The Belgian Cookbook | Page 8

herbs dried and mixed, which in England replace the thyme and bay-leaves used in Belgium. Add sufficient water to cook the potatoes and your slices of bacon. Cook till tender.
[E. Wainard.]
TOMATOES AND SHRIMPS
Lay on a dish some sliced tomatoes, taking out the seeds, and sprinkle them over with picked shrimps. Then pour over all a good mayonnaise sauce. For the sauce: Take the yolk of an egg and mix it with two soupspoonfuls of salad oil that you must pass in very gently and very little at a time. Melt a good pinch of salt in a teaspoonful of vinegar (tarragon vinegar, if you have it); add pepper and a small quantity of made mustard. In making this sauce be sure to stir it always the same way. It will take about half-an-hour to make it properly.
[Paquerette.]
FLEMISH ENDIVE
Choose twelve endives that are short and neat; cut off the outside leaves and pare the bottom; wash them in plenty of water, and cook them in simmering water for three minutes. Then take them from the water and place them in a well-buttered frying-pan, dust them with salt and also with a pinch of sugar. Add the juice of half a lemon, and rather less than a pint of water. Place the pan on the fire for two or three minutes to start the cooking, then cover it closely, and finish the cooking by placing it in the oven for fifty minutes. Take out the endives and put them in the vegetable-dish and pour over them the liquor in which they have been cooked. This liquor is improved by being reduced, and when off the fire, by having a small piece of butter added to it.
The above recipe can be used for chicory as well as for endive.
[J. Kirckaert.]
CAULIFLOWER AND SHRIMPS
Take a cauliflower and cut off the green part, and wash it several times in salted water. Boil it gently till cooked, taking care that it remains whole. Put it aside to cool, and when it is quite cold make a hole in the center down to the bottom. Pick some shrimps till you have half a pint of them, make a good mayonnaise and, taking half of it, mix it with the shrimps. Fill the hole in the cauliflower with the shrimps and sauce, and pour the rest of the sauce over the top of the cauliflower.
This dish is to be served very cold.
[E. Defouck.]
BELGIAN CARROTS
Clean well the carrots, cut them in dice, and wash them well. Put them on the fire with enough water to cover them, a bit of butter, an onion well minced, salt and pepper and a dessert-spoonful of powdered sugar. Place the dish in the oven for at least an hour, and, when you serve it, sprinkle over the carrots some minced parsley.
[Gabrielle Janssens.]
STUFFED TOMATOES
Take ten good tomatoes and cut off the tops, which are to serve as lids. Remove the insides, and fill with the following mixture: minced veal and ham, rather more veal than ham, mushrooms tossed in butter, a little breadcrumb, milk to render it moist, pepper and salt. Put on the covers and add on each one a scrap of butter. Bake them gently in a fireproof dish. The following excellent sauce is poured over them five minutes before taking them out of the oven: Use any stock that you have, preferably veal, adding the insides of the tomatoes, pepper and salt; pass this through the wire sieve. Make a roux--that is, melt some butter in a pan, adding flour little by little and stirring until it goes a brown color. Add to it then your tomatoes that have been through the sieve, and some more fried mushrooms. Pour this sauce over the whole and serve very hot.
[Mme. van Praet.]
RED CABBAGE
Mince the cabbage and put it in a pan with plenty of refined fat (clarified fat) and two or three large potatoes, pepper and salt. Add sufficient water to cover it, with a dash of vinegar and six dessertspoonfuls of brown or moist sugar. Let it simmer for four hours, drain it and serve cold.
[Mme. Segers.]
VEGETABLE SALAD
The special point of this dish is that peas, beans, carrots in dice, are all cooked separately and when they are cold they are placed in a large dish without being mixed. Decorate with the hearts of lettuce round the edge and with slices of tomato, and pour over it, or hand with it, a good mayonnaise.
[Mme. van Praet.]
CHICORY
This excellent vegetable can be dressed either in a bechamel sauce, or with butter and lemon-juice. It is gently stewed, first of all, and it requires pepper and salt. The sauces can be varied with tomato, or with some of the good English bottled sauces stirred with the bechamel.
[Mme. van Praet.]
CAULIFLOWER �� LA REINE ELIZABETH
Simmer the cauliflowers till