Egg-Cups And Anchovies

Cut thick rounds of stale bread, and with a small cutter mark a circle in the centre, pressing the cutter half-way through the bread. Dig out a hollow along this line capable of holding a tablespoonful of custard or other soft matter. Wash the rounds of bread all over with butter and let them dry, and crisp slightly upon the upper grating of a hot oven. Fill the cups with the following mixture :

Heat a tablespoonful of butter in a saucepan, and add half a cupful of cream (not forgetting a bit of soda). When both are hot stir in five well-beaten eggs and cook to a soft paste. Have ready a dozen anchovies, skinned and minced fine. Half fill the "cups" with them, squeeze upon them a few drops of lemon, and heap upon them the creamed eggs. Stick a bit of parsley in the top of each.

Egg-Cups And Sardines

Prepare in the same way, substituting sardines for anchovies.

Egg-Cups With Tomato

When the egg-cups are ready, fill with a rich tomato puree, made by straining tomato sauce, and thickening it with a good white roux, and seasoning it with grated onion, pepper, salt, and a little sugar. Lay a neatly poached egg upon the top of each.

Egg-Baskets

Six hard-boiled eggs ; one cupful of minced cold meat - ham, veal, or poultry - well seasoned; one cupful of drawn butter or strained gravy; a little chopped parsley. Cut the eggs smoothly around, dividing each into two cups, extracting the yolk. Cut a small piece from the bottom of each cup, so that it will stand upright. Mash the yolks to powder with a potato-beetle or bowl of a spoon; mix with them the chopped meat, and mould into pellets about the size and shape of a yolk. Put one of these in each "basket," arrange them in a dish, and pour over them the gravy or drawn butter, made very hot and seasoned with the chopped parsley. Set in the oven for five minutes to heat the eggs, and serve.

Should you wish to add further to this dish, cut stale bread into rounds with a cake-cutter; scoop out a hollow in each to fit the bottom of the egg; toast and butter them, and put one under each egg-basket before you pour the gravy over all. In this case there should, of course, be more liquid, as the toast would absorb much.

Egg-Cups And Tongue

Prepare the hollowed rounds of bread as before directed, fill the centres with minced tongue seasoned with a drop or two of onion-juice, pepper, and French mustard to taste, then wet with a little consomme. Around the edge of the cup lay a ring of stiffly frothed white of egg, and in the central space left by this a raw yolk, with a bit of butter upon it. Set on the upper grating of a hot oven until the white begins to color slightly and becomes encrusted. Transfer each "cup" and contents to a small hot plate of its own, and surround with a close garnish of parsley. Have the sprigs picked and ready when the cups come from the oven and serve promptly.