For a little home dinner.

Potage a la Palestine.

Croustades de grandes crevettes.

Perdreaux a la soubise.

CEufs a la Suisse.

"Pudding" a la Duchesse.

Fromage, hors d'oeuvres.

Dessert.

1. - This is an especially favourite soup with those who are fond of the flavour of the Jerusalem artichoke.

There are two methods of composing it: to wit, au maigre (with milk) and au gras (with stock): I take the latter as the commoner form. Having washed, peeled, and boiled a nice dish of artichokes, pass them through the sieve; save the pulp so obtained, until your daily allowance of soup meat has yielded sufficient nice clear stock for the puree. Now proceed to amalgamate the two in the proper way, by melting an ounce of butter at the bottom of a sauce-pan first, incorporating therewith a dessert-spoonful of flour, and after that has been done, stock, and pulp of artichoke by degrees until you have while, and when the puree conies to the boil, it will be ready to serve. On its way to the table, like all purees, it may be enriched by a table-spoonful of cream, or a little fresh milk into which the yolk of an egg has been stirred, but the addition is not essential. An old fowl makes a good stock for this soup, if assisted by a slice or two, or a bone, of bacon, or ham. Fried croutons of bread should be handed round with it.

Jerusalem artichoke soup.

Let those who rejoice in a dairy try the recipe au maigre thus: - Take as much milk as you want soup, and boil in it twenty pepper corns, some parsley,and a sweet onion. When thoroughly flavoured, strain the milk, mingle the pulp of the artichoke with it, as described for stock, and finish it off in the same manner: the cream must be added in this case.

2. - Choose two or three small dinner rolls which have been baked in tins, and will stand upright. Scoop out all the crumb, and fry the cases so obtained a golden yellow colour in melted butter. Drain them. Now prepare enough boiled prawns to fill them, cut them into quarter inch pieces, toss them in melted butter, with a little mace, pepper and salt; fill your cases, moistening the salpicon with a little white sauce, shake a little bread-crumb over the surface of each, place them on a buttered baking tin, and heat them for five minutes in the oven, serve as soon as the tops take colour. This recipe can be followed, substituting canned prawns, shrimps, or lobster.

3. - This is a capital dish for Darby when it pleases him to dine cosily with his Joan. Prepare the partridges as for roasting : fill each of them with a chopped Bombay onion (previously boiled in milk) seasoned with spiced pepper, salt, and rolled in a slice of boiled bacon. Make a broth with the giblets of the birds, any scraps you may have, a slice of lean bacon, an onion cut into quarters, a few pepper corns, and a seasoning of salt and pepper : when you have got a broth to your mind, simmer the partridges therein until perfectly tender. When done, (they will take three-quarters of an hour) take them out, and drain them, replacing them in the hot pan in which they were done, with the cover on. Now strain the liquor in which the birds have been cooked, and with it make a rich soubise sauce as follows:- Simmer four large Bombay onions in milk till tender, drain them, chop them up very fine, pass them through the sieve, and proceed with melted butter, and the stock aforesaid, to make a rich puree; when boiling hot, dish the birds, pour the onion puree over them, and serve, garnished with curls of crisply fried bacon. The onions should, of course, be prepared beforehand to prevent delay: the puree ought not to occupy more than ten minutes in preparation. A spoonful of cream should be added to it if possible.

Prawn croustades.

Partridges with sou-bise sauce.

4. - Butter a little pie-dish well, strew a good layer of mild grated cheese at the bottom of it, pour over the cheese a coffee-cupful of cream, break four fresh eggs very carefully, and pass them into the cream without breaking them : dust a light layer of cheese over the surface, bake for about seven minutes (till the surface slightly colours) and serve. The eggs ought not to be done hard : the dish is not a pudding, but eggs, just set, in a creamy sauce with a little delicate cheese flavouring. Some people call this dish "CEufs a la Suisse."

5. - Grate four ounces of fine stale crumbs, put them in a basin, and pour over them half a pint of boiling milk: cover the basin with a plate, and let the liquid soak into the crumbs, and get cold : now stir into the basin four ounces more of used all you have, The spoon must be kept going all the crumbs, four ounces of dry, finely minced suet, a pinch of salt, three ounces of crushed ratafias, three ounces of candied peel sliced thin, and a few drops of lemon essence. Next whisk five eggs well, with four ounces of sugar, continue to beat them together until the sugar is dissolved, then pour them into the basin with the other ingredients, and mix well; turn all into a buttered basin, and boil for two hours. This will be enough for a quart basin or mould; half of everything will be sufficient for the home dinner.

Eggs with cream.

Duchesse pudding.

Sauce a la Careme may accompany the pudding, made in this way. Beat the yolks of three eggs with two ounces of sugar and a claret-glassful of Madeira, when well mixed, set the sauce in the bain-marie and let it thicken like a custard. When smooth and creamy, serve it in a boat, hot. This is a good sauce with any pudding. You can use Marsala instead of Madeira just as effectively.

Vanilla cream ice

This is a simple recipe for a delicious ice that will not be found expensive. Mix the yolks of eight eggs well with a pint of fresh milk, strain it, sweeten it to taste, flavour it with vanilla, and set it in a sauce-pan in your bain-marie to thicken. When you have got a nice thick custard, whip it well, let it get cold, pour it into your ice pot and freeze it. It will turn out rich and creamy, not a bit like the milk-and-water ices that one so often mourns over.

A coffee-cupfui of whipped cream may be added, if a superlatively nice ice be required; wait until the custard has nearly frozen, then stir the cream in, and work it well for a minute or two. Half an ounce of gelatine dissolved and added to the custard, and two ounces of chopped apricot, greengage, citron, or preserved ginger stirred in with the coffee-cupful of cream, will give you a nice iced pudding.

Homard a l'Americaine.

Open a tin of lobster: choose all the larger pieces for the dish you are going to make, and put all the mashed fragments aside to be used in bouchees or croquettes for some other meal. Having washed and drained the firm pieces aforesaid, dry them, and cut them up into quarter inch collops, and pile them in the centre of a dish that will stand the oven. Now cut up a good sized Bombay onion, fry it in an ounce of butter, adding off the fire a sherry glass of chablis or sauterne : when the onion seems cooked, stir in a breakfast-cupful of rich thick brown sauce, and the same quantity of tomato puree; add a strong suspicion of Nepaul pepper, and reduce the mixture for five minutes. When nice and thick, pour the sauce over the lobster, put the dish into the oven, and when thoroughly hot, serve.