and age. When done, take it up, drain it, dish it under a cover, or
napkin, and serve it up hot. Before eating it, rub each ear with salt
and pepper, and then spread it with butter. Epicures in corn consider it
sweetest when eaten off the cob. And so it is; but _before company_ few
persons like to hold an ear of indian corn in their hands, and bite the
grains off the cob with their teeth. Therefore, it is more frequently
cut off the cob into a dish; mixed with salt, pepper, and butter, and
helped with a spoon.

It is said that young green corn will boil sufficiently in ten minutes,
(putting it, _of course_, into a pot of boiling water.) Try it.

_Another way._--Having pulled off the silk, boil the corn without
removing any but the outside leaves. With the leaves or husk on, it will
require a longer time to cook, but is sweeter and more nutritious.

HOMINY.--Hominy is white indian corn, shelled from the cob, divested of
the outer skin by scalding in hot lye, and then winnowed and dried. It
is perfectly white. Having washed it through two or three waters, pour
boiling water on it; cover it, and let it soak all night, or for several
hours. Then put it into a pot or sauce-pan, allow two quarts of water to
each quart of hominy, and boil it till perfectly soft. Then drain it,
put it into a deep dish, add some butter to it, and send it to table
hot, (and _uncovered_,) to eat with any sort of meat; but particularly
with corned beef or pork. What is left may be made next day into thick
cakes, and fried in butter. To be _very good_, hominy should boil four
or five hours.

CAROLINA GRITS OR SMALL HOMINY.--The small-grained hominy must be washed
and boiled in the same manner as the large, only allow rather less water
for boiling. For instance, put a pint and a half of water to a quart of
small hominy. Drain it well, send it to table in a deep dish _without a
cover_, and eat it with butter and sugar, or molasses. If covered after
boiling, the vapor will condense within the lid, and make the hominy
thin and watery.

SAMP.--This is indian corn skinned, and then pounded or ground till it
is still smaller and finer than the Carolina grits. It must be cooked
and used in the same manner. It is very nice eaten with cream and sugar.

For invalids it may be made thin, and eaten as gruel.

HOMINY CAKES.--A pint of small hominy, or Carolina grits; a pint of
white indian meal, sifted; a salt-spoonful of salt, three large
table-spoonfuls of fresh butter; three eggs or three table-spoonfuls of
strong yeast; a quart of milk. Having washed the small hominy, and left
it soaking all night, boil it soft, drain it, and while hot mix it with
the indian meal; adding the salt, and the butter. Then mix it gradually
with the milk, and set it away to cool. Beat the eggs very light, and
add them gradually to the mixture. The whole should make a thick batter.
Then bake them on a griddle, in the manner of buckwheat cakes, rubbing
or scraping the griddle always before you put on a fresh cake. Trim off
their edges nicely, and send them to table hot. Eat them with butter.

Or you may bake them in muffin rings.

If you prefer making these cakes with yeast, you must begin them
earlier, as they will require time to rise. The yeast should be strong
and fresh. If _not_ very strong, use four table-spoonfuls instead of
two. Cover the pan, set it in a warm place; and do not begin to bake
till it is well risen, and the surface of the mixture is covered with
bubbles.

CORN PORRIDGE.--Take young corn, and cut the grains from the cob.
Measure it, and to each heaping pint of corn allow not quite a quart of
milk. Put the corn and milk into a pot, stir them well together, and
boil them till the corn is perfectly soft. Then add some bits of fresh
butter dredged with flour, and let it boil five minutes longer. Stir in
at the last, four beaten yolks of eggs, and in three minutes remove it
from the fire. Take up the porridge and send it to table hot, and stir
some fresh butter into it. You may add sugar and nutmeg.

CORN OYSTERS.--Three dozen ears of large young indian corn, six eggs;
lard and butter in equal portions for frying. The corn must be young and
soft. Grate it from the cob as fine as possible, and dredge it with
wheat flour. Beat very light the six eggs, and mix them gradually with
the corn. Then let the whole be well incorporated by hard beating. Add a
salt-spoon of salt.

Have ready, in a frying pan, a sufficient quantity of lard and fresh
butter mixed together. Set it over the fire till it is boiling hot, and
then put in portions of the corn mixture, so as to form oval cakes about
three inches long, and nearly an inch thick. Fry them brown, and send
them to table hot. In taste they will be found to have a singular
resemblance to fried oysters, and are universally liked if properly
done. They make nice side-dishes at dinner, and are very good at
breakfast.

SUMMER SACCATASH.--String a quarter of a peck of young green beans, and
cut each bean into three pieces, (not more,) and do not split them. Have
by you a pan of cold water, and throw the beans into it as you cut them.
Have ready over the fire a pot or sauce-pan of boiling water; put in the
beans, and boil them hard near twenty minutes. Afterwards take them up,
and drain them well through a cullender. Take half a dozen ears of young
but full-grown indian corn, (or eight or nine if they are not all large)
and cut the grains down from the cob. Mix together the corn and the
beans, adding a very small tea-spoonful of salt, and boil them about
twenty minutes. Then take up the saccatash, drain it well through a
sieve, put it into a deep dish, and while hot mix in a large piece of
butter, (at least the size of an egg,) add some pepper, and send it to
table. It is generally eaten with salted or smoked meat.

Fresh Lima beans are excellent cooked in this manner, with green corn.
They must be boiled for half an hour or more, before they are cooked
with the corn.

Dried beans and dried corn will do very well for saccatash, but they
must be soaked all night before boiling. The water poured on them for
soaking should be hot.

WINTER SACCATASH.--This is made of dried shelled beans and hard corn,
soaked over night in separate pans, and boiling water poured over them
in the morning, after pouring off the first water. Then boil both
together till they are _quite soft_. Drain them dry in a sieve, put them
into a deep dish, and mix in a large piece of butter, seasoned with
pepper. This is a good accompaniment to corned pork or beef. The meat
must be boiled in a separate pot.

