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To Prevent Burning by Paper or Paste

78. Paper is often wrapped or skewered over the fat to prevent its wasting away, as in the inside of the sirloin of beef, or on both sides of the haunch of mutton or venison. For these last also a paste is often made of flour and water, and applied about half an inch thick, when the joint is first put down. Whether the paper or paste is used, it is only suffered to remain on until within half an hour of the finishing, when it is removed, and the surface allowed to assume a delicate light-brown, without any great loss of substance. In this is the great art of roasting to perfection, according to the fashion of the present day. 79. The directions for roasting the several joints, &c., embrace the exceptional and peculiar modes of dressing each kind. It will be understood that the general principles described in the last section apply to them all; but that superadded to them are also some other points, which differ in each, more or less, and require attention to give to each dish its characteristic appearance and flavour, as is usual in this country.

LARDING. 80. Larding consists in the introduction of thin and narrow pieces of ham or bacon into poultry and meats naturally somewhat dry and devoid of flavour. Indeed whatever roast or stewed dish is usually eaten with these additions, is improved by their introduction into its substance by means of the larding-needle. Thus veal, turkeys, fowls, and rabbits may all be larded with advantage, and roasted or stewed at the conclusion of the operation. 81. A LARDING-NEEDLE is merely a short thick needle, with a spring opening or slit instead of an eye, so that a narrow slip of bacon may be introduced-just as a penholder is inserted in a steel pen. Charged with this larding, the needle is passed through a pinched-up portion of flesh, and having inserted it so that its two ends project, the slit of the needle is opened and liberates its charge. These pieces of bacon are inserted in regular order, and at intervals of about an inch, in the breast of a turkey, a fowl, or in the substance of veal, &c.; after which the article is considered larded, and is ready for being dressed.