“In the morning Beth made breakfast, and when it was over, if crusts had accumulated in the cupboard, she steeped them in hot milk in a pie-dish, beat them up with an egg, a little butter, sugar, currants, and candied peel, and some nutmeg grated, for a bread-pudding, which Prentice took out to bake for dinner, remarking regularly that little miss promised to be helpful, to which Aunt Victoria as regularly responded Yes, she hoped Miss Beth would become a capable woman some day.”
A cook of roughly the same moment, setting down the same dish.
380. INGREDIENTS.--1 teaspoonful of flour, 2 oz. butter, 1/3 pint of milk, a few grains of salt. _Mode_.--Mix the butter and flour smoothly together on a plate, put it into a lined saucepan, and pour in the milk. Keep stirring it _one way_ over a sharp fire; let it boil quickly for a minute or two, and it is ready to serve. This is a very good foundation for onion, lobster, or oyster sauce: using milk instead of water makes it look so much whiter and more delicate. _Time_.--Altogether, 10 minutes. _Average cost_ for this quantity, 3d.
Sources: The passage is from Sarah Grand, The Beth Book: Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, free to read in full at Project Gutenberg. The recipe is from Beeton, The Book of Household Management of 1861, also free in full. Both are in the public domain in the United States. The binding above is ours — navy cloth, amphora stamp.