CAROLINA WAY OF BOILING RICE.--Pick the rice carefully, and wash it
through two or three cold waters till it is quite clean. Then (having
drained off all the water through a cullender,) put the rice into a pot
of boiling water, with a very little salt, allowing as much as a quart
of water to half a pint of rice. Boil it twenty minutes or more. Then
pour off the water, draining the rice as dry as possible. Lastly, set it
on hot coals with the lid off, that the steam may not condense upon it
and render the rice watery. Keep it drying thus for a quarter of an
hour. Put it into a deep dish, and loosen and toss it up from the bottom
with two forks, one in each hand, so that the grains may appear to stand
alone.

TOMATOS.--Tomatos require long cooking; otherwise they will have a raw
taste, and be quite too acid. Take fine tomatos that are quite ripe, put
them into a pan, and scald them in very hot water. Let them remain for
ten minutes, or till you can peel them without scalding your hands.
Drain them through a sieve. You may either press out all the seeds,
(retaining only the pulp or liquid,) or leave the seeds in, squeezing
the tomatos slightly. Put them into a stew-pan, which must on no account
be of copper, as the acid of the tomatos will render it poisonous. We
knew a lady who died in agonies from eating tomatos cooked in a copper
vessel that had the tinning partly worn off. If the tin inside is
indispensable, (which it is) why have any copper about it? A vessel of
_double_ block tin only, will last as long, and stand the fire as well
as if there was copper inside. For all stews, an iron pan, lined with
delft (or what is called porcelain or enamel) is excellent. Best of all
for stewing tomatos, and many other things, is a _bain marie_, or double
kettle, with the water outside, in the outer kettle.

Having nearly filled the stew-pan with the tomatos, (cut up, if they are
large) add a little salt and pepper, a piece of fresh butter dredged
with flour, and (if approved) a very little chopped onion. If you have
ready-boiled onions at hand, take one or two of them and mince it fine.
Add to the tomatos some powdered white sugar to lessen the excessive
acid. Put but very few bread-crumbs--if too many, they will weaken the
taste. Tomatos are an improvement to every kind of plain soups, and may
be added, with advantage, after the soup is in the tureen. The cooking
of tomatos should be commenced at least three hours before dinner. Put
no water with them--their own juice is sufficient.

Many persons like tomatos raw, sliced like cucumbers, and seasoned with
vinegar and pepper.

TO KEEP TOMATO PULP.--Having boiled them till entirely dissolved,
(adding a little salt and pepper) press and strain them through a sieve,
pour the liquor into pint or half-pint bottles, (which must be perfectly
clean) and stand the bottles up in a large iron pot or oven, with a
layer of straw in the bottom. Fill up the pot with cold water, cork
them tightly, and let the water boil round the bottles for five hours.
As it boils away, fill up with more hot water. When you take them out,
put a spoonful of salad oil at the top of each bottle; seal the bottles
with rosin cement. This pulp will be good for tomato purposes till next
summer, if kept in a cool dry place. When you open a bottle use it fast,
or cork it again immediately.

BROILED TOMATOS.--Take the very largest and ripest tomatos. Wash, but do
not scald or peel them. Cut the tomatos _half_ apart on four sides,
extract the seeds, and fill each tomato with a nice forcemeat of
stuffing, made of bread-crumbs, butter, minced veal or pork, mace,
nutmeg, and sweet marjoram. Having stewed this stuffing in a sauce-pan,
(moistening it with tomato juice, or gravy) fill all the tomatos with
it, opening them out a little like the leaves of a tulip. Butter
slightly a heated gridiron, and broil them on it. Or, they may be baked
in an oven.

This is a dish for company, either at dinner or breakfast.

BUTTON TOMATOS.--These are the very smallest tomatos, and are excellent
for pickling and preserving. If quite ripe, and free from blemishes,
they will keep very well in cold vinegar, and are the easiest done of
all pickles. There are two sorts of button tomatos, the red and the
yellow, both equally good. Wipe every tomato clean and dry, and put
them into small glass jars that have a cover. Fill the jars two-thirds
with the tomatos, and then fill up to the top with the best cider
vinegar. On the top put a table-spoonful of salad oil, and cover them
closely. They require nothing to secure their keeping well. But the
taste will be improved, by putting in with them, three very small thin
muslin bags, each containing mace, nutmeg, and ginger, broken small, but
not powdered. Lay one bag of spice at the bottom of the jar; one about
the middle, and one near the top. If done without spice, they are the
cheapest of all pickles. Do not put them into soups or stews; but eat
them cold with meat, like other pickles.

If kegs of these tomatos were carried to sea, and liberally served out
to the crew, the scurvy would be less frequent, even on long voyages.

Large whole tomatos would do for this purpose. We wish it were the
universal custom in ships to take out with them plenty of tomatos kept
in this way in vinegar. Tomato catchup is now much used for the army--so
it should be for the navy; not only for the sick, but for the well; to
keep them well.

BREAD, PLAIN CAKES, etc.

HINTS ON HEATING OVENS AND BAKING.--Brick ovens are generally heated
with dry fagots or small branches, or with light split wood. For baking
bread, the oven-wood must be heavier than for pies. A heap of wood
should be placed in the centre of the oven on the brick floor, and then
set on fire. While the wood is burning, the door of the oven must be
left open. When the wood is all burnt down, and reduced to a mass of
small red coals, the oven will be very hot. Then shovel out all the
coals and sweep the oven floor with a broom, till it is perfectly clean,
and entirely free from ashes. Try the heat within. For baking bread, the
floor of the oven should look red, and a little flour thrown in should
burn brown immediately. If you can hold your hand within the mouth of
the oven as long as you can distinctly count twenty, the heat is about
right. Pies, puddings, &c., require less heat. When a brick oven is
used, a peel, or large broad-bladed long-handled wooden shovel is
necessary for putting in the bread, pies, &c., placing them on the broad
or shovel-end of the peel, and slipping them off on the oven floor. Then
close up the door of the oven, and leave the things to bake. When done,
slip the peel beneath them, and hand them out on it.

