Semolina Soup
INGREDIENTS.- 5 oz. of semolina, 2 quarts of boiling stock.
AVERAGE COST, 10d. per quart.
Drop the semolina into the boiling stock and keep stirring, to prevent its burning.
Simmer gently for 1/2 hour, and serve.
TIME. hour.
SEASONABLE all the year.
SEPTEMBER, DINNERS FOR. 373 SEPTEMBER, DINNERS FOR.
September-Dinner for Twelve Persons.
MENU. (English.) Quantity. Average Grilled Mushrooms.
Cost. 8. d.
Oysters. 4 doz. 60 Clear Soup. 2 quarts. 36 Boiled Soles, Lobster Sauce. 2 pairs. 60 2 tur. 26 Red Mullet. 12 fish. 80 3baskts. 46 2 dishes. 60 1 joint. 96 4lbs.ea. 6 birds. 12 0 2 dishes. 40 2 dishes. 16 2 dishes. 46 £390 Hashed Game.
Sirloin.
Potatoes. French Beans.
Partridges.
Greengage Tart.
Custard.
Compôte of Fruit.
MENU. (French.) Huîtres.
Consommé.
Soles, Sauce Homard.
Rougets.
Champignons Grillés.
Salmis de Gibier.
Aloyau. 10 Pommes de Terre. Haricots Verts.
Perdreaux.
Tourte aux Prunes Verts.
Crême..
Compôte de Fruits.
September-Dinner for Ten Persons.
MENU. (English.) Quantity. Average Appetisans.
Turbot, Green Dutch Sauce.
Salmi of Wild Duck.
Mutton Cutlets.
Goose, Apple Sauce.
Cost. 8. d. 3 dishes. 20 Soup à la Reine. 2 quarts. 56 1 fish. 10 0 2 tur. 26 1 dish. 56 1 dish. 40 1 bird. 96 2 tur. 09 Potatoes. Sprouts. 3lbs, ea. 09 Olives, Stuffed. 2½ doz. 20 Cream Eggs.
Iced Pudding. 1 dish. 30 1 50 £2 10 6 MENU. (French.) Appetisans.
Soup à la Reine.
Turbot, Hollandaise Verte.
Salmi de Canards Sauvages.
Côtelettes de Mouton.
Oiseau, Sauce aux Pommes.
Pommes de Terre. Choux.
Olives Farcies.
Œufs à la Crême.
Pouding Glacé.
September-Dinner for Eight MENU. (English.) Quantity. Average Flemish Soup.
Cold Salmon Cutlets, Horseradish Sauce.
Game Croquettes.
Veal Collops.
Saddle of Mutton.
Potatoes. French Beans.
Sweet Omelette.
Compôte of Peaches.
Cost. 8. d. 3 pints. 26 1 dish. 46 1 tur. 10 1 dish. 30 1 dish. 36 1 joint 10 6 3 lbs. ea. £1 10 0 Persons.
MENU. (French.) Soup à la Flamande.
Côtelettes de Saumon, Sauce Raifort.
Croquettes de Gibier.
Escalopes de Veau.
Selle de Mouton.
Pommes de Terre. Haricots Verts.
Omelette aux Confitures.
Compôte de Pêches.
SEPTEMBER, DINNERS FOR. 374 SEPTEMBER, DINNERS FOR.
September-Dinners for from Six to Twelve Persons.
MER Menu Gravy Soup.
Turbot, with Cream Sauce.
Sweetbreads, Maître d'Hôtel Sauce.
Rump-steak and Mushrooms.
Chipped Potatoes.
Partridges.
Compôte of Fruit.
Vanilla Cream.
Clear Mock Turtle.
Perch Stewed with Wine.
Vol-au-Vent of Oysters.
Hashed Wild Duck.
Leg of Mutton.
Potatoes.
French Beans.
Cabinet Pudding.
Marbled Jelly.
MENU Celery Soup.
Fried Soles, Piquante Sauce.
Oyster Patties.
Sirloin of Beef, Horseradish Sauce.
Potatoes. Sprouts.
Olives.
Damson Tart. Custard.
Stone Cream.
Menu Julienne.
Turbot, Shrimp Sauce.
Chicken Croquettes.
Saddle of Mutton.
Potatoes.
Sprouts.
Grouse.
Russian Salad.
Marasquino Jelly.
Ices.
SEPTEMBER, DINNERS FOR. 375 SEPTEMBER, DINNER TABLE. September-Plain Family Dinners for.
No. 1.
No. 2.
Sunday. Saddle of mutton, potatoes, Sunday. - Roast turkey, sausages, sea-
A plain thickened broth of the sort Victorian and Edwardian households served as a first course. The whole of it hinges on how the semolina goes into the pot.
- Add the grain in a streamSemolina clumps the instant it hits liquid in a heap. Rain it slowly through the fingers into stock at a rolling boil while whisking, and keep whisking for the first minute or two.
- Proportions and yield5 oz semolina to 2 quarts (about 140 g to 2.3 litres, these being imperial quarts) gives a lightly thickened soup, not a porridge. The book's own menus reckon 2 quarts of soup to a table of ten or twelve.
- StockThe recipe assumes a well-made brown or white bone stock, which supplies all the flavour and most of the seasoning. A weak stock leaves you with cloudy starch water; use a good home-made or a low-salt concentrated stock, and season at the end since the soup reduces slightly.
- The half hourHalf an hour of gentle simmering is longer than semolina needs to cook, but it is what softens the grains completely and lets them swell into the stock. Fifteen to twenty minutes over the lowest heat gives much the same result; below a simmer, or it catches.
- Burning is the real riskStarch settles and scorches on a thin pan base. Use a heavy-bottomed pan and stir down to the bottom every few minutes throughout the simmer.
- Which semolinaUse plain fine or medium durum wheat semolina, not the sweetened or vitamin-fortified milk-pudding semolina sold for desserts, and not coarse couscous-grade grain.
- ServingThe recipe says only 'serve', with no garnish specified. Grated Parmesan, a spoonful of cream, or chopped parsley all improve a plain stock considerably.
- Cost noteThe '10d. per quart' is a household-budgeting guide from the period of the book and has no modern equivalent.
Semolina — the coarse wheat middlings left after milling — reached British kitchens chiefly as a cheap thickener and a nursery pudding grain, and cookery writers of Mrs Beeton's era leaned on it for exactly the purpose seen here: turning two quarts of stock into a course substantial enough to open a dinner. Soups of this kind sit in a family with the German Griessuppe and the Italian practice of cooking semolina in broth, and their appeal in a large Victorian household was arithmetic as much as taste, since a few pence of grain stretched the stockpot across a table of eight. The book's habit of quoting an average cost per quart is a reminder that these menus were compiled for mistresses managing a fixed weekly allowance, with the plainest soups doing the work of making the showier courses affordable.