Salads, Sandwiches and Chafing-Dish Dainties — Fish Salads, part 2
(See page 64)] =Shells of Fish and Mushrooms.
= Cut cold fish--salmon, halibut, lobster, etc. --into small cubes, mix with one-third in measure of cooked mushrooms, also cut small, and add for each cup of mushrooms and fish one tablespoonful of gherkins cut fine.
Season with French dressing and let stand one hour; then drain, and mix with jellied mayonnaise.
Fill chilled shells with this preparation, rounding it on the top.
Make smooth, and mask with jellied mayonnaise.
Decorate with gherkins and the white of a hard-boiled egg cut in fanciful shapes, and with stars of mayonnaise.
=Oysters in Aspic Jelly.
= Parboil, drain, cool, and wipe dry one quart of oysters.
Make a pint of mayonnaise sauce with aspic jelly and coat the well-dried oysters with the sauce.
Prepare a quart of chicken aspic.
Dip in half-set aspic the white of egg, poached and cut in fanciful shapes, and small gherkins cut in thin slices, and decorate the bottom and sides of a charlotte or cylindrical mould standing in ice water.
Pour in jelly to the depth of half an inch; when set, arrange the oysters on it in a circle, one overlapping another; pour in more jelly, and, when set, dispose upon it another circle of oysters.
Continue this order until the mould is filled.
When removed from the mould, garnish with chopped aspic and fans cut from gherkins and lettuce.
Serve with the remainder of the pint of mayonnaise.
=Oyster-and-Celery Salad.
= Parboil the oysters (heating them to the boiling-point in their own liquor), drain, and, if large, halve each; marinate with a French dressing (_i.
e. _, toss the bits of oyster in oil enough to coat them nicely; then toss them in a little lemon juice, dust with salt and pepper, and set aside to become thoroughly chilled).
When ready to serve, drain again and add about one-third as much in bulk of fine-chopped celery and one or two tablespoonfuls of pickled nasturtium seeds or capers; then mix with mayonnaise or a boiled dressing.
Serve on a bed of lettuce leaves.
Cabbage, sliced as for slaw, may be used in the place of celery.
Garnish with small pickles cut in thin slices and spread to resemble a fan.
=Oyster-and-Sweetbread Salad.
= Cut a pair of cold cooked sweetbreads into cubes.
Parboil one pint of oysters, drain, cool, and cut in halves; marinate the sweetbreads and oysters with French dressing, and allow them to stand at least half an hour; drain, mix with mayonnaise, and serve on a bed of lettuce or cress.
Or, surround with a circle of chopped cucumbers seasoned with French dressing.
=Shrimp Salad in Cucumber Boats.
= Pare the cucumbers, which should be rather short, and cut them in halves lengthwise; remove the seeds and steam until tender; chill, and arrange on lettuce leaves, or on a bed of watercress.
Clean and marinate the shrimps.
If large, divide into two or three pieces.
Mix with mayonnaise and place in the cucumbers.
Decorate with stars of mayonnaise and whole shrimps.
=Shrimp Salad with Aspic Border.
= Set a border mould in ice water; dip hard-boiled eggs, cut in halves lengthwise and trimmed to fit the mould, in aspic jelly, and press against the sides of the mould alternately with small vegetable balls, or peas dipped in half-set aspic; fill gradually the empty space in the mould with partly cooled jelly, adding vegetables here and there if desired.
Dip in hot water and turn from the mould.
Fill in the centre with lettuce, torn in pieces, and one pint of shrimps, broken in pieces and dressed with French dressing.
Smooth the mound and mask with jelly mayonnaise.
Decorate with shrimps and small heart leaves of lettuce.
=Shrimp Salad with Aspic Border, No. 2. = Decorate the sides of a ring mould, chilled, with hard-boiled eggs cut in halves, alternated with hearts of lettuce cut in halves; dip the egg and lettuce in half-set aspic, and they will adhere to the sides of the mould.
Then proceed as above.
=Shrimp Salad.
= Take the shrimps from the shells, reserve the most perfect for garnishing, and break the others into pieces; marinate with French dressing.
When ready to serve, drain, and mix with shredded lettuce, or celery cut fine, and mayonnaise.
Shape in a mound on a bed of lettuce leaves and mask with mayonnaise.
Use capers or olives, chopped very fine, to mark out five or six designs on the mound; a scroll effect is always pretty.
Fill in the designs with shrimps and the rest of the mound with capers, sifted yolks or chopped whites of cooked eggs; or fill the designs with the capers or eggs and the rest of the mound with shrimps.
Finish with a tuft of lettuce at the top.
=Scallop Salad.
= Soak the scallops in salted water (a tablespoonful of salt to a quart of water) one hour; rinse in cold water, cover with boiling water, and let simmer five or six minutes.
Rinse again in cold water, drain, and when cold cut into slices.
Cut white stalks of celery into small pieces.
Mix the celery and scallops--half as much celery as scallops--with mayonnaise or boiled dressing, and shape in a mound.
Mask the mound with a thin coating of mayonnaise.