To bake in an Iron Dutch oven, (a large deep, cast-iron pan, with a
handle, a close-fitting lid, and standing on three or four feet,) you
must first stand the lid upright before a clear fire to heat the inside;
and it will be best if the oven itself is also stood up before the fire
for the same purpose. This should be done while the article to be baked
is preparing, that it may be put in as soon as it is ready. The oven may
be suspended to the crane, and hung over the fire, or it may be set on a
bed of hot wood coals in the corner of the hearth. As soon as the loaf
or pie is in, put on the lid of the oven, and cover it all over with hot
coals, replenishing it with more live coals as the baking proceeds. If
you find it too hot on the top, deaden it with ashes. If the oven stands
on the hearth, keep up the heat at the bottom, by additional live coals
placed beneath it. Whether the oven is hung over the fire, or stood on
the hearth, there must always be hot coals all over the lid, the hottest
near the edge.

To bake on a griddle, you may either hang it over the fire, or set it
over hot coals on the hearth. Most griddles have feet. The fire must be
quite clear and bright, and free from smoke, or the cakes will be
blackened, and have a disagreeable taste. The griddle must be perfectly
clean; and while you are baking, it will require frequent scraping, with
a broad knife. If it is well scraped after every cake is taken off, it
will not want greasing, as there will be no stickiness. Otherwise, some
butter tied up in a clean rag and laid on a saucer, must be kept at hand
all the time, to rub over the griddle between the baking of each cake;
for butter, lard, or nice beef or veal dripping may be substituted, but
it will not be so fine. Never grease with mutton fat, as it will
communicate the taste of tallow. A bit of the fat of _fresh_ pork may
do, (stuck on a fork,) but salt pork will give the outside of the cakes
a disagreeable saltness, and therefore should not be used.

A griddle may be placed in the oven of a hot stove. Some close stoves
have a hole in the top with a flat lid or cover, which lid can be used
as a griddle.

The tin-reflecting ovens (with shelves for the pies and cakes) that are
used for baking in the summer, and that, having a furnace beneath, and a
chimney-pipe, can be set out of doors, so that the kitchen may not be
kept hot, are very good for things that will bake soon, and that do not
require what is called a strong, solid heat. But they are not effective
unless the inside is kept _very bright_; otherwise it will not reflect
the heat. The tin ovens should (as well as tin roasters) be cleaned
thoroughly and scoured bright with sand every time they are used.

The art of baking with anthracite, (or any other mineral coal,) can only
be acquired by practice. The above hints on baking, refer exclusively to
wood fires.

When a charcoal furnace is used for baking, stewing, or any sort of
cooking, it should either be set out in the open air, or the door of the
kitchen must be kept open all the time. The vapor of charcoal in a
close room is so deleterious as to cause death.

DRIED CORN MEAL YEAST CAKES.--Half a pound of fresh hops, four quarts of
water, a pint of wheat or rye flour, half a pint of strong fresh yeast
from the brewer or baker, three pints or more of indian meal. Boil half
a pound of fresh hops in four quarts of water, till the liquid is
reduced to two quarts. Strain it into a pan, and mix in sufficient wheat
flour to make a thin batter, adding half a pint of the best yeast you
can procure. Leave it to ferment; and when the fermentation is over,
stir in sufficient indian meal to make a moderately stiff dough. Cover
it, and set in a warm place to rise. When it has become very light, roll
it out into a square sheet an inch thick, and cut it into flat cakes,
about four inches square. Spread them out separately, on a large dish,
and let them dry slowly in a cool place where there is no sun. While
drying, turn them five or six times a day. When they are quite dry and
hard, put them, separately, into brown paper bags, and keep them in a
box closely covered, and in a place not the least damp.

When you want them to use for yeast, dissolve in a little warm water one
or more of the cakes, in proportion to the quantity of bread you intend
making. When it is quite dissolved, stir it hard, thicken it with a
little wheat flour, cover it, and place it near the fire to rise, before
you use it. Then mix it with the flour, according to the usual manner
of making bread. One yeast cake is enough for two quarts of meal or
flour.

This way of preserving yeast is very convenient for keeping through the
summer, or for conveying to a distance.

EXCELLENT HOME-MADE YEAST.--Yeast should always be kept in a glass
bottle or a stone jug, and never in earthen or metal. Before you make
fresh yeast, empty entirely the vessel that has contained the last; and
if of stone, scald it twice with boiling water, in which it will be well
to mix a little clear lye. Then rince it with cold water, till perfectly
clean. If you have not used lye in scalding it, dissolve some potash or
pearlash in the rinsing water, to remove any acidity that may linger
about the vessel, and may therefore spoil the new yeast. If you keep
your yeast in glass bottles, the water must be warm, but not hot; as
scalding water may crack them: also, melt some potash or pearlash in
this water. The vessel for keeping it being purified, proceed to make
your yeast. Have ready, in a kettle over the fire, two quarts of boiling
water; put into it a very large handful of hops, (as fine and fresh as
possible,) and let the water boil again with the hops in it for twenty
minutes more. Sift into a pan three pints of wheat flour. Strain the
liquor from the hops into a large bowl, and pour half of it hot over the
flour. Stir it well, and press out all the lumps till it is quite
smooth. Let the other half of the liquid stand till it is cool, and then
pour it gradually to the rest; mixing it well, by stirring as you
proceed. Then take half a pint of good strong yeast--brewer's or baker's
yeast, if you can get it fresh; if not, you must use some that has been
left from your last making, provided it is not the least sour; stir this
yeast into the mixture of hop water and flour, put it immediately into
your jug or bottles, and cork it loosely till the fermentation is over,
(which should be in an hour,) and it will then be fit for use.
Afterwards cork it tightly. It will keep better if you put a raisin or
two into the bottom of each bottle, before you pour in the fresh yeast.
Into a stone jug put half a dozen raisins.

All yeast is better and more powerful for being fresh. It is better to
make it frequently, (the trouble being little,) than to risk its
becoming sour by endeavoring to keep it too long. When sour it becomes
weak and watery, and tastes and smells disagreeably, and will never make
light bread; besides, being very unwholesome. The acidity may be
somewhat corrected by stirring in some dissolved pearlash, saleratus, or
soda, immediately before the yeast is used; but it is better to have it
good and fresh, without the necessity of any corrective. Yeast should
always be kept in a cool place.

