Mush Sautes
Sautes is sauteed, in meaning, according to English terminations, and that means fried in a common frying-pan like fried eggs, etc. The French or proper frying requires a quantity of hot fat or oil, as indicated in the preceding directions for fried mush.
The word Sautes is perpetually appearing in hotel bills of fare, but the people to whom it conveys any meaning are extremely few. It seems to be usually guessed to mean sauce. As it is a technical term, a person might read French a long time without meeting with it elsewhere than at table. There is sufficient reason for its use, seeing that no other word expresses the same thing correctly.
To saute mush, cut it in slices not over half an inch thick, and flour them all over. Place a spoonful of lard, clarified butter or clarified meat fat, in the frying pan, and when hot put in two or three slices, not near enough to touch. Brown it quickly, and turn over with an egg slice. Is only good when fried as wanted and served immediately.
There is still another variety of mush, and whether we make use of the knowledge or not, the necessity of at least being posted on them all was well exemplified in the luck of a certain man from Boston. He came from one of the best hotels of that city, and obtained a good position in St. Louis. What he claimed to have been, or what he had been in the famous Boston house, is neither here nor there, but it was evident that his had been only one particular line of duty, for, unexcelled in some things, there were other smaller matters that baffled his efforts, and one of these was fried mush. He knew of but one kind, and that was fried mush balls, which, you see, was a great misfortune, considering that he was head cook of a large hotel, having assistants who did not think it best to do otherwise than as he directed. So mush balls they made and made them good, very likely, or else the demand was small and the style unnoticed, for that way lasted quite a while. But presently evil days came, and brought with them some people of grand import, who had been boarding at the Hotel Terrible, up the avenue. They came in a huff, and soon began to sniff, and looking about for inferiorities, observed the fried mush balls. Then they pulled them apart, analyzed them, condemned them. If there was anything they did love, it was good fried mush; but these mush balls were simply atrocious. They demanded what they were pleased to term the genuine article. But they might as well have called spirits from the vasty deep, that would not come when they did call them, for neither they themselves nor anybody else could tell what difference of process was required. So dissatisfaction grew up on both sides. It took an earth-quake to "roll" the cooks out of their kitchens at Pompeii, and required an eruption of Vesuvius to make the bakers forget their bread in their ovens at Herculaneum, but that was in grander times than these, and it is not exceeding the truth to say that this sad fugitive from the modern Athens was impelled to sever his connection through no greater reason than the vacuity of his perceptions of the inherent possibilities of fried mush. Perhaps you think that after he was gone all was peace, and joy, and love, but it was not. His successor's mush was orthodox and irreproachable, but-- Well, there were some old habitues who had conceived an affection for the other kind, they did not know what made the difference, but there was a solid sweetness in the other that the new kind did not possess. The new cook did not understand it either, for he only knew one way; so they split the slices and double breaded them, and tried to make believe, and worried along, and I think they are all dead by this time and out of their troubles, but if ever you get into such a place after learning the following receipt, you will know what they want, better than they know themselves.