N.B. Pettitoes are sometimes boiled and dipped in batter, and fried a light brown.
_Obs._--If you have no gravy, put into the water you stew the pettitoes in an onion, a sprig of lemon thyme, or sweet marjoram, with a blade of bruised mace, a few black peppers, and a large tea-spoonful of mushroom catchup (No. 439), and you will have a very tolerable substitute for gravy. A bit of No. 252 will be a very great improvement to it.
Cover a pound of nice streaked bacon (as the Hampshire housewives say, that "has been starved one day, and fed another") with cold water, let it boil gently for three-quarters of an hour; take it up, scrape the under-side well, and cut off the rind: grate a crust of bread not only on the top, but all over it, as directed for the ham in the following receipt, and put it before the fire for a few minutes: it must not be there too long, or it will dry it and spoil it.
Two pounds will require about an hour and a half, according to its thickness; the hock or gammon being very thick, will take more.
_Obs._--See Nos. 526 and 527: when only a little bacon is wanted, these are the best ways of dressing it.
The boiling of bacon is a very simple subject to comment, upon; but our main object is to teach common cooks the art of dressing common food in the best manner.
Bacon is sometimes as salt as salt can make it, therefore before it is boiled it must be soaked in warm water for an hour or two, changing the water once; then pare off the rusty and smoked part, trim it nicely on the under side, and scrape the rind as clean as possible.
MEM.--Bacon is an extravagant article in housekeeping; there is often twice as much dressed as need be: when it is sent to table as an accompaniment to boiled poultry or veal, a pound and a half is plenty for a dozen people. A good German sausage is a very economical substitute for bacon; or fried pork sausages (No. 87).
Though of the bacon kind, has been so altered and hardened in the curing, that it requires still more care.
Ham is generally not half-soaked; as salt as brine, and hard as flint; and it would puzzle the stomach of an ostrich to digest it.
MEM.--The salt, seasoning, and smoke, which preserve it before it is eaten, prevent its solution after; and unless it be very long and very gently stewed, the strongest stomach will have a tough job to extract any nourishment from it. If it is a very dry Westphalia ham, it must be soaked, according to its age and thickness, from 12 to 24 hours; for a green Yorkshire or Westmoreland ham, from four to eight hours will be sufficient. Lukewarm water will soften it much sooner than cold, when sufficiently soaked, trim it nicely on the underside, and pare off all the rusty and smoked parts till it looks delicately clean.