Those who live in towns where there are breweries have no occasion to
make their own yeast during the brewing season, and in summer they can
every day supply themselves with fresh yeast from the baker's. It is
only in country places where there are neither brewers or bakers that it
is expedient to make it at home. For home-made yeast, we know the above
receipt to be excellent.

Sweet cakes, buns, rusks, &c., require stronger and fresher yeast than
bread; the sugar will otherwise retard their rising.

INDIAN BREAD OR PONE.--Four quarts of indian meal sifted, a large half
pint of wheat flour, a table-spoonful of salt, half a pint of strong
fresh yeast, a quart of warm water. Sift into a large deep pan the
indian meal and the wheat flour, mixing them well. Make a hole in the
centre. The water must be warm, but not hot. Mix it with the yeast, and
pour them into the hole in the midst of the meal. Take a spoon, and with
it mix into the liquid enough of the surrounding meal to make a thin
batter, which you must stir till it is quite smooth, and free from
lumps. Then strew a handful of wheat flour over the surface, scattering
it thinly, so as to cover the whole. Warm a clean cloth, and lay it
folded over the top of the pan. Then set it in a warm place to rise,
nearer the fire in winter than in summer. When it is quite light, and
has risen so that the flour on the surface is cracked, strew on the
salt, and begin to form the whole mass into a dough; commencing round
the hole that contains the batter, and adding, gradually, sufficient
lukewarm water (which you must have ready for the purpose,) to mix it of
the proper consistence. When the whole is completely mixed, and the
batter in the centre is thoroughly incorporated with the dough, knead it
hard for at least half an hour. Then, having formed the dough into a
round lump in the middle of the pan, strew a little more flour thinly
over it. Cover it, and set it again in a warm place for half an hour.
Then flour your pasteboard, divide the dough equally, and make it into
two loaves. Have the oven ready. Put in the loaves directly, and bake
them about two hours or more. Indian meal requires always more baking
than wheat. When you take them out, it is well to wrap each loaf in a
clean, coarse towel, well sprinkled with cold water, and rolled up damp
till the bread is baked. Having thus wrapped up the loaves, stand them
on end to cool slowly. The damp cloths will prevent the crust from
hardening too much while the loaves are cooling.

All indian bread, and every sort of indian cake, is best when quite
fresh.

Excellent bread may be made of equal proportions of wheat, rye flour,
and indian corn; or of three parts wheat and one part indian. All bread
should be kept closely secluded from the air, wrapped in cloths, and put
away in boxes or baskets with tightly-fitting lids.

Should you find the dough sour, (either from the heat of the weather, or
from standing too long,) you may recover it, by dissolving in a little
lukewarm water a tea-spoonful of pearlash, saleratus, or soda. Sprinkle
this water all over the dough. Then knead it in, so that it may be
dispersed throughout. Then put it into the oven as soon as possible;
first tasting the dough, to discover if the sourness is entirely
removed. If not, mix in a little more pearlash, and then taste it again.
Take care not to put in too much of any of these alkaline substances,
lest they communicate a disagreeable, soapy taste to the bread.

When you buy corn meal, it will keep better if the whole is sifted as
soon as you get it. Avoid buying much at a time, unless you can keep it
in a very cool place. When sour, it is unfit to eat. Common indian meal
is much the best for use.

INDIAN RYE BREAD.--Two quarts of indian meal, two quarts of rye meal,
three pints of milk or water, two tea-spoonfuls of salt, half a pint of
strong fresh yeast. Having sifted the rye and indian meal in a large
pan, mix them well together, adding the salt. Boil the milk or water in
a sauce-pan, and when scalding hot pour it on the meal, and stir the
whole very hard. If too stiff, add a little more warm water. Let it
stand till it becomes only of a lukewarm heat, and then stir in the
yeast. Knead the mixture into a stiff dough, and knead it long and hard
for at least half an hour. Then cover the pan with a thick cloth that
has been previously warmed, and set it near the fire to rise. When the
dough is quite light, and cracked all over the top, take it out of the
pan; divide the mass in half, make it into two loaves, knead each loaf
well for ten minutes or more, and then cover and set them again near the
fire for about half an hour. By this time have the oven ready, put in
the loaves directly, and bake them at least an hour and a half. This
bread is considered very wholesome.

Should you find the dough sour, you may rectify it by kneading in a
tea-spoonful of soda or pearlash, dissolved in a little warm water.

INDIAN WHEAT BREAD.--This is made in the above manner, substituting
wheat for rye flour.

In any sort of home-made bread, (either white or brown) a handful or
more of indian meal will be found an improvement, rendering it moist and
sweet.

BOSTON RYE AND INDIAN BREAD.--Two quarts of indian meal, two quarts of
rye meal, half a pint of strong fresh yeast, half a pint of West India
molasses, a small table-spoonful of salt. Sift the rye and indian meal
into a large pan or wooden bowl; and mix them well together, adding a
little salt. Have ready half a pint of water, warm but not hot. Mix with
it the molasses, and then stir into it the yeast. Make a hole in the
middle of the pan of meal, pour in the liquid, and then with a spoon
work into it a portion of the flour that surrounds the hole, till the
liquid in the centre becomes a thick batter. Sprinkle the top with rye
meal, lay a thick cloth over the pan, and set it in a warm place to
rise. In three or four hours it should be light enough to appear cracked
all over the surface. Then pour into the middle (by degrees) about a
pint of warm water, (it must not be hot,) and as you pour mix it well
all through the dough, till the whole becomes a round mass. Sprinkle
some rye flour on the dough, and having floured your hands, knead it
long and hard, (at least half an hour, and after it ceases to stick to
your hands,) turning it over as you proceed. Then sprinkle the dough
again with flour, cover it, and again set it in a warm place to rise.
Have the oven ready, and of the proper heat, so that the bread may be
put in as soon as it has completely risen the second time. When
perfectly light, the dough will stand high, and the surface will be
cracked all over. This quantity will be sufficient for a common-sized
loaf. Set it directly into the oven, and bake it about two hours. When
bread has done rising, it will fall again if not put into the oven. As
soon as it is done, wrap it immediately in a clean coarse towel wet with
cold water, and stand it up on end till it is cool.

