To accomplish this, care must be taken that the roots and herbs are perfectly well cleaned, and that the water is proportioned to the quantity of beef and other ingredients.  Generally a quart of water could be allowed to a pound of meat for soups, and 1/2 of the quantity for gravies.  In making soups or gravies, mild stewing or simmering is incomparably the best.  It may be remarked, however  a really good soup can not ever be made but in a well-closed vessel, although, perhaps, greater wholesomeness is got by an occasional exposure to the air.  Soups will, generally, take from three to six hours doing, and are far better prepared the day before they’re wanted.

When the soup is cold, the fat could be much more easily and completely removed ; and when it is poured off, care must be taken not to disturb the settlings at the base of the vessel, which are so fine that they’ll escape thru a sift.  A tamis is the best strainer, and if the soup is strained even though it is hot, let the tamis or material be formerly soaked in cold water.  Clear soups must be perfectly clear, and thickened soups about the consistence of cream.

To thicken and give body to soups and gravies, potato-mucilage, arrow-root, bread-raspings, isinglass, flour and butter, barley, rice, or oatmeal, in a little water rubbed well together, are used.  A piece of boiled meat battered to a pulp, with a bit of butter and flour, and rubbed through a sieve, and continuously incorporated with the soup, will be found an excellent addition.  When the soup appears to be too thin or too weak, the cover of the boiler should be taken off, and the contents permitted to boil till some of the watery parts have evaporated ; or some of the thickening materials, above mentioned, should be added.  When soups and gravies are kept from day to day in hot weather, they deserve to be warmed up every day, and put into fresh scalded pans or tureens, and placed in a cool basement.  In temperate weather, every other day might be sufficient.

Varied herbs and veggies are needed for the purpose of making soups and gravies.  Of these the principal are, Scotch barley, pearl barley, wheat flour, oatmeal, bread-raspings, pease, beans, rice, vermicelli, macaroni, isinglass, potato-mucilage, mushroom or mushroom ketchup, champignons, parsnips, carrots, beetroot, turnips, garlic, shalots and onions.  Cut onions, fried with butter and flour till they’re browned, and then rubbed through a sift, are excellent to increase the colour and flavor of brown soups and sauces, and form the foundation of many of the fine relishes furnished by the cook.  The older and drier the onion, the stronger will be its flavor.  Leeks, cucumber, or burnet vinegar ; celery or celery-seed battered.

The latter, though equally strong, does not communicate the delicate sweetness of the fresh plant ; and when used as a substitute, its flavour should be corrected by the addition of a little bit of sugar.  Cress-seed, parsley, common thyme, lemon thyme, orange thyme, knotted marjoram, sage, mint, winter tasty, and basil.  As fresh green basil is rarely to be gained, and its fine flavor is soon lost, the best way of preserving the extract is by pouring wine on the fresh leaves.

For the seasoning of soups, bay-leaves, tomato, tarragon, chervil, burnet, allspice, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, clove, mace, black and white pepper, essence of anchovy, lemon-peel, and juice, and Seville orange-juice, are all taken.  The latter provides a finer flavor than the lemon, and the acid is much milder.  These materials, with wine, mushroom ketchup, Harvey’s sauce, tomato sauce, combined in diverse proportions, are, with other ingredients, manipulated into a nearly unlimited variety of glorious soups and gravies.  Soups, which are intended to constitute the principal part of a meal, actually ought not to be flavoured like sauces, which are only designed to give a relish to some particular dish.

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