eg of mutton is the best for
this dish. Cut the slices of equal thickness, and broil and brown
them carefully and slightly over a clear smart fire, or in a Dutch
oven; give those slices most fire that are least done; lay them in a
dish before the fire to keep hot, while you poach the eggs and mash
the potatoes. This makes a savoury luncheon or supper. The meat should
be _underdone_ the first time.

1182. Curried Oysters.

This receipt may be greatly modified, both in quantity and
ingredients. Let a hundred of large oysters be opened into a basin
without losing one drop of their liquor. Put a lump of fresh butter
into a good-sized saucepan, and when it boils, add a large onion, cut
into thin slices, and let it fry in the uncovered stewpan until it is
of a rich brown: now add a bit more butter, and two or three
tablespoonfuls of curry powder. When these ingredients are well mixed
over the fire with a wooden spoon, add gradually either hot water, or
broth from the stock-pot; cover the stewpan, and let the whole boil
up. Meanwhile, have ready the meat of a cocoa-nut, grated or rasped
fine, put this into the stewpan with an unripe apple, chopped. Let the
whole simmer over the fire until the apple is dissolved, and the
cocoa-nut very tender; then add a cupful of strong thickening made of
flour and water, and sufficient salt, as a curry will not bear being
salted at table. Let this boil up for five minutes.

Have ready also a vegetable marrow, or part of one, cut into bits, and
sufficiently boiled to require little or no further cooking. Put this
in with a tomato or two. These vegetables improve the flavour of the
dish, but either or both of them may be omitted. Now put into the
stewpan the oysters with their liquor, and the milk of the cocoa-nut,
if it be perfectly sweet; stir them well with the former ingredients;
let the curry stew gently for a few minutes, then throw in the
strained juice of half a lemon. Stir the curry from time to time with
a wooden spoon, and as soon as the oysters are done enough, serve it
up with a corresponding dish of rice on the opposite side of the
table. This dish is considered at Madras the _ne plus ultra_ of Indian
cookery.

1183. Fried Oysters.

Large oysters are the best. Simmer for a minute or two in their own
liquor; drain perfectly dry; dip in yolks of eggs, and then in
bread-crumbs, seasoned with nutmeg,