This is a palatable, cheap, and wholesome bread. It may be baked in a
deep tin or iron pan.

If the dough should have stood so long as to become sour, (which it
will, if mixed over night,) restore it by kneading in a small
tea-spoonful of pearlash or saleratus melted in a little warm water.

EGG PONE.--Three eggs, a quart of indian meal, a large table-spoonful of
fresh butter, a small tea-spoonful of salt, a half pint (or more) of
milk. Beat the eggs very light, and mix them with the milk. Then stir
in, gradually, the indian meal, adding the salt and butter. It must not
be a batter, but a soft dough, just thick enough to be stirred well with
a spoon. If too thin, add more indian meal; if too stiff, thin it with a
little more milk. Beat or stir it _long and hard_. Butter a tin or iron
pan. Put the mixture into it, and set the pan immediately into an oven,
which must be moderately hot at first, and the heat increased afterward.
A Dutch oven is best for this purpose. It should bake an hour and a half
or two hours, in proportion to its thickness. Send it to table hot, and
cut into slices. Eat it with butter, or molasses.

INDIAN MUSH.--Have ready on a clear fire a pot of boiling water. Stir
into it, by degrees, (a handful at a time,) sufficient indian meal to
make a very thick porridge, and then add a very small portion of salt,
allowing not more than a level tea-spoonful to a quart of meal. You must
keep the pot boiling all the time you are stirring in the meal; and
between every handful stir hard with the mush-stick, (a round stick
about half a yard long, flattened at the lower end,) as, if not well
stirred, the mush will be lumpy. After it is sufficiently thick and
smooth, keep it boiling an hour longer, stirring it occasionally. Then
cover the pot closely, and hang it higher up the chimney, or set it on
hot coals on the hearth, so as to simmer it slowly for another hour. The
goodness and wholesomeness of mush depends greatly on its being long and
thoroughly boiled. It should also be made very thick. If well made, and
well cooked, it is wholesome and nutritious; but the contrary, if thin,
and not sufficiently boiled. It is not too long to have it three or four
hours over the fire, first boiling, then simmering. On the contrary, it
will be better for it. The coarser the corn meal the less cooking it
requires. Send it to table hot, and in a deep dish. Eat it with sweet
milk, buttermilk, or cream, or with butter and sugar, or with butter and
molasses; making a hole in the middle of your plate of mush, putting
some butter into the hole, and then adding the sugar or molasses.

Cold mush that has been left may be cut into slices, or mouthfuls, and
fried next day, in butter, or in nice dripping of veal, beef, or pork;
but not mutton or lamb.

INDIAN HASTY PUDDING.--Put two quarts of milk into a clean pot or
sauce-pan. Set it over the fire, adding a level tea-spoonful of salt,
and, when it comes to a boil, stir in a lump of fresh butter about the
size of a goose egg. Then add (a handful at a time) sufficient indian
meal to make it very thick, stirring it all the while with a mush stick.
Keep it boiling well, and continue to throw in indian meal till it is so
thick that the stick stands upright in it. Then send it to table hot,
and eat it with milk, cream, or molasses and butter. What is left may be
cut into slices, and fried next day, or boiled in a bag.

INDIAN MEAL GRUEL.--This is an excellent food for the sick. Having
sifted some indian meal, mix in a quart bowl three table-spoonfuls of
the meal with six of cold water. Stir it smooth, and press out the lumps
against the side of the bowl. Have ready a very clean sauce-pan,
entirely free from grease, with a pint of boiling water. Pour this,
scalding hot, on the mixture in the bowl, a little at a time, and stir
it well, adding a pinch of salt. Then put the whole back into the
sauce-pan. Set it on hot coals and stir it till it boils, making the
spoon go down to the bottom to prevent the gruel from burning. After it
has come to a boil, let it continue boiling half an hour, stirring it
frequently, and skimming it. Give it to the invalid warm, in a bowl or
tumbler, to be eaten with a tea-spoon. It may be sweetened with a little
sugar. When the physician permits, some grated nutmeg may be added;
also, a very little wine.

RYE MUSH.--To make smooth rye mush, sift a quart or more of rye meal
into a pan, and gradually pour in sufficient cold water to make a very
thick batter, stirring it hard with a spoon as you proceed, and
carefully pressing out all the lumps against the side of the pan. Add a
very little salt. The batter must be so thick at the last that you can
scarcely stir it. Then thin it with a little more water, and see that it
is quite smooth. Rye, and also wheat flour, have a disposition to be
more lumpy than corn meal, when made into mush. When thoroughly mixed
and stirred, put it into a pot, place it over the fire and boil it well,
stirring it with a mush-stick till it comes to a hard boil; then place
it in a diminished heat, and simmer it slowly till you want to dish it
up. Eat it warm, with butter and molasses, or with sweet milk, or fresh
buttermilk. Rye mush is considered very wholesome, particularly in cases
of dyspepsia.

COMMON HOE-CAKE.--Take an earthen or tin pan, and half fill it with
coarse indian meal, which had best be sifted in. Add a little salt. Have
ready a kettle of boiling water. Pour into the indian meal sufficient
hot water (a little at a time,) to make a stiff dough, stirring it with
a spoon as you proceed. It must be thoroughly mixed, and stirred hard.
If you want the cakes for breakfast, mix this dough over night; cover
the pan, and set it in a _cool_ place till morning. If kept warm, it
may turn sour. Early next morning, as soon as the fire is burning well,
set the griddle over it, and take out the dough, a handful at a time.
Flatten and shape it by patting it with your hands, till you form it
into cakes about the size of a common saucer, and half an inch thick.
When the griddle is quite hot, lay on it as many cakes as it will hold,
and bake them brown. When the upper side is done, slip a broad knife
beneath and turn them over. They must be baked brown on both sides. Eat
them warm, with buttermilk, sweet milk, butter, molasses, or whatever is
most convenient. If you intend these cakes for dinner or supper, mix
them as early in the day as you can, and (covering the pan) let them
stand in a cool place till wanted for baking. In cold weather you may
save trouble by mixing over night enough to last the next day for
breakfast, dinner, and supper; baking them as they are wanted for each
meal. Or they may be all baked in the morning, and eaten cold; but they
are then not so palatable as when warm. They will be less liable to
stick, if before each baking the griddle is dredged with wheat flour, or
greased with a bit of fat pork stuck on a fork. You may cover it all
over with one large cake, instead of several small ones.

