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Shrimps and Tomatoes
Melt two tablespoons butter; add one can tomatoes; simmer until of purée consistency. Season highly with salt, pepper and onion juice. Add two cups shrimps which have been marinated in French dressing for one hour. When hot, serve on hot buttered toast.
A chafing-dish supper dish that depends almost entirely on two things: reducing the tomatoes far enough, and keeping the shrimp in the pan as briefly as possible.
- Add the shrimp last, and barely heat themCooked shrimp need only a minute or two in the hot sauce to warm through. Held longer they tighten and turn rubbery, which is the usual failure of this dish.
- "One can tomatoes"Can sizes were not yet standardised at this date; a period can of tomatoes generally held somewhere between a pint and a quart. A modern 14.5-oz can is a reasonable stand-in; use whole or diced tomatoes, not sauce, since the recipe expects you to cook the liquid off.
- Purée consistencyExpect 20 to 30 minutes of open simmering, breaking the tomatoes down with a spoon, until the mixture mounds slightly and no watery liquid separates at the edge. A thin sauce will soak the toast through.
- Onion juiceGrate a peeled onion on a fine grater and press the pulp through a sieve, or grate it on a microplane and use juice and pulp together. A teaspoon is a reasonable starting point for this quantity.
- French dressingIn this period the term means a plain vinaigrette of oil, vinegar, salt and pepper, not the sweet orange bottled dressing. Use about a quarter cup, and drain the shrimp before adding them so the sauce does not turn sharp and loose.
- Two cups shrimpsThat is roughly three-quarters of a pound of cooked, peeled shrimp. Canned shrimp were widely available and commonly used at this date; cooked fresh or thawed frozen shrimp behave better, and small or medium sizes suit the toast.
- The chafing dishThe recipe names no vessel; if cooked in a chafing dish, the work would be done in the blazer pan over the flame directly. A wide skillet does the same job, and a water pan beneath is only useful for holding the finished dish warm at the table.
- YieldNo yield is given; the quantities suggest enough for about four as a light supper, over thick-cut toast buttered while hot.
Lowney's Cook Book was published in 1907 by the Walter M. Lowney Company, a Boston chocolate manufacturer, and it surrounded its confectionery chapters with a full run of general household cookery. A chapter of chafing-dish recipes was almost obligatory by then: the chafing dish had become a fashionable middle-class fixture in the 1890s, associated with after-theatre suppers, bachelor entertaining and college rooms, because it let a host cook in front of guests without a kitchen. Its repertoire ran heavily to shellfish, eggs, cheese and cream, all things that cook in minutes over a spirit lamp. Canned tomatoes and canned shrimp made a dish like this possible at any season, and the marinade of French dressing is a small piece of period technique.