SHELL-FISH


STEWED WATER TURTLES, OR TERRAPINS.

Select the largest, thickest and fattest, the females being the best;
they should be alive when brought from market. Wash and put them alive
into boiling water, add a little salt, and boil them until thoroughly
done, or from ten to fifteen minutes, after which take off the shell,
extract the meat, and remove carefully the sand-bag and gall; also all
the entrails; they are unfit to eat, and are no longer used in cooking
terrapins for the best tables. Cut the meat into pieces, and put it
into a stewpan with its eggs, and sufficient fresh butter to stew it
well. Let it stew till quite hot throughout, keeping the pan carefully
covered, that none of the flavor may escape, but shake it over the
fire while stewing. In another pan make a sauce of beaten yolk of egg,
highly flavored with Madeira or sherry, and powdered nutmeg and mace,
a gill of currant jelly, a pinch of cayenne pepper, and salt to taste,
enriched with a large lump of fresh butter. Stir this sauce well over
the fire, and when it has almost come to a boil take it off. Send the
terrapins to the table hot in a covered dish, and the sauce separately
in a sauce tureen, to be used by those who like it, and omitted by
those who prefer the genuine flavor of the terrapins when simply
stewed with butter. This is now the usual mode of dressing terrapins
in Maryland, Virginia, and many other parts of the South, and will be
found superior to any other. If there are no eggs in the terrapin,
"egg balls" may be substituted. (See recipe.)