Forcemeat balls for maigre soups of any description should be always used to compensate for the savor of which they are deprived by the want of meat-broth; and may be made of fish and sweet herbs, or only of herbs and crumbs of bread, in the following manner:-

Pound in a mortar the soft parts of a crawfish, or a few shrimps, with an anchovy, and the yolk of a hard-boiled egg, beaten up with crumbs of stale bread, pounded mace, cayenne pepper, salt, and a very little finely minced garlic. Then work it up into a paste with a raw egg to bind it into dough; roll it out, cut it into small balls of the size of marbles, and fry them of a fine brown.

Or:- Leave out the fish, and make them entirely of bread and savory chopped herbs - chervil, tarragon, marjoram, and thyme, with a little garlic and a shalot - and bind them up as above, with egg, butter, and crumbs of bread.

Or:- Chop, and afterwards pound in a mortar, any kind of fish, adding an anchovy or two, or a tea-spoonful of the essence of anchovies, but do not allow the taste to prevail, and the yolk of a hard-boiled egg: pound butter with it; add a third portion of bread, prepared by soaking and pounding previously, and mix the whole up with raw eggs.

Or:- Beat the flesh and soft parts of a middling-sized lobster, half an anchovy, a large piece of boiled celery the yolk of a hard egg, a little cayenne, mace, salt, and white pepper, with two table-spoonfuls of bread-crumbs, one ditto of- oyster liquor, two ounces of butter warmed, and two eggs long beaten: make into balls, and fry of a fine brown in butter.

Or:- Take a few shrimps, stripped of their shells, an anchovy, and the yolk of a hard-boiled egg, with bread-crumbs and seasoning as above, but adding some finely minced sweet herbs, and omitting the oyster liquor: make all this into a paste with a little butter and a raw egg, made up in balls and fried as before.

Or:- Instead of making the balls of fish and frying them, it is a more simple way to make them merely of breadcrumbs, hard-boiled egg, and sweet herbs seasoned with raw egg: drop the balls, one by one, into the boiling soup a few minutes before serving. Two eggs and a quarter of a pound of bread should make twelve or fifteen balls.

Or:- Pound in a mortar, into a smooth substance, an anchovy, the yolk of a hard-boiled egg, a head of boiled celery, and some sweet herbs, with a couple of table-spoonfuls of bread-crumbs, seasoned with mace, a grating of nutmeg, cayenne, and salt; then add two ounces of butter melted, and work it into a paste with a little flour and the yolk of a raw egg; make it into balls the size of marbles, and fry them quite brown.