Quick-Lunch Pie For Minor Hot Meals

Press, Volume C, Issue 29469, 22 March 1961, Page 3

Quick-Lunch Pie For Minor Hot Meals

IBy

ELIZABETH]

This recipe for quick-lunch pie is as good as any I know, for it takes about five minutes to whisk it into the oven, yet it comes out looking splendid and is widely popular. Ingredients: 11b chippolata sausages 1 egg J cup mslk Salt and pepper 2 tomatoes 2 j-inch thick slices processed cheese 1 16-oz tin spaghetti A few potato straws Method: Fry sausages gently until browned, drain and place in an ovenware dish. Cover with the contents of one tin of spaghetti in tomato sauce. Beat one egg with half a cup of milk, salt and pepper and pour over. Slice tomatoes into fairly thick slices and arrange over the spaghetti in the form of a cross of overlapping slices. Cut cheese slices into two longways, and arrange out from the centre of the cross. Sprinkle a few potato straws •if yqu have that very useful trick of keeping a jar full for garnish) round the edge of the dish. Bake in a moderate oven until set and the top browmed.

Nutted Cutlets A dinner does not need to be elaborate to have a sophisticated air of distinction. A novel presentation of quite ordinary ingredients will do as much for a meal as a long list of extravagant luxuries. For that special little dinner you were planning, gather up lamb cutlets, carrots and a packet of that mixed dried fruit, pears, prunes, apricots, and from these prosaic beginnings turn out a dish with a dash of eclat. NUTTED CUTLETS WITH SPICED FRUIT Ingredients: 8 lamb cutlets Coconut Salt and pepper 1 egg 1 tablespoon water 1 packet mixed fruit 1 cup sugar 1 cup water 1 cup vinegar 1 teaspoon mixed spice 2 teaspoon cinnamon 4 teaspoon salt Method: Soak mixed fruit in water, then cook until tender in one cup of water and one cup of sugar. Add spices and vinegar and bring back to the boil. Keep hot until required. Beat egg with 1 tablespoon water. Season some coconut with salt. Dip cutlets first in egg then in coconut, coating well on all sides. Heat a little butter or dripping and in it fry the cutlets until well browned on both sides. Drain out on to a hot dish. Drain fruit and place in a shallow bowl set in the centre of the dish. Serve with carrot rings in parsley sauce and duchesse potatoes.

In all the homes where a man's occupation brings him home to lunch, a second minor hot meal either at lunch time or in the evening has to be thought out and included in the day’s chores. Since cooking is only one of the thousand things a woman does in the course of the week, it is not always convenient to give a great deal of time to this second cooked meal. Hence a few quick and easy tricks for making attractive and substantial meals are a boon.

Mushroom Cups When you are catering for a meatless meal, try serving creamed mushrooms in bread and butter cups with warmly satisfying Onions au Gratin, and crumb stuffed tomatoes for a meal which is satisfying both to look at and to eat. This is a winner for its blending of flavours and its contrast of colours. ONIONS AU GRATIN Ingredients: 2jlb small onions. 4 tablespoons butter. 4 tablespoons of flour. 2 cups of milk. 1 teaspoon dry mustard. 1 teaspoon Worcester sauce. Salt and pepper. 3oz grated cheese. Fine brown breadcrumbs. Method: Boil onions until tender in salted water and drain. Place in buttered ovenware dish. Melt butter, blend in flour, then stir in milk, cooking until smooth and boiling. Mix mustard with a little milk and stir in, together with sauce, salt and pepper and half the grated cheese. Pour over the onions. Cover with brown breadcrumbs and the remaining cheese. Bake about 20 minutes in a moderate oven. Whilst it is cooking, press buttered bread slices into muffin tins and bake until crisp and golden. MUSHROOM CUPS Ingredients: 11b mushrooms. 2 tablespoons butter. 24 tablespoons flour. 1 cup of milk. Salt and pepper. 2 teaspoons sherry. Method: Peel mushrooms and saute in two tablespoons melted butter until tender. Sprinkle in flour and blend together, then add milk, stirring until thick and boiling. Season with salt and pepper and add sherry. Pile into the prepared bread cups and serve hot with the onion dish.

Autumn Dish Small beans are always left on the plant at the end of the season when the first frosts come. They will be too small to slice in the usual way, but if they are topped and tailed they can be cooked whole and served with tomatoes and a savoury sauce. Boil the beans in salted water till tender, peel tomatoes in boiling water. Put both vegetables on a large plate. Serve with a savoury sauce, given below. This vegetable dish can be used as hors d’oeuvres or teamed with fried fish, hot or cold meat. Ingredients: 2 tablespoons olive oil 2 tablespoons white vinegar 1 tablespoon lemon juice 1 tablespoon chopped chives A little dill and rosemary. if available I teaspoon salt. Method: Mix all ingredients well, ( pour over tomatoes and beans, cool till ready to serve. * 4s * Lining Cake Tins.— To make paper linings for cake tins, trace round the bottom of the tin with pencil on the paper,, then cut'.

Baked Quince Pudding Highlight of the week in the way of pudding was this Baked Quince Pudding. No trace at all of the crude acidity which puts some off quinces, this pudding is mellow and light and delicate. Definitely one to put a star against. Ingredients: 2 large quinces 1 cup sugar 2 cups water 2| tablespoons cornflour 2 eggs Pink colouring Small pinch salt. Method: Peel quinces and cut into thin segments. Place in a saucepan with two cups of water and half a cup of sugar and stew until tender and turning pink. Mix half a cup of sugar with 2J tablespoons cornflour. Drain juice from cooked quinces and make up to 14 cups with water. Mix corpflour with an additional half cup of cold water and stir in the fruit juice. Bring to the boil, stirring: until smooth and boiling. Add a little pink colouring and jour into two well beaten egg yolks, whisking well. Whisk two whites with a pinch of salt and fold through, lightly but completely. Fold quinces through last and turn into a well buttered baking dish. Bake at 350 degrees for half an hour.

Rose Hip Syrup This recipe for Rose Hip Syrup has been recommended by the home science extension, Adult Education Department, University of Otago. Ingredients: 41b rose hips lib sugar loz citric acid Method: Mince the rose hips, add 6 pints cold water in an aluminium or enamel pan and let stand 24 hours, stirring occasionally. Squeeze liquid through colander or coarse bag. Then allow fluid to drip through a jelly bag. Add citric acid and boil juice down to 3 pints (about 15 minutes). Skim, add sugar and boil 3 minutes more. Bottle in small sterilised bottles, insert sterile corks. Let bottles cool, then dip corks in wax. Total yield—--3 pints juice—with a vitamin content 4 to 6 times that of orange juice. Lumpy Custard.— To prevent lumps forming in custard or white sauce while cooking, whip up the mixture with a wire whisk. . Preventing Wall Marks.— Stick a small piece of foam rubber on the back of furniture where it touches the wall. This prevents marks on the walls.

Removing Egg Shell.— To remove bits of shell or a drop of yolk from egg white, use half a broken eggshell to lift out the unwanted piece.

Roasting Goose.— Do not brush goose with fat, do not cover it with cloth, do not baste it and pour off fat as it accumulates in the pan.

To Keep lettuce, cress and other'salad greens in a newspaper in the shape of a cone, with the point of the cone and the bottom of the lettuce just immersed in water. They will keep fresh much longer. 4t * ♦ Bacon Splutter.— To prevent bacon from spluttering, put a pinch of cornflour into the bacon fat.