With large-sized capers outline a design on each of the four sides of the mound, fill these with whites of eggs, cooked and chopped fine.
Ornament with figures cut from slices of boiled beets.
Fill in the spaces around the designs with capers, and garnish with green celery leaves and white stalks of celery, fringed.
[Illustration: Shell of Fish and Mushrooms.
(See page 65)] [Illustration: Shrimp Salad in Cucumber Boat.
(See page 67)] =Sardine Salad.
= Lay the sardines upon soft paper, that they may be freed from oil.
Scrape off the skin and remove the bones; squeeze over them a little lemon juice.
Arrange upon a bed of crisp lettuce leaves, or upon shredded lettuce, and dress with either French or mayonnaise dressing.
Garnish with hard-boiled eggs cut in slices.
=Sardine Salad, No. 2. = Arrange a pint of cold cooked fish, flaked, on a bed of lettuce leaves and cover with sardine dressing.
Carefully split six selected sardines;
remove the bones and arrange the halves on the top of the salad, with the heads at the centre.
Garnish with slices of lemon.
=Sardine-and-Egg Salad.
= Skin and bone a dozen sardines and put them in a mortar; remove the shells from an equal number of hard-boiled eggs and cut them into halves crosswise, so as to form cups with pointed edges; put the yolks into the mortar with the sardines, add a tablespoonful, or less, of chopped parsley, a dash of pepper and salt, and work to a smooth paste; moisten with salad dressing and season to taste with salt and pepper.
Cut a thin slice from the ends of the egg cups, that they may be set upright on the serving-dish, and fill with the mixture, making it round on the top like a whole yolk.
Arrange these on a bed of watercress, or shredded lettuce, and sprinkle plentifully with French dressing.
=Lobster Salad.
= Cut lobster meat in dice and marinate with French dressing.
Keep on ice until ready to serve, then drain carefully.
Make cups of the inside leaves of lettuce, put a spoonful of the lobster meat in the centre of each cup, and press mayonnaise dressing through a pastry bag with star tube attached on the top of the lobster in each nest.
Or, arrange the lobster in a mound on a bed of lettuce leaves, and mask the mound with mayonnaise.
Finish the centre with a little bouquet of the heart leaves of lettuce; sift dried coral in a circle about it, and below that arrange circles of sifted yolk or chopped white of egg alternately with the coral.
Garnish with the fans and feelers of the lobster.
Or, arrange as before, then finish the centre with a bouquet of heart leaves of lettuce and the head of the lobster.
Garnish with stars of mayonnaise and fans from the tail.
[Illustration: Shrimp Salad, Border of Eggs in Aspic.
(See page 68)] [Illustration: Lobster Salad.
] =Lobster Salad, No. 2. = Remove the flesh carefully from the shell of a lobster, so as to keep the shell of body and tail intact; wash and dry the shell and arrange on a bed of lettuce leaves.
Marinate the flesh, cut into cubes, with French dressing.
After an hour drain, mix with an equal quantity of shredded lettuce, and replace in the shell.
Garnish with mayonnaise and the lobster coral.
Dry the coral thoroughly, after which it may be passed readily through a sieve.
=Lobster Salad, No. 3. = INGREDIENTS.
2 good-sized lobsters.
Lettuce.
Mayonnaise, or sauce tartare.
Lobster cutlets.
2 tablespoonfuls of butter.
1/3 a cup of flour.
Salt and paprica.
1 cup of milk.
Lobster coral.
1 tablespoonful of butter.
1 yolk of egg.
1 teaspoonful of lemon juice.
2 cups of lobster meat.
3 cups of aspic jelly.
_Method.
_--Make a white sauce of the butter, flour, seasonings and milk;
add the coral and butter, after pounding until smooth in a mortar, also the yolk of egg, beaten and diluted with the lemon juice, and the lobster meat chopped rather coarsely.
When cold shape into cutlets, dust over with sifted coral, and insert a bit of feeler or claw into the small end of each.
Pour a little aspic into a dish, and, when it sets, arrange the cutlets upon it a little distance apart; pour over each a few spoonfuls of aspic, and when set cover with more aspic.
When cold and very firm cut out the cutlets, giving a border of aspic to each.
Marinate the flesh of the other lobster, cut into cubes, with French dressing; pile in a mound on a bed of lettuce leaves.
Insert a tuft of leaves in the top, and arrange the cutlets against the mound.
Garnish with feelers and claws.
Serve mayonnaise or sauce tartare with the salad.
=Lobster Salad in Ring of Aspic.
= Set a ring mould in ice water.
In the bottom of the mould arrange pitted olives or pim-olas an inch apart.
Dip figures, cut from slices of royal custard, or from cooked carrot or turnip, into liquid aspic, and place them on the sides of the mould, to which they will adhere; dip large-sized capers (a larding-needle or skewer is of assistance in this work) in aspic and with them ornament the mould; then fill with aspic and set aside to become fixed.
When ready to serve, dip the mould in hot water and invert on a serving-dish.
Cut the meat from two two-pound lobsters into small cubes.
Season with French dressing.
