New Year's Eve dinner recipes, turnips, winter-squash, and plum pudding.

image from Grandma's Graphics.

If anyone wants recipes for the smoked tongue or cold-slaw[sic] that were mentioned in the menu from Godey's, please let me know and I'll research them. They were nowhere to be found in my antique recipe books! Here are the other vegetable side dishes:

"Turnips should be pared; put into boiling water, with a little salt; boiled till tender; then squeeze them thoroughly from the water, mash them smooth, add a piece of butter and a little pepper and salt."

"Squash is a rich vegetable, particularly the yellow winter squash. This requires more boiling than the summer kind. Pare it, cut it in pieces, take out the seeds and boil it in a very little water till it is quite soft. Then press out all the water, mash it and add a little butter, pepper and salt."

And plum pudding is not just for Christmas!

"Plum Pudding.-- Chop half a pound of suet very fine; stone half a pound of raisins; half a pound of currants nicely washed and picked; four ounces of bread crumbs; four ounces of flour; four eggs well beaten; a little grated nutmeg; mace and cinnamon pounded very fine; a spoonful of salt; four ounces of sugar; one ounce candied lemon; same of citron.

Beat the eggs and the spices well together: mix the milk with them by degrees, then the rest of the ingredients; dip a fine, close linen cloth into boiling water, and place it in a hair sieve; flour it a little, then pour in the batter and tie it up, allowing a little room to swell; put it into a pot containing six quarts of boiling water; keep a tea-kettle of boiling water and fill up your pot as it wastes; be sure to keep it boiling at least six hours -- seven would not injure it. This pudding should be mixed an hour or two before it is put on to boil; it makes it taste richer."