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Gravy for Hashes, Cheap

Divide into small pieces the bones and trimmings of the meat to be hashed, and put them into a saucepan, with as much cold water as will cover them, and to every pint and a half of water add six berries of allspice, six peppercorns, half a tea-spoonful of pounded celeryseed, tied in muslin, a small bundle of savoury herbs, half a salt-spoonful of salt, and half a slice of bread, toasted on both sides till it is brown and hard, but not burnt. Cover the saucepan closely, and simmer gently for an hour. Cut a good-sized onion into thin slices, and put them into a saucepan with a piece of butter the size of a walnut. Let them remain over the fire till brightly browned, moving them about to prevent them burning. Mix in very smoothly as much flour as will make a stiff batter, and add gradually the gravy made from the bones and trimmings. Boil gently for a few minutes, to take off the raw taste of the flour, strain it through a coarse sieve, and it is ready for the hash, which, it is, perhaps, scarcely necessary to say, must not be boiled in it, but only well heated. The gravy is improved by the addition of a table-spoonful of mushroom or walnut ketchup, or Harvey's sauce, or finely-minced pickles. Probable cost, 4d., exclusive of the bones, etc. Sufficient for a pint and a quarter of gravy. Instead of thickening in the way described above, two dessert-spoonfuls of flour, a tea-spoonful of anchovy sauce, and about half a tea-spoonful of made mustard may be mixed smoothly with a little water stirred into the gravy, which should then be stewed gently twenty minutes longer.