forcemeat No. 417, 3 carrots, 2 onions, salt and pepper to taste, a
faggot of savoury herbs, 3 blades of pounded mace, water, thickening of
butter and flour.
_Mode_.--Bone the joint by carefully detaching the meat from the
blade-bone on one side, and then on the other, being particular not to
pierce the skin; then cut the bone from the knuckle, and take it out.
Fill the cavity whence the bone was taken with a forcemeat made by
recipe No. 417. Roll and bind the veal up tightly; put it into a
stew-pan with the carrots, onions, seasoning, herbs, and mace; pour in
just sufficient water to cover it, and let it stew _very gently_ for
about 5 hours. Before taking it up, try if it is properly done by
thrusting a larding-needle in it: if it penetrates easily, it is
sufficiently cooked. Strain and skim the gravy, thicken with butter and
flour, give one boil, and pour it round the meat. A few young carrots
may be boiled and placed round the dish as a garnish, and, when in
season, green peas should always be served with this dish.
_Time_.--5 hours. _Average cost_, 7d. per lb.
_Sufficient_ for 8 or 9 persons. _Seasonable_ from March to October.
THE FATTENING OF CALVES.--The fattening of calves for the market
is an important business in Lanarkshire or Clydesdale, and
numbers of newly-dropped calves are regularly carried there from
the farmers of the adjacent districts, in order to be prepared
for the butcher. The mode of feeding them is very simple; milk
is the chief article of their diet, and of this the calves
require a sufficient supply from first to last. Added to this,
they must be kept in a well-aired place, neither too hot nor too
cold, and freely supplied with dry litter. It is usual to
exclude the light,--at all events to a great degree, and to put
within their reach a lump of chalk, which they are very fond of
licking. Thus fed, calves, at the end of 8 or 9 weeks, often
attain a very large size; viz., 18 to 20 stone, exclusive of the
offal. Far heavier weights have occurred, and without any
deterioration in the delicacy and richness of the flesh. This
mode of feeding upon milk alone at first appears to be very
expensive, but it is not so, when all things are taken into
consideration; for at the age of 9 or 10 weeks a calf,
originally purchased for 8 shillings, will realize nearly the
same number of pounds. For 4, or even 6 weeks, the milk of one
cow is sufficient,--indeed half that quantity is enough for the
first fortnight; but after the 5th or 6th week it will consume
the greater portion of the milk of two moderate cows; but then
it requires neither oil-cake nor linseed, nor any other food.
Usually, however, the calves are not kept beyond the age of 6
weeks, and will then sell for 5 or 6 pounds each: the milk of
the cow is then ready for a successor. In this manner a relay of
calves may be prepared for the markets from early spring to the
end of summer, a plan more advantageous than that of overfeeding
one to a useless degree of corpulency.
VEAL SAUSAGES.