This cake is so called, because in some parts of America it was
customary to bake it on the iron of a hoe, stood up before the fire. It
is better known by that name than by any other.

COMMON GRIDDLE CAKE.--A quart of indian meal, sufficient warm water to
make a soft dough, a small tea-spoonful of salt. Put the indian meal
into a pan, and add the salt. Make a hole in the centre of the meal, and
pour in a little warm water. Then mix it with a large, strong spoon,
adding, by degrees, water enough to make a soft dough. Flour your hands,
and knead it into a large lump--divide it into two equal portions. Flour
your pasteboard, lay on it the first lump of dough, and roll it out
about an inch thick. Then, (having already heated your griddle,) lay the
cake upon it, spreading it evenly, and make it a good round shape. It
should cover the whole surface of the griddle, which must first be
greased, either with butter or lard tied in a rag, or with a bit of fat
fresh pork. Bake it well; and when one side is well browned, turn it on
the other, taking care not to break it. Send it to table hot, cut into
three-cornered pieces--split and butter them. As soon as the first cake
is sent in, put on the other to bake.

This is one of the plainest and simplest preparations of indian cake;
and is very good when warm.

PLAIN JOHNNY CAKE.--A quart of indian meal, a pint of warm water, a
level tea-spoonful of salt. Sift a quart of indian meal into a pan. Make
a hole in the middle, and pour in a pint of warm water, adding the salt.
With a spoon mix the meal and water gradually into a soft dough. Stir
it very hard for a quarter of an hour or more, till it becomes light and
spongy. Then spread the dough, smooth and evenly, on a stout, flat
board. A piece of the head of a flour barrel will serve for this
purpose. Place the board nearly (but not quite) upright, and set a
smoothing-iron or a stone against the back to support it. Bake it well.
When done, cut it into squares, and send it hot to table, split and
buttered. You may eat molasses with it.

VERY PLAIN INDIAN DUMPLINGS.--Sift some indian meal into a pan; add
about a salt-spoon of salt to each quart of meal, and scald it with
sufficient boiling water to make a stiff dough. Pour in the water
gradually, stirring as you pour. When the dough becomes a stiff lump
divide it into equal portions; flour your hands, and make it into thick
flat dumplings, about as large round as the top of a glass tumbler, or a
breakfast cup. Dredge the dumplings on all sides with flour, put them
into a pot of boiling water, (if made sufficiently stiff they need not
be tied in cloths,) and keep them boiling hard till thoroughly done. Try
them with a fork, which must come out quite clean, and with no
clamminess sticking to it. They are an excellent appendage to salt pork
or bacon, serving them up with the meat; or they may be eaten afterwards
with butter and molasses, or with milk sweetened well with brown sugar,
and flavored with a little ground cinnamon. On no account boil them with
meat.

INDIAN MUFFINS.--A pint and a half of yellow indian meal, sifted; a
handful of wheat flour; a quarter of a pound of fresh butter; a quart of
milk; four eggs; a very small tea-spoonful of salt. Put the milk into a
sauce-pan. Cut the butter into it. Set it over the fire and warm it till
the butter is very soft, but not till it melts. Then take it off, stir
it well till all mixed, and set it away to cool. Beat four eggs very
light, and when the milk is cold, stir them into it alternately with the
meal, a little at a time, of each. Add the salt. Beat the whole very
hard after it is all mixed. Then butter some muffin-rings on the inside.
Set them in a hot oven, or on a heated griddle; pour some of the batter
into each, and bake the muffins well. Send them hot to table, continuing
to bake while a fresh supply is wanted. Pull them open with your
fingers, and eat them with butter, to which you may add molasses or
honey. These muffins will be found excellent, and can be prepared in a
very short time; for instance, in three quarters or half an hour before
breakfast or tea.

This mixture may be baked in waffle-irons, as waffles. Butter them, and
have on the table a glass bowl with powdered sugar and powdered
cinnamon, to eat with these waffles.

CORN MEAL BREAKFAST CAKES.--A quart of indian meal; a handful or more of
wheat flour; a large salt-spoon of salt; a quart of warm water; an
additional pint of lukewarm water; a bit of pearlash the size of a
hazle-nut, or the same quantity of soda or saleratus. Mix over night, in
a large pan, the indian meal, the wheat flour and salt. Pour on
gradually a quart of warm water, (warm but not hot,) and stir it in with
a large wooden or iron spoon, so as to form a very soft dough. Cover the
pan, and set it on the dresser till morning. In the morning thin the
dough with another pint of warm water, so as to make it into a batter,
having first dissolved in the water a salt-spoonful of powdered pearlash
or saleratus, or a bit the size of a hazle-nut. Beat the mixture hard.
Then cover it, and let it stand near the fire for a quarter of an hour
before you begin to bake it. Bake it in thin cakes on a griddle. Send
them to table hot, and eat them with butter and molasses, or honey.

INDIAN RICE CAKES.--Take equal quantities of yellow indian meal and well
boiled rice. Mix them together in a pan, the meal and rice alternately,
a little at a time of each. The boiled rice may be either hot or cold;
but it will be rather best to mix it hot. Having first mixed it with a
spoon, knead it well with your hands; moistening it with a little milk
or water, if you find it too stiff. Have ready, over the fire, a heated
griddle. Grease it with fresh butter tied in a clean rag; and having
made the mixture into flat round cakes, bake them well on both sides.
Eat them with butter and sugar, or butter and molasses, or with butter
alone.

