fire for twenty minutes; then cool, strain,
and bottle tight. In using the caramel add it just as you are about to
serve the soup, or sauce colored with it.

3. =Clear Soup, or Consomme.= (_Two quarts for eight persons._)--This is
made by straining two quarts of stock, which has been cooled and freed
from fat, through a piece of flannel or a napkin until it is bright and
clear; if this does not entirely clear it, use an egg, as directed for
clarifying soup; then season it to taste with salt, using at first a
teaspoonful, and a very little fine white pepper, say a quarter of a
saltspoonful; and color it to a bright straw color with caramel, of
which a scant teaspoonful will be about the proper quantity. _Consomme_
is sent to the table clear, but sometimes a deep dish containing poached
eggs, one for each person, with enough _consomme_ to cover them,
accompanies it.

4. =Poached Eggs for Consomme.=--Break the eggs, which should be very
fresh, into a deep sauce-pan half full of boiling water, seasoned with a
teaspoonful of salt, and half a gill of vinegar; cover the sauce-pan,
and set it on the back part of the fire until the whites of the eggs are
firm; then lift them separately on a skimmer, carefully trim off the
rough edges, making each egg a regular oval shape, and slip them off the
skimmer into a bowl of hot, but not boiling water, where they must
stand for ten minutes before serving.

5. =Vermicelli and Macaroni Soup.=--These soups are both made as for
_consomme_; and to every quart of stock is added two ounces of one of
these pastes blanched as follows. Put the paste into plenty of boiling
water, with one tablespoonful of salt to each quart of water, and boil
until tender enough to pierce with the finger nail; then drain it, and
put it in cold water until required for use, when it should be placed in
the two quarts of hot soup long enough to heat thoroughly before
serving.

6. =Rice and Tomato Soup.=--Strain, and pass through a sieve with a wooden
spoon, one pint of tomatoes, either fresh or canned, stir them into two
quarts of good, clear stock, free from fat; season it with a teaspoonful
of salt, and quarter of a saltspoonful of pepper; taste, and if the
seasoning seems deficient add a little more, but do not put in too much
for general liking, for more can easily be added, but none can be taken
out. Add four ounces of rice, well washed in plenty of cold water, and
boil the soup slowly for three quarters of