When you toast bread for soups, stews, &c. always cut off the crust.
Put into a sauce-pan, or skillet, five or six onions, and as many carrots cut into small pieces, with about two pounds of scraps of beef, in which there must be none of the fat. Pour over them a pint of water. Cover the pan, and begin with a brisk fire. When the gravy has become brown, add a little boiling water (or broth if you have it), with a tea-spoonful of salt, three or four cloves, and a bunch of sweet herbs. Diminish the fire, and let the gravy stew gently for an hour and a half. Occasionally prick the meat with a fork, and press it with the back of a spoon to extract its juices. Then strain it through a sieve, and let it stand a while before you use it.
In addition to the beef, you may put in pieces of cold goose, or cold duck.
Butter the bottom of a sauce-pan, and put in two pounds of scraps of veal, and, if you have it at hand, some cold fowl, or cold turkey; add two white onions, and four or five blades of mace; pour over it a pint of boiling water, or broth; cover the pan, and set it over a slow fire for five or six hours, pricking and pressing the meat with a fork and spoon. Strain it through a sieve, and if it is too thin, set it again over the fire, to stew a while longer.
Take scraps of any kind of game (partridges, pheasants, hares, &c.), and also four calves feet, and a few small pieces of ham. Put them all into a stew-pan, with half a bottle of white wine, two carrots, two onions, and a bunch of sweet herbs. Stew them over a slow fire for four hours, and when they are reduced to a jelly, moisten it with four table-spoonfuls of hot water, or broth, stirred in gently. Strain it through a sieve, and then clear it by stirring in the whites of three eggs slightly beaten.
Having strained your gravy through a sieve, beat slightly the whites of three eggs, and stir them into it. Place it again on the fire, and stir it till it comes to a boil; then take it from the fire, and put it away to settle. Strain it then through a napkin, and you will have a transparent jelly excellent for making fine sauces.
Take half a pound of scraps of veal, the same quantity of pieces of fowls, and twelve or fifteen mushrooms; stew them slowly in butter, and then add two onions, half a carrot, and a bunch of sweet herbs cut small, three table-spoonfuls of flour, three of boiling water or broth, and salt, pepper, and nutmeg to your taste. Let it stew an hour and a half, and then strain it.