A very small family, "a young menage" for instance, is very much more difficult to cater for without waste than a larger one; two people are so apt to get tired of anything, be it ever so good eating, when it has been on the table once or twice; therefore it would be useless to make galantine or the large pies I have indicated, except for occasions when guests are expected; but, as I hope to aid young housekeepers to have nice dishes when alone, I will devote this chapter to their needs.

The chapter on "Warming Over" will be very useful also to this large class.

In the first place it is well to have regard, when part of a dish leaves the table, as to whether it, or any particular part of it, will make a nice little cold dish, or a rechauffe; in that case have it saved, unless it is required for the servants' dinner (it is well to manage so that it is not needed for that purpose); for instance, if there is the wing and a slice or two of the breast of a chicken left, it will make a dainty little breakfast dish, or cold, in jelly, be nice for lunch. There is always jelly if you have roast chicken, if you manage properly, and this is how you do it:

Carefully save the feet, throat, gizzard, and liver of your chickens; scald the feet by pouring boiling water over them; leave them just a minute, and pull off the outer skin and nails; they come away very readily, leaving the feet delicately white; put these with the other giblets, properly cleansed, into a small saucepan with an onion, a slice of carrot, a sprig of parsley, and a pint of water (if you have the giblets of one chicken), if of two, put a quart; let this slowly simmer for two hours and a half; it will be reduced to about half, and form a stiff jelly when cold; a glass of sherry, and squeeze of lemon, or teaspoonful of tarragon vinegar, makes this into a delicious aspic, and should be added if to be eaten cold. The jelly must of course be strained.

In roasting chickens, if you follow the rule for meat, that is, put no water in the pan, but a piece of butter, and dredge a very little flour over the chicken, you will have a nice brown glaze at the bottom of the pan, provided it has been cooked in a quick oven; if in a cool oven there will be nothing brown at all; but we will suppose the bird is browned to a turn; pour your gravy from the giblets into the pan, take off every bit of the glaze or osmazone that adheres, and let it dissolve, rubbing it with the back of the spoon; then, if you are likely to have any chicken left cold, pour off a little gravy in a cup through a fine strainer, leaving in your pan sufficient for the dinner; in this mash up the liver till it is a smooth paste which thickens the gravy, and serve. Some object to liver, therefore the use of it is a matter of taste. If you dress the chickens English fashion, you will need the liver and gizzard to tuck under the wings ; in this case, stew only the feet and throat, using a little meat of any kind, if you have it, to take their place ; but on no account fail to use the feet, as they are as rich in jelly as calves' feet in proportion to their size.

The jelly laid aside will be enough to ornament and give relish to a little dish of cold chicken, and changes it from a dry and commonplace thing to a recherche one. If two chickens are cooked it is more economical than one; there is, then, double the amount of gravy, generally sufficient, if you lay some very nice pieces of cold chicken in a bowl, to pour over it and leave it enveloped in jelly; you still then, if from dinner for two people, have perhaps joints enough to make a dish of curry or fricassee, or any of the many ways in which cold chicken may be used, for which see chapter on "Warming Over."

For small households large joints are to be avoided, but even a small roast is a large joint when there are but two or three to eat it. For this reason it is a good plan to buy such joints as divide well. A sirloin of beef is better made into two fine dishes than into one roast, and then warmed over twice. Every one knows that "Filet de boeuf Chateaubriand" is one of the classical dishes of the French table, that to a Frenchman luxury can go no further; but every one does not know how entirely within his power it is to have that dish as often as he has roast beef ; how convenient it would be to so have it. Here it is : When your sirloin roast comes from the butcher, take out the tenderloin or fillets, which you must always choose thick; cut it across into steaks an inch thick, trim them, cover them with a coat of butter (or oil, which is much better), and broil them ten minutes, turning them often ; garnish with fried potatoes, and serve with sauce Chateaubriand, as follows: Put a gill of white wine (or claret will do if you have no white) into a saucepan, with a piece of glaze, weighing an ounce and a half; add three quarters of a pint of espagnole, and simmer fifteen minutes; when ready to serve, thicken with two ounces of maitre d'hotel butter in which a dessert-spoonful of flour has been worked. That is how Jules Gouffe's recipe runs ; but, as no small family will keep espagnole ready made, allow a little more glaze (of course the recipe as given may be divided to half or quarter, provided the correct proportions are retained), and use a tablespoonful of roux and the maitre d'hotel butter, both of which you have probably in your store-room; if not, brown a little flour, chop some pars-ley, and add to two ounces of butter; work them together, then let them dissolve in the sauce, for which purpose let it go off the boil; let the sauce simmer a minute, skim, and serve.

The sirloin of beef, denuded of its fillet, is still a good roast; and as you can't have your cake and eat it too, and hot fresh roast beef is better than the same warmed over, warm ye never so wisely, I think this plan may commend itself to those who like nice little dinners.

A nice little dinner of a soup, an entree, or made dish, salad, and dessert, really costs no more than frequent roast meat, or even steak and pudding, by following some such plan as this :