Slow Cooking Meats

Certain cuts may be made most palatable. Such meats are pot roast, braised and browned beef, beef a la mode, " gravy stews," and baked meats which are previously boiled. The preparation of meat in most of these ways was more familiar to our grandmothers, in the days of pots and kettles, than to us, who live in the era of gas stoves. But with the modern fireless cooker, even those who have abandoned the coal range may enjoy the meat dishes of old, and, what is better, they may do so without giving the pot any occasion for uncomplimentary remarks to the kettle.

Pot roasting is especially adapted to shoulder pot roasts of beef, the shoulder block roast or " Boston cut," and the end round cut or " horseshoe piece." Rumps, briskets, shoulder clods, plates, and flanks of beef and shoulder of mutton are other cuts that are used in this way.

Braised beef usually is made from round steak cut two or three inches thick (known as " California roast" or "Swiss steak"), or from rumps, flanks, or rib ends. Beef tenderloins, mutton chops, ox hearts, and ox joint's (tails) also are braised.

Boiling followed by baking or oven-roasting is a method of cooking to which smoked hams and shoulders or " picnics " are especially adapted. Broiled breakfast bacon, when extremely salt, is improved for some palates by parboiling first for a minute or two. Very thick steaks may be made well done without burning the surface if they are broiled partially and then cooked to the desired point in a hot oven.

" Made-over dishes " in endless variety may be made from many of the meats listed, and especially from the cheaper cuts. In this way five to ten pounds of meat may be cooked and afterwards served in five to ten different ways, with little loss either of food value or flavor.

Sugar-Cured Breakfast Bacon.

1. Extra Lean.

2. Medium.

3. Fat.

Bacon 1 sells 100 per cent. Higher than 3, but the Quality and Food Value are Similar.

Mutton Loin Roasts. 1. Excessively Fat. 2. Medium. 3. Too Thin.

As hints on this point we may merely mention meat balls or cakes, from chopped steak or veal; minced meat from any of the leaner cheap cuts; pot-pie, especially from mutton shoulder; beef round and flank; veal loaf, from shoulder or neck of veal; hash of the various kinds; and chili con carne, goulash, etc., from beef round or chuck.

Other forms in which to utilize fresh meats are: homemade sausage, from lean pork two parts, lean beef one part and pork one part; Hamburg steak, from beef round or chuck or from the flank end of porterhouse steaks; head cheese, from pigs' heads and pork trimmings; and pressed meat loaf (spiced), from beef plates, flanks, or briskets.