82 POT-POURRI FROM A SURREY GARDEN 



the whole. At the last moment add the whites of the 

 eggs, beat slightly, and put it into the oven in a round 

 flat tin with a thin rim. Serve it on a large round 

 plate. Fresh-water fish, so rare now in England, though 

 the traces of tanks and ponds are always to be found in 

 the neighbourhood of old abbeys and monasteries, are 

 still much eaten in the country in France. Pike and carp 

 marinaded are constantly seen at table. Marinading 

 is far too little done in England; it is most useful for 

 many things hares, venison, beef, and grouse and it 

 preserves the meat for some time, if that is what is wanted. 

 It is described in ' Dainty Dishes,' but I give you also 

 the following receipt : 



German Receipt for Roast Hare. Take a bottle 

 of common white wine (or any remnants of already opened 

 bottles) ; cut up onions, carrots, herbs, bay-leaf, a clove or 

 two ; and pour the whole over the raw hare in a shallow 

 baking-pan, basting it well every few hours in a cool 

 place for two or three days. Then prepare the hare. Take 

 off the head, lard it well, and put it into the roasting-pan 

 with a little dripping and more onions, carrots, herbs, 

 salt, and pepper. When roasted, take it out of the oven, 

 pour off all the grease, and replace it by half a breakfast- 

 cupful of thick sour cream, which is to be mixed with 

 the gravy at the bottom of the pan. Eeplace it in the 

 oven, baste well with the mixture, and serve just as it is, 

 pouring the sauce over the hare. 



Chervil is always used in France for spring decoration 

 of fish, cold meat, &c. It is much hardier and more 

 easily grown than Parsley, and lives through the coldest 

 weather if covered up with sticks and fern. In severe 

 winters Parsley sometimes fails in English gardens. 



The life in the little French town near which we were 

 was like a page out of a volume of Balzac's ' Vie de 

 Province/ so full of character, and, in a sense, so far 

 away and old-fashioned. 



