Potage is the modern word for soup, and is used in bills of fare everywhere.

Three kinds of liquor are used to make potages: broth, milk, and water.

Besides the liquor, meat, fish, and vegetables are used.

The richest potages are made with consomme and some other compounds; such as bread, Italian pastes, vegetables, etc.

Consomme means rich broth; literally, it means consumed, perfect, that is, properly reduced and partly consumed, as it is the case in making it. Consomme is broth reduced to a certain point, according to want or taste.

Broth

Broth is to good cooking what wheat is to bread. Dishes (with some exceptions) prepared without broth are, to those prepared with it, what rye or corn bread is to wheat bread. Broth, and especially consomme, are to old age what milk is to the infant. Broth is called oouillon in France, and stock in England. The word pot-au-feu means the meat, vegetables, seasonings, spices, and the "pot" or soup-kettle itself, i. e., every thing made use of in making broth. The popular meaning of the term in France is, the soup and the beef and vegetables served as releves; and, with the working-classes, the only thing (with bread, wine, and fruit) composing the family dinner. The French army is fed on this pot-au-feu three hundred and sixty days in the year.

It is a great mistake to believe that bones or veal make good broth; by boiling or simmering bones or veal, you obtain a gelatinous liquid, but not a rich broth with a pleasant flavor. When properly made, broth is clear. If milky, it has been made with bones, veal, or very inferior beef.

Broth For Potages

Take three pounds of good, lean, fresh beef, from any part except the shin. There must not be more than two ounces of bone to a pound of meat, and the less bone the better. Place the meat in a soup-kettle or iron saucepan lined with tin, with three quarts of cold water and salt, and set it on a good fire. After about thirty minutes, the scum or albumen of the meat will gather on the surface, and the water will commence boiling. Now place the kettle on a more moderate fire, add one gill of cold water, and begin to skim off the scum, which will take only a few minutes. Then add one middle-sized carrot, half as much turnip, one middle-sized leek, a stalk of celery, one of parsley, a bay-leaf, one onion with two cloves stuck in it, and two cloves of garlic. Keep the kettle between simmering and boiling heat for about five hours. Dish the meat with carrot, turnip, and leek around it, and serve it as a releve. Strain the broth, and it is ready for use.

If the broth is required to be richer, use more beef and less water, but follow the same process; if weaker, use more water and less beef, but still follow the same process.

Broth For Sauces And Gravies

Place in a soup-kettle or saucepan fresh bones of beef, mutton, lamb, veal, or poultry - of either, or of all; also, bones of the same meats from roasted pieces; also trimmings of the same, if very fresh, with one quart of cold water to every pound of bones or meat; skim it like the preceding, add the same vegetables and seasonings, and simmer for at least six hours. Then skim off very carefully all the fat on the surface, pass the remainder through a strainer or a sieve, and it is ready for use. This broth is certainly very inferior to the preceding one, but it is excellent for sauces and gravies, and is very cheaply made. It may be used for potages also; but, as we have said above, it is very gelatinous, and cannot be compared with the highly nutritious beef broth.

Broth that is not to be used immediately must be cooled quickly after being strained, as the quicker it is cooled the longer it keeps. As soon as cold, put it in a stone jar or crockery vessel, and place it in a cool, dry, and dark place. It will keep three or four days in winter, but only one day in summer. If the weather is stormy, it will not keep even for twelve hours; it turns sour very quickly.

I do not put parsnips or thyme in broth, the taste of these two vegetables being too strong. They really neutralize the fine aroma of broth. Even in this nineteenth century there are some pretty good cooks who put thyme and parsnip in broth, but they do it by routine. Routine is in every thing the greatest enemy of progress. Ancient cookery used to put in the pot (old name for soup-kettle) a burnt onion to give an amber color to the broth. This has exactly the same effect as thyme and parsnip, giving it a bad taste, and neutralizing the flavor given to the broth by the osmazome of the meat. When broth of an amber color is desired, add to it a few drops of burnt sugar, the receipt for making which, will be found elsewhere.