Italian Recipe

Prosciutto Tarragon Tomato Piquante Mushroom Neapolitan Sauces

Ham Sauce, Salsa di Prosciutto

Ingredients: Ham, Musca or sweet port, vinegar, basil spice.

Cut up an ounce of ham and pound it in a mortar then mix it with three dessert spoonsful of port or Musca and a teaspoonful of vinegar a little dried basil and a pinch of spice. Boil it up, and then pass it through a sieve and warm it up in a bain-marie. Serve with roast meats. If you cannot get a sweet wine add half a teaspoonful of sugar. Australian Muscat is a good wine to use.

Tarragon Sauce

Ingredients: Tarragon, stock, butter, flour.

To half a pint of good stock add two good sprays of fresh tarragon, simmer for quarter of an hour in a stewpan and keep the lid on. In another stewpan melt one ounce of butter and mix it with three dessert-spoonsful of flour, then gradually pour the stock from the first stewpan over it, but take out the tarragon. Mix well, add a teaspoonful of finely chopped tarragon and boil for two minutes.

Tomato Sauce

Ingredients: Tomatoes, ham, onions, basil, salt, oil, garlic, spices.

Broil three tomatoes, skin them and mix them with a tablespoonful of chopped ham, half an onion, salt, a dessert-spoonful of oil, a little pounded spice and basil. Then boil and pass through a sieve. Whilst the sauce is boiling, put in a clove of garlic with a cut, but remove it before you pass the sauce through the sieve.

Tomato Sauce Piquante

Ingredients: Ham, butter, onion, carrot, celery, bay leaf, thyme, cloves, peppercorns, vinegar, Chablis, stock, tomatoes, Velute or Espagnole sauce, castor sugar, lemon.

Cut up an ounce of ham, half an onion, half a carrot, half a stick of celery very fine, and fry them in butter together with a bay leaf, a sprig of thyme, one clove and four peppercorns. Over this pour a third of a cup of vinegar, and when the liquid is all absorbed, add half a glass of Chablis and a cup of stock. Then add six tomatoes cut up and strained of all their liquid. Cook this in a covered stewpan and pass it through a sieve, but see that none of the bay leaf or thyme goes through. Mix this sauce with an equal quantity of Velute (No. 2) or Espagnole sauce, (No. 1), let it boil and pass through a sieve again and at the last add a teaspoonful of castor sugar, the juice of half a lemon, and an ounce of fresh butter. (Another tomato sauce may be made like this, but use stock instead of vinegar and leave out the lemon juice and sugar.)

Mushroom Sauce

Ingredients: Velute sauce, essence of mushrooms, butter.

Mix two dessert-spoonsful of essence of mushrooms with a cupful of Velute sauce (No. 2), reduce, keep on stirring, and just before serving add an ounce of butter. This sauce can be made with essence of truffle, or game, or shallot.

Neapolitan Sauce

Ingredients: Onions, ham, butter, Marsala, blond of veal, thyme, bay leaf, peppercorns, cloves, mushrooms, Espagnole sauce (No. 1), tomato sauce, game stock or essence.

Fry an onion in butter with some bits of cut-up ham, then pour a glass of Marsala over it, and another of blond of veal, add a sprig of thyme, a bay leaf, four peppercorns, a clove, a tablespoonful of mushroom cuttings, and reduce half. In another saucepan put two cups of Espagnole sauce, one cupful of tomato sauce, and half a cup of game stock or essence. Reduce a third, and add the contents of the first saucepan, boil the sauce a few minutes, and pass it through a sieve. Warm it up in a bain-marie before using.