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Spanish Soup

Take a piece of the shin of beef weighing about four pounds, and one pound of the knuckle of ham. Break the bones into small pieces with a cleaver, and tie the meat with string to keep it in shape. Put both into a large pot, and pour over them a gallon of cold water. Bring the liquor gently to the point of boiling, remove the scum carefully, and, before it fully boils, throw half a tea-spoonful of cold water into it once or twice, to assist the scum in rising. Add a little pepper, draw the pan to the side of the fire, and let its contents simmer gently and steadily for two hours and a half. Blanch a table-spoonful of rice, throw it into the soup, and boil it an hour longer. Half an hour before the soup is to be served, put into it a pint of Brussels sprouts and an onion thinly sliced. If preferred, other vegetables may be added to or substituted for the sprouts. They must be blanched and stewed in the soup long enough to cook them, and no longer. Remove the bones from the soup, take up the meat, put it on a dish, garnish with the sprouts, and serve very hot. Send the soup to table in a tureen. If the ham has not made the broth sufficiently salt, a little more salt should be added. Time, three hours and a half from the time the water boils. Probable cost, 4s. 6d. Sufficient for seven or eight persons.