Modern cookery for private families

PLAIN BEEF GRAVY SOUP. (_Baron Liebeg’s Receipt._) OBSERVATION.—This admirable preparation is not only most valuable as a restorative of the best kind for invalids who require light but highly nutritious diet, it is also of the utmost utility for the general purposes of the kitchen, and will enable a cook who can take skilful advantage of it, to convert the _cold meat_ which often abounds so inconveniently in an English larder, from our habit of having joints of large size so much served, into good nourishing dishes, which the hashes and minces of our common cookery _are not_, though they may answer well enough as mere varieties of diet. We shall indicate in the proper chapters the many other uses to which this _beef juice_—for such indeed it is—will be found eminently adapted. Of its value in illness it is impossible to speak too highly; and in every family, therefore, the _exact_ mode of making it ought to be thoroughly understood. The economist who may consider it expensive, must remember that drugs and medical advice are usually far more so; and in cases of extreme debility the benefit derived from it, when it is well prepared and judiciously administered, is often remarkable. It should be given in small quantities at first, and in its pure state. It may afterwards be varied by the addition of vermicelli, semoulina, or other preparations of the kind; and also by using for it a portion of mutton, calf’s head, poultry, or game, when these suit a patient as well as the beef. RECEIPT.—Take a pound of good, juicy beef (rump-steak is best for the purpose), from which all the skin and fat that can possibly be separated from it, has been cut away. Chop it up small like sausage-meat; then mix it thoroughly with an exact pint of cold water, and place it on the side of the stove to heat _very slowly indeed_; and give it an occasional stir. It may stand two or three hours before it is allowed to simmer, and will then require at the utmost but fifteen minutes of