may be used also. Braise gently till done. Lift the capon out of the pan, strain and reduce the gravy in which it was cooked, add a couple of table-spoonfuls of minced truffle, and pour this over the bird before serving; sippets of dry fried bacon, and slices of lime may garnish the dish.

Oyster Kramouskys.

Capon in the French way.

6. - Roast the wild ducks, and serve them with this sauce: - Pare as thin as possible the rind of two oranges (sweet limes), cut them into thin shreds and boil them in water for five minutes, drain, and put them aside. Melt an ounce of butter in a sauce-pan, stir into it a dessertspoonful of flour, and a breakfast-cupful of common stock (made with scraps, and the giblets of the ducks,) pepper, salt, and the juice of the oranges, with a pinch of sifted sugar, a table-spoonful of Marsala, and a tea-spoonful of chilli vinegar; now add the boiled rinds, stir till the sauce boils, and serve in a boat.

7. - Wash the contents of a tin of petits pois in cold water, by emptying the tin into your strainer and pouring a jug of water over them. Put them into a jar, (or small sauce-pan with a close fitting cover) with a large spoonful of fresh butter, a tea-spoonful of sifted sugar, and a tea-spoonful of salt with a little bundle of mint leaves : secure the top of your jar and immerse it within a large sauce-pan (the water should half cover the jar,) steaming the peas until thoroughly hot. Stir in a little more butter, pick out the mint, and serve on a very hot silver dish. Minced ham fried in butter and mingled with the peas is nice, if you happen to have ham in the house, vide page 137.

8. - An effective and most excellent sweet dish. Put half a pound of prunes into a saucepan with two ounces of white sugar, a slice or two of a lime, a little cinnamon, and sufficient claret and water, mixed half and half, to cover them : stew gently till the fruit is quite tender: lift the saucepan from the fire, drain off the liquor, stone the prunes:

Roast wild ducks with Bigarade sauce.

Green peas with butter.

Prune jelly.

pass the fruit through the sieve, and save the pulp in a basin. Crack the stones, and throw the prune kernels into the pulp. Steep about an ounce of gelatine in the liquor that you strained off, put it on the fire and let it dissolve, mix it with the prune pulp, and pour in a liqueur glass of cherry brandy and a glass of good red wine. Decorate a plain border mould with blanched almonds, fill the mould with the prune liquid, and set it upon ice to form. When required, turn out the pain, and fill the centre of the mould with whipped cream. Unlike ordinary jellies this one is dark tinted, and opaque, but its flavour* is quite beyond question.

9. - Line a pudding mould (see Menu IV) with finger biscuits, or slices of sponge-cake. Make a rich custard sufficient in quantity to nearly fill the mould; be generous with the egg-yolks, and do not use flour if you want a creamy pudding ; tint the custard a pale rosy-pink with a few drops of cochineal, strain, whip it well as soon as it is formed, and flavour it with strawberry syrup; when ready, add half an ounce of dissolved gelatine to it, and work as described for "iced apricot pudding," Menu No. 1, adding crystallized strawberries to the frozen custard, and a coffee-cupful of whipped cream.

Note. - To adapt this menu, strike out the chapon a la Francaise, and insert, after the fish, Filet de boeuf a l'Italienne, page 189.