PUMPKIN INDIAN CAKES.--Take equal portions of indian meal, and stewed
pumpkin that has been well mashed and _drained very dry_ in a sieve or
cullender. Put the stewed pumpkin in a pan, and stir the meal gradually
into it, a spoonful at a time, adding a little butter as you proceed.
Mix the whole thoroughly, stirring it very hard. If not thick enough to
form a stiff dough, add a little more indian meal. Make it into round,
flat cakes, about the size of a muffin, and bake them over the fire on a
hot griddle greased with butter. Or lay them in a square iron pan, and
bake them in an oven.

Send them to table hot, and eat them with butter.

EXCELLENT BUCKWHEAT CAKES.--A quart of buckwheat meal, sifted; a level
tea-spoonful of salt; a small half pint or a large handful of indian
meal; two large table-spoonfuls of strong fresh brewer's yeast or four
table-spoonfuls of home-made yeast; sufficient lukewarm water to make a
moderate batter. Mix together the buckwheat and indian meal, and add the
salt. Make a hole in the centre of the meal, and pour in the yeast. Then
stir in gradually, from a kettle, sufficient tepid or lukewarm water to
make a moderately thick batter when united with the yeast. Cover the
pan, set it in a warm place, and leave it to rise. It should be light in
about three hours. When it has risen high, and is covered with bubbles,
it is fit to bake. Have ready a clean griddle well heated over the fire.
Grease it well with a bit of fresh butter tied in a clean white rag, and
kept on a saucer near you. Then dip out a large ladleful of the batter,
and bake it on the griddle; turning it when brown, with the cake-turner,
and baking it brown on the other side. Grease the griddle slightly
between baking each cake, or scrape it smooth with a broad knife. As
fast as you bake the cakes, lay them, several in a pile, on a hot plate.
Butter them, and if of large size cut them across into four pieces. Or
send them to table to be buttered there. Trim off the edges before they
go in.

If your batter has been mixed over night, and is found sour in the
morning, dissolve a salt-spoon of pearlash or saleratus in a little
lukewarm water, stir it into the batter, let it stand a quarter of an
hour, and then bake it. The alkali will remove the acidity, and increase
the lightness of the batter. If you use soda for this purpose it will
require a tea-spoonful.

If the batter is kept at night in so cold a place as to freeze, it will
be unfit for use. Do not grease the griddle with meat-fat of any sort.

NICE RYE BATTER CAKES.--A quart of lukewarm milk, two eggs, a large
table-spoonful of fresh, brewer's yeast or two of home-made yeast;
sufficient sifted rye meal to make a moderate batter; a salt-spoon of
salt; having warmed the milk, beat the eggs very light, and stir them
gradually into it, alternately with the rye meal, adding the salt. Put
in the meal, a handful at a time, till you have the batter about as
thick as for buckwheat cakes. Then stir in the yeast, and give the
batter a hard beating, seeing that it is smooth and free from lumps.
Cover the pan, and set it in a warm place to rise. When risen high, and
covered with bubbles, the batter is fit to bake. Have ready over the
fire a hot griddle, and bake the cakes in the manner of buckwheat. Send
them to table hot, and eat them with butter, molasses, or honey.

Yeast powders, used according to the directions that accompany them, and
put in at the last, just before baking, are an improvement to the
lightness of all batter cakes, provided that real yeast or eggs are also
in the mixture. But it is not well to depend on the powders exclusively;
particularly when real yeast is to be had. The lightness produced by
yeast powders alone, is not the right sort; and though the cakes are
eatable, they are too tough and leathery to be wholesome. As
_auxiliaries_ to genuine yeast, and to beaten eggs, yeast powders are
excellent. But not as the sole dependence.

Indian batter cakes may be made as above; or rye and indian meal be
mixed in equal proportions.

INDIAN CUP CAKES.--A pint and a half of yellow Indian meal; half a pint
of wheat flour; a pint and a half of _sour_ milk; (buttermilk is best;)
a small tea-spoonful of saleratus or soda dissolved in warm water; two
eggs; a level tea-spoonful of salt. Sift the indian and wheat meal into
a pan and mix them well, adding the salt. If you have no buttermilk or
other sour milk at hand, turn some sweet milk sour by setting a pan of
it in the sun, or stirring in a spoonful of vinegar. Take out a small
tea-cupful of the sour milk, and reserve it to be put in at the last.
Beat the eggs very light, and then stir them, gradually, into the milk,
alternately with the meal, a little at a time of each. Lastly, dissolve
the soda or saleratus, and stir it into the cup of sour milk that has
been reserved for the purpose. It will effervesce; stir it while foaming
into the mixture, which should be a thick batter. Have ready some
tea-cups, or little deep tins. Butter them well; nearly fill them with
the batter, and set them immediately into a rather brisk oven. The cakes
must be thoroughly baked all through. When done, turn them out on large
plates, and send them hot to the breakfast or tea-table. Split them into
three pieces, and eat them with butter.

The soda will entirely remove the acidity of the milk, which will
effervesce the better for being sour at first, adding therefore to the
lightness of the cake. Taste the milk, and if you find that the
slightest sourness remains, add a little more dissolved soda.

All the alkalies, pearlash, saleratus, soda, and sal-volatile, will
remove acidity, and increase lightness; but if too much is used, they
will impart a disagreeable taste. It is useless to put lemon or orange
juice into any mixture that is afterwards to have one of these alkalies,
as they will entirely destroy the flavor of the fruit.

CAROLINA RICE CAKES.--Having picked and washed half a pint of rice, boil
it by itself till the grains lose all form, and are dissolved into a
thick mass or jelly. While warm, mix into it a large lump of the best
fresh butter, and a salt-spoonful of salt. Pour into a bowl a moderate
sized tea-cupful of ground rice flour, and add to it as much milk as
will make a tolerably stiff batter. Stir it till it is quite smooth, and
free from lumps. Then mix it thoroughly with the boiled rice. Beat six
eggs as light as possible, and stir them, gradually, into the mixture.
Bake it on a griddle, in cakes about as large round as a saucer. Eat
them warm with butter; and have on the table, in a small bowl, some
powdered white sugar and nutmeg, for those who like it.

