their flavour may mix them
with melted butter, &c. This is a hint for economists, which will save
them many pounds of butter, &c. See MEM. to No. 256.

[228-+] A silver saucepan is infinitely the best: you may have one big
enough to melt butter for a moderate family, for four or five pounds.

[234-*] Oysters which come to the New-York market, are too large and
fine to be mangled according to this receipt. They are generally cooked
by being fried or stewed. When they are intended to be kept a length of
time, they are pickled in vinegar, with spices. A.

[236-*] You must have a hen lobster, on account of the live spawn. Some
fishmongers have a cruel custom of tearing this from the fish before
they are boiled. Lift up the tail of the lobster, and see that it has
not been robbed of its eggs: the goodness of your sauce depends upon its
having a full share of the spawn in it, to which it owes not merely its
brilliant red colour, but the finest part of its flavour.

[238-*] So much depends upon the age of the celery, that we cannot give
any precise time for this, young, fresh-gathered celery will be done
enough in three-quarters of an hour; old will sometimes take twice as
long.

[240-*] If you wish to have them _very_ mild, cut them in quarters, boil
them for five minutes in plenty of water, and then drain them, and cook
them in fresh water.

[244-*] Composer and Director of the Music of the Theatre Royal Drury
Lane, and the Italian Opera.

[246-*] "By the best accounts I can find, soy is a preparation from the
seeds of a species of the _Dolichos_, prepared by a fermentation of the
farina of this seed in a strong lixivium of common salt."--CULLEN'S
_Mat. Med._ vol. i. p. 430.

[250-*] One of "_les bonnes hommes de bouche de France_" orders the
following addition for game gravy:--"For a pint, par-roast a partridge
or a pigeon; cut off the meat of it, pound it in a mortar, and put it
into the stew-pan when you _thicken_ the sauce." We do not recommend
either soup or sauce to be _thickened_, because it requires (to give it
the same quickness on the palate it had before it was thickened) double
the quantity of _piquante_ materials; which are thus smuggled down the
red lane, without affording any amusement to the mouth, and at the risk
of highly offending the stomach.

[251-*] To this some add a table-spoonful of mushroom catchup (No. 439),
and instead of the salt-spoonful of salt, a tea-spoonful of essence of
anchovy (