Fill the open space in the aspic with the salad; garnish the top with the feelers and delicate lettuce leaves, and arrange a wreath of lettuce leaves around the aspic.
Stamp out rounds of bread; stamp again with the same cutter to form crescents, spread delicately with butter, and then with caviare seasoned with a few drops of lemon juice, and dispose symmetrically on the lettuce.
[Illustration: Bluefish Salad.
(See page 75)] [Illustration: Litchi Nut and Orange Salad.
(See page 88)] =Mousseline of Lobster as a Salad.
= Chill timbale moulds in ice water; dip thin slices of gherkins into half-set aspic, and arrange them symmetrically against the sides of the moulds, and brush over the decoration with aspic.
Cut the claw meat of a two-pound lobster into small cubes; chop fine, and pound the remaining meat in a mortar; then add to it the liver and fat, and pass through a sieve.
There should be about one cup.
Simmer the shell in water to cover half an hour.
Beat the yolks of three eggs, slightly, with one-fourth a teaspoonful of salt and a dash of paprica; add one cup of the lobster liquor very gradually, and cook over hot water as a boiled custard.
Remove from the fire and add one-fourth a package of gelatine, softened in one-fourth a cup of cold lobster liquor, or chicken stock; strain over the sifted lobster meat and stir occasionally over ice water; when it begins to set, add the lobster dice, and fold in carefully one cup of whipped cream.
Turn the mixture into the decorated mould, and, when set, turn out on to lettuce leaves.
Decorate with the head, feelers and claws of the lobster.
Serve with French or mayonnaise dressing.
French dressing is preferable with so rich a mixture.
=Anchovy Salad.
= INGREDIENTS.
8 salted anchovies, or 12 bottled anchovies.
4 hard-boiled eggs.
1 head of lettuce.
Juice of half a small lemon.
French or mayonnaise dressing, or Sauce tartare.
_Method.
_--If salt anchovies are to be used, soak them in cold water two hours, then drain, dry, and remove skin and bones; divide the flesh into small pieces and squeeze the lemon juice over them.
When ready to serve, arrange the lettuce leaves upon a serving-dish, stalk ends at the centre, cut the eggs in slices, mix with the bits of anchovies, and arrange upon the lettuce.
Pour a French or mayonnaise dressing made with onion juice, or a sauce tartare, over the salad.
=Salad of Lettuce, Bamboo Sprouts, and Shrimps.
= Marinate a cup of shrimps, broken in small pieces, with three tablespoonfuls of oil, one tablespoonful of lemon juice, a dash of salt and pepper.
Select the tender bamboo sprouts in a can, and cut them into small pieces of the shape desired.
When ready to serve, dress these with salt, pepper, oil, and lemon juice.
Use three measures of oil to one of acid.
Begin with the oil.
Continue mixing and adding oil, until each piece is glossy.
Then add the acid.
Mix the prepared sprouts and the drained shrimps, and turn them onto a bed of lettuce, cut in narrow shreds, and dressed with oil and acid.
Decorate the salad with heart leaves of lettuce, whole shrimps, and hollow sections of bamboo, cut in thin slices.
[Illustration: Moulded Salmon Salad.
(See page 75)] [Illustration: Salad of Shrimps and Bamboo Sprouts.
] =Bluefish Salad (excellent).
= Separate the remnants of a baked bluefish into flakes, discarding skin and bones.
Set aside, covered, until cold.
About an hour before serving, sprinkle with salt and pepper and (for a generous pint of fish) the juice of a lemon.
When ready to serve, dispose heart leaves of lettuce on the edge of a salad plate, and turn the fish into the centre, letting it come out over the stems of the lettuce leaves.
Pour a boiled dressing over the top, and spread evenly (with a silver knife) over the fish.
Put a tablespoonful of chopped pickled beet at the stems of each group of leaves, a ring of the beet near the top, and figures, cut from the beet, between.
=Moulded Salmon Salad.
= Use a pound of salmon, fresh-cooked or canned.
Remove skin and bone, and pick the flesh fine with a silver fork.
Mix half a teaspoonful of salt, a teaspoonful of sugar, a teaspoonful of flour, half a teaspoonful of mustard, and a dash of paprica.
Over these pour very gradually three-fourths a cup of hot milk and stir and cook over hot water ten minutes, then add one-fourth a cup of hot vinegar and two tablespoonfuls of butter creamed and mixed with the beaten yolks of two eggs; stir until the egg is set, then add one level tablespoonful of granulated gelatine, softened in one-fourth a cup of cold water, and strain over the salmon; mix thoroughly, and turn into a mould.
When chilled serve with Cream Salad Dressing (page 27), to which half a cucumber, chopped fine and drained, has been added.
Reserve a part of the dressing, omitting the cucumber, and use with slices of cucumber as a garnish.
To prepare the cucumber, pare with a handy slicer and cut from it a section three-fourths an inch thick; pare this round and round very thin and roll loosely to form a cup.
Dispose this on the top of the fish and fill with dressing.
(Use a pastry bag and tube.
) Cut the rest of the cucumber in thin slices.
