“On my first experience, we started the meal with Solomon Grundy--pickled herring. Then followed a thick soup, in which were little threads of a paste made from eggs and flour and little balls of unleavened dough. Then came a kind of pea-soup, and here a little lady of the party ordered unfermented Muscat wine. The good Jew may not touch shell-fish or any fish without scales, so we were next served with fried soles and fried plaice, of which Rachel took both, following, apparently, the custom of the country. Although the menu consists of seven courses, each item contains two, and sometimes three or four, dishes; and the correct diner tastes every one. Roast veal, served in the form of stew, followed, and then came roast fowl and tongue. There were also salads, and sauerkraut, and then a pease-pudding, and then almond-pudding, and then staffen, and then ... I loosened a button, and gazed upon Rachel in wonder. She was still eating bread.”
A cook of roughly the same moment, setting down the same dish.
185. INGREDIENTS.--Any pieces of salt beef or pork, say 2 lbs.; 4 carrots, 4 parsnips, 4 turnips, 4 potatoes, 1 cabbage, 2 oz. of oatmeal or ground rice, seasoning of salt and pepper, 2 quarts of water. _Mode_.--Cut up the meat small, add the water, and let it simmer for 23/4 hours. Now add the vegetables, cut in thin small slices; season, and boil for 1 hour. Thicken with the oatmeal, and serve. _Time_.--2 hours. _Average cost_, 3d. per quart without the meat. _Seasonable_ in winter. _Sufficient_ for 6 persons. _Note_.--If rice is used instead of oatmeal, put it in with the vegetables.
Sources: The passage is from Thomas Burke, Nights in London, free to read in full at Project Gutenberg. The recipe is from Beeton, The Book of Household Management of 1861, also free in full. Both are in the public domain in the United States. The binding above is ours — oxblood cloth, grapes stamp.