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Indian Dumplings
hot) to every quart of hominy, and boil for five or six hours, stirring it frequently. Drain it dry though a sieve or colander, and put it in a deep dish; add a little butter, pepper, and salt; serve it hot to eat with any sort of meat, particularly with beef, pork, or bacon. If properly prepared, it is very wholesome and strengthening. What is left may be re-boiled next day for one hour, or it may be made into flat cakes, adding a little wheat-flour, and fried in lard or butter. 1206. Mix three pints of Indian-meal with half a pound of finelychopped suet, dredged with wheat-flour; add one small tea-spoonful of salt; put in gradually sufficient milk to make it into a stiff dough, and knead it; divide the dough into equal portions, and then, having floured the hands, make each portion into a ball the size of a small orange; flatten them with a rolling-pin, and beat on both sides to make light and flaky. Tie them up loosely in small cloths previously soaked in hot water and floured, put them in boiling water, and boil for two hours. When done, dip each dumpling in cold water before the cloth is untied. Send them to table hot. They may be eaten with boiled fresh or salt meat, or as sweet dumplings, with treacle, or butter and sugar. 1207. With the above dishes a poor man's wife may manage to make a few shillings go a great way, varying them with dried fish and potatoes, or the same fried. In the above calculations, it has been assumed that there is a family of four to six children; but when this is the case, two or three will always be able to earn a little, in order to help the wages of the father. Altogether it may be assumed that the whole family will earn about 15s. per week, and that the rent and clothing are paid by the garden and pig, which ought to be the case with good managers; there will then remain, after allowing 3s. for coals, wood, schooling, and emergencies, 12s. per week to be spent in food. Of this, 1s. 2d. may be allowed for beer, which will give nearly three gallons per week if brewed at home, and 10s. 10d. for food. The breakfasts and suppers may be made at about 1d. per head, or 6d. per day, which per week will be 3s. 6d., leaving 7s. 4d. for the dinners, which, as I have shown, may be furnished in the most ample manner for that money, as follows:- Sunday, with bread, 1s.; Monday, soup (1191), four quarts, 8d., and bread, 4d.; Tuesday, trotters, prepared (1190), 8d.; Wednesday, bacon fried, 1 lb., potatoes, 3 lb., 1s, Old.; Thursday, soup, with rice (1122), 9d., bread, 4d.; Friday, same as Sunday, Is.; Saturday, rice pudding, 6d., and blackpuddings, or some other dish with bread. The outlay altogether being below the allotted sum. 1208. IT HAS THUS BEEN SHOWN that the family of a labouring man may be kept in a good and wholesome way, upon viands which are appetizing enough to those who use strong exercise, for a sum which will barely suffice to purchase bread and potatoes. Thus, supposing the family to consist of seven in number, they would eat at least sixty pounds of bread, and as much of potatoes, costing 13s.; and if cheese or bacon is added, at least 7s. more. In point of economy, the bread diet so much practised by the poor is a very extravagant one; and in point of nutrition, potatoes when used alone, as by the very poor, are of very inferior value, and not adapted for the hard-working man. But with the above diet, costing no more money, he may be kept in full health.
Recipe 1206 is a plain boiled cornmeal dumpling, cooked in floured cloths rather than in a stew. The chief thing to get right is the dough's stiffness: too wet and the dumplings slump in the cloth, too dry and they cook to grit.
- Indian-mealThis is cornmeal, not any Indian spice or flour. Use a medium-grind yellow cornmeal; stone-ground meal has more flavour, though it drinks more milk.
- SuetHalf a pound of suet, finely chopped and tossed with flour so the pieces stay separate. Packaged shredded suet, beef or vegetarian, works directly; frozen butter grated coarse is a common substitute, though it melts sooner and gives a denser dumpling.
- Three pints of mealA pint of cornmeal weighs nearer 12 oz than a pound, so three pints is roughly 2 to 2.5 lb of meal plus the suet and milk: a large batch, yielding a dozen or more balls of the stated size. Halve or quarter the quantities for a household of four.
- How much milkNone is specified because cornmeals vary. Add it gradually until the dough holds a ball without cracking or sticking, then let it stand ten minutes: coarse meal keeps absorbing liquid and a dough that seemed right can stiffen noticeably.
- Boiling in clothsSquares of cotton or muslin, scalded, wrung out and dusted with flour on the inside. Tie loosely, as instructed, so the dumpling can swell; a tight tie splits the dough. Keep the water at a steady rolling boil and topped up so the dumplings stay submerged.
- Two hoursNot padding. Coarse cornmeal needs long, wet heat to lose its raw, sandy edge, and suet needs time to render through the dough. A shorter boil leaves the centre chalky.
- The cold-water dipDipping the cooked dumpling in cold water for a moment shrinks the surface away from the cloth so it peels off cleanly instead of tearing. Do it, then unwrap and serve at once.
- ServingSavoury with boiled fresh or salt meat, or sweet with treacle, or with butter and sugar. Treacle here means black treacle; molasses is the closest widely sold equivalent.