Method.—Peel and slice the pumpkin, remove the seeds, boil it in slightly-salted water until tender, and pass it through a fine sieve. Beat and add the eggs, sweeten to taste, put in the lemon-rind, cinnamon and ginger, and stir in gradually sufficient milk to reduce the consistency to that of thick batter. Turn the mixture into a piedish lined with short crust paste, cover and bake in a moderately hot oven from 40 to 45 minutes. Serve hot.
Time.—To bake the pie, from 40 to 45 minutes. Average Cost, uncertain. Sufficient for 6 or 7 persons. Seasonable in summer.
1595.—PUMPKIN AND APPLE PIE.
Ingredients.—Pumpkin, apples, sugar, ground allspice, paste.
Method.—Remove the rind, seeds and puffy centre part of the pumpkin, and slice the rest thinly. Fill a piedish with alternate layers of apple and pumpkin, sprinkling each layer with sugar and a pinch of allspice. Add 3 or 4 tablespoonfuls of water, cover with paste, and bake in a moderately-hot oven from 45 to 60 minutes. Serve hot.
Time.—To bake, from 45 to 60 minutes. Average Cost, uncertain. Sufficient for 6 or 7 persons. Seasonable in summer.
1596.—SALSIFY, BOILED. (Fr.—Salsifis bouillis, Sauce Blanche.)
Ingredients.—Salsify: to each ½ gallon of water allow 1 heaped tablespoonful of salt, 1 oz. of butter, 2 tablespoonfuls of lemon-juice.
Method.—Scrape the roots gently, so as to strip them only of their outside peel; cut them into pieces about 4 inches long, and, as they are peeled, throw them into water mixed with a little lemon-juice, to prevent their discolouring. Put them into boiling water with salt, butter and lemon-juice in the above proportion, and let them boil rapidly until tender; try them with a fork, and, when it penetrates easily, the roots are done. Drain the salsify, and serve with good white sauce.
Time.—From 30 to 40 minutes. Seasonable from December to March.
Note.—Salsify may also be cooked according to any of the recipes given for dressing celery.
Salsify (Fr. salsifis), or purple goat's beard, is a plant indigenous to England, belonging to the same tribe as chicory or lettuce. It is less often eaten in England than on the Continent and in America, where it is known from its peculiar taste as the "oyster plant." The root is long and tapering, similar to the parsnip.
1597.—SCALLOPED OYSTER PLANT. (Fr.—Salsifis.)
Ingredients.—1½ lb. of stewed oyster plant (salsify), 3 ozs. of butter, ½ a gill of milk, salt to taste, a pinch of cayenne pepper.
Method.—When the oyster plant is boiled tender, rub it through a sieve; add part of the butter and all the other ingredients, mix well, put in a baking-dish, cover the top with grated breadcrumbs and the rest of the butter, Bake it a delicate brown, and serve hot.
