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Beef Soup

A historical recipe from Domestic French Cookery, 4th ed., by Sulpice Barué (1836).

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A historical recipe

Domestic French Cookery, 4th ed., by Sulpice Barué (1836). Project Gutenberg eBook #34837.

From an old book: a historical recipe, not current advice. Its methods, additives and storage may be unsafe by today's standards.

France

Known as a French recipe, with similar versions prepared across other nations.

Ingredients 2 ingredients

  1. four pounds of meat
  2. a gallon of water

Cook safely

Keep children and pets away from the hob and the oven, and keep oven gloves and a lid within reach.

  • Oven and hot trays. Use dry oven gloves for trays and dishes: a hot tray looks just like a cold one. Open the oven door away from your face and let the first rush of heat out.
  • Boiling water and steam. Turn pan handles inward, away from the edge of the hob. Lift lids away from you, and pour hot water away from your body: steam burns too.
  • Sharp knives. Cut on a board that doesn't slip (a damp cloth under it helps), and curl the fingers of the hand that holds the food.

Method

  1. The best soup is made of the lean of fine fresh beef.
  2. The proportion is four pounds of meat to a gallon of water.
  3. It should boil at least six hours.
  4. Mutton soup may be made in the same manner.
  5. Put the meat into cold water, with a little salt;
  6. set it over a good fire;
  7. let it boil slowly but constantly, and skim it well.
  8. When no more fat rises to the top, put in what quantity you please of carrots, turnips, leeks, celery, and parsley, all cut into small pieces;
  9. add, if you choose, a laurel-leaf, or two or three peach-leaves, a few cloves, and a large burnt onion, to heighten the color of the soup.
  10. Grate a large red carrot, and strew it over the top.
  11. Then continue to let it boil, gently but steadily, till dinner time.
  12. Next to the quantity and quality of the meat, nothing is more necessary to the excellence of soup than to keep the fire moderate, and to see that it is boiling all the time, but not too fast.
  13. Have ready in the tureen some toasted bread, cut into small squares;
  14. pour the soup over the bread, passing it through a sieve, so as to strain it thoroughly.
  15. Some, however, prefer serving it up with all the vegetables in it.
  16. The soup will be improved by boiling in it the remains of a piece of cold roast beef.
  17. Soups made of veal, chickens, &c.
  18. are only fit for invalids.
  19. After you have strained out the vegetables, you may put into the soup some vermicelli (allowing two ounces to each quart), and then boil it ten minutes longer.

Plating

Cookware for this recipe

  • Saucepan
  • Chef's knife
  • Grater
  • Slotted spoon
  • Sieve
Source Public domain in the USA
Credit

From Domestic French Cookery, 4th ed., by Sulpice Barué (1836). Digitised by Project Gutenberg, eBook #34837 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/34837). Public domain in the USA; its status may differ elsewhere.

What was changed: As printed, from the book's text; Project Gutenberg's header and licence removed. Ingredient lines were read out of the text by a program. A historical recipe, not current advice.