For a little home dinner.

Consomme de laitue.

Pomfret a la Normande.

Piece de boeuf en aspic.

Courge-a-la-moelle au gratin.

Pain de groseilles.

Fromage, hors d'oeuvres.

Dessert.

1. - Make a clear consomme as usual, and treat the lettuce in this way: - Pick and wash one large, or two small cabbage lettuces, dip them into boiling water for a few minutes, take them out, cut them into quarters : tie them together again: butter a stew-pan, place a couple of slices of bacon at the bottom of the pan, lay the lettuces on them, and cover them with stock: add two cloves, an onion, a tea-spoonful of sugar, and one of salt, and a tea-spoonful of dried herbs. Simmer the lettuces until done, take them out, drain them, and when dry, cut them into shreds with a dessert-knife : put the shredded pieces at the bottom of your tureen, and pour the consomme, boiling hot, over them. Serve. One average lettuce will be found enough for four basins. The broth in which it is cooked can be strained, and added to the soup; see, however, that it is clear.

Clear soup with lettuce.

2. - Clean and trim a fine pomfret; draw off the dark skin and detach the flesh from the bone with a sharp knife : take the two sides so obtained, and season them on their respective inner sides (which you must first brush over with a well beaten egg) with pepper, salt, a little finely-chopped parsley, and some minced mushroom, lay them together again : the fish resuming its former appearance. Now butter a flat silver dish, or one that will stand the fire, strew over the butter some minced onion, place the fish thereon, moisten it with a little chablis, or a light white wine of that class, and a cupful of broth, and bake it in the oven. Whilst baking, make a good veloute, in which you should pour the liquor of a tin of oysters, and use the broth made from the bones and trimmings of the pomfret. When the fish is nearly done, take it out of the oven ; pour the liquor from its dish into your veloute : garnish the fish with the oysters of the tin previously mentioned, and some black Leicestershire mushrooms, over all pour your veloute - which should be nice and thick,- set the dish in the oven again for five minutes, and serve with croutons of bread, buttered on each side, and coloured a pale brown in the oven. This will be found an excellent dish - far from difficult: veloute remember, is a rich creamy white sauce.

3. - Tie a nice piece of fresh brisket of beef into a compact shape and lard it with plenty of fat bacon : braise it in stock, and vegetables with a glass of white wine : when done, take it out, remove the string, and place the meat in an oblong shape with a heavy weight upon it ; when thoroughly cold, and set, trim it all round with a sharp knife, glaze it with its own gravy reduced, and set it in aspic in the ice-box. A plain oblong mould should be selected. When you turn it out, garnish with hardboiled eggs, and parsley, and serve with the best salad you can devise, and a good mayonnaise sauce. Or, the beef may be served hot, with its own gravy thickened, and garnished with glazed onions.

Pomfret in the Normandy manner.

Brisket of beef in jelly, (cold).

This recipe may be followed with a home-cured ox-tongue: boil the tongue, of course, you cannot braise it.

4. - Slice up a cold boiled (not over-boiled) vegetable marrow. Butter the bottom of a pie-dish, place a layer of slices thereon, grate a little mild cheese over them, place another layer of slices above the first and strew grated cheese over that also. Now melt some butter in a small sauce-pan, and add a little gravy to it, together with some finely powdered cheese, when you have enough to half cover your layers of marrow, pour the liquid round them, and bake for ten minutes or so in a fast oven. Salt and pepper should be dusted over each layer, before the cheese gratings are added.

This is a simple yet effective entremets sucre suggested to me by a Madras Gouffe. Turn out a bottle of gooseberries, sweeten them to taste in their own syrup. Melt an ounce of gelatine in water, and stir into the basin containing the fruit; now place this in a mould, and set it to get firm in the ice-box. The best creamy custards (also set in the ice-box) should go round in glasses; this is cooling, and inexpensive. A glass of maraschino or curacoa may be stirred into the syrup with manifest advantage.

Vegetable marrow au gratin.

Mould of gooseberries.