AUNT LYDIA'S CORN CAKE.--Sift into a large pan a quart of yellow corn
meal, and add a level tea-spoonful of salt, (not more.) Have ready a
pint of boiling milk, sufficient to make a soft dough. Mix the milk hot
into the corn meal, and add about a quarter of a pound, or half a pint
of nice fresh butter. Having beaten five eggs till very light and thick,
stir them gradually into the mixture, and set it to cool. All
preparations of corn meal require much beating and stirring. Have ready
some small tin pans, about four or five inches square, and two or three
inches deep. They are especially good for baking such cakes, (far better
than patty-pans,) and are made by any tinsmith. Grease the pans with the
same butter you have used in mixing the cakes. _Fill the pans to the
top_ with the above mixture, that the heat may immediately catch the
surface, and cause it to puff up high above the edges of the pan. If
properly mixed, and well beaten, there is no danger of it running over.
If only half filled, and not very light, the mixture when baking will
sink down, and become heavy and tough. Set these cakes immediately into
a moderate oven. Bake them brown, and send them to the breakfast table
hot. Split and butter them.

They may be baked in muffin rings, but the small square pans are best.

This is the very best preparation of Indian cakes. If _exactly
followed_, we believe there is none superior; as is the opinion of all
persons who have eaten them. The cook from whom this receipt was
obtained, is a Southern colored woman, called Aunt Lydia.

The above quantities will furnish cakes only for a small family. If the
family is of tolerable size, double the proportions of each article--as
for instance, two quarts of Indian meal, one quart of milk, half a pound
of butter, and ten eggs, with a level table-spoonful of salt. Let them
be well baked; not scorched on the top, and raw at the bottom.

We recommend them highly as the perfection of corn cakes, if well made,
well baked, and with all the ingredients of the best quality.

Use yellow indian meal in preference to white. The yellow is sweeter,
has more of the true corn taste, and its color shows at once what it is.
The white has less flavor, and may be mistaken for very coarse wheat. It
is difficult to keep corn meal good for the whole year. Before the new
corn meal is in market, the old is apt to become musty. If you live in a
city it is best to buy it as you want it; a few pecks at a time. If in
the country, sift your barrel of corn meal soon after it is brought;
divide it, and keep it in several different vessels, always well
covered.

SHORT CAKE.--As this requires no rising, it may be mixed and prepared at
half an hour's notice. Take a quart and a pint of wheat flour, sift it
into a pan, and divide into three parts three quarters of a pound of
nice fresh butter. Cut up one piece into the pan of flour, and mix it
into a dough with a broad knife, adding, as you proceed, as little water
as will be barely sufficient. The water must be very cold. Roll out this
lump of paste, dredge it slightly with flour, fold it up, and roll it
out again. Then cover it with a second division of the butter, put on
the sheet of paste with the knife, and dispersed at equal distances.
Sprinkle it with flour, fold it, and roll out the sheet again. Put on
the remainder of the butter as before, in bits equally dispersed. Fold,
dredge, and roll out the dough into a rather thin sheet. Cut it into
small round cakes with the edge of a tumbler, or something like it,
using up the clippings of paste left at the last to make one more cake.
Have ready a hot griddle or oven. Put on the cakes so as not to touch
each other, and bake them light brown on both sides. Send them to table
hot, to be split and buttered. Mix and roll out these cakes as fast as
possible, and avoid handling them more than you need. Paste made
_slowly_ is never light or flakey. Mix quick and roll quick. This is a
good plain paste for fruit pot-pies or dumplings.

You may make common short cake for very healthy people, with two quarts
of flour, a quarter of a pound of fresh butter, and a quarter of a pound
of lard, mixed into the pan of meal with a very little cold water, and a
second quarter of lard spread all over the sheet of paste, after rolling
it out. Fold, sprinkle, and roll it out again into one round griddle
cake, or two if you have enough of dough. Take care, in baking, not to
have it smoked or blackened at the edge. When done, cut it into "pie
pieces," and send it to table to be split and buttered.

HALF MOONS.--Of this paste you may make half-moon pies. Cut the paste
into round cakes. On half the circle, lay plenty of stewed fruit well
sweetened, (for instance, stewed dried peach,) fold over it the other
half, pinch the two edges together, and crimp them. Bake them in an
oven, and eat them fresh. If you have fruit in the house ready stewed,
half-moon pies can be got up for a plain dessert on an emergency. Either
mince meat, or sausage meat, may be baked in half-moons. They will bake
very nicely, laid side by side, in large square tin pans, first dredged
slightly with flour.

SOFT MUFFINS.--Warm a quart of milk, and melt in it a quarter of a pound
of the best fresh butter, cut into bits. When melted, stir it about, and
set it away to cool. Beat four eggs till very thick and light, and stir
them gradually into a pan of milk, and butter when it is quite cold.
Then, by degrees, stir in enough of sifted flour to make a batter as
thick as you can well beat it. Then, at the last, stir in three
table-spoonfuls of baker's or brewer's yeast. Cover the pan of batter
with a double cloth, and set it on the hearth (or some other warm place)
to rise, but it must not be allowed to get hot. It should have risen
nearly to the top of the pan, and be covered with bubbles in about three
hours. The griddle being heated, grease it with nice butter tied in a
rag; take a ladleful of batter out of the pan, pour it into the ring,
and bake the muffins. Send them hot to table, and split and butter them.
These are superior to all muffins. Those who have eaten them will never
desire any others, if this receipt has been faithfully followed. Try it.

SALLY LUNN CAKE.--This is a favorite tea cake, and so universally liked
that it is well to make a liberal quantity of the mixture, and bake it
in two loaves. Sift into a large pan three pounds of fine flour. Warm in
a quart of milk half a pound of fresh butter, and add a small
tea-spoonful of salt, six eggs well beaten, and add, gradually, two wine
glasses of excellent fresh yeast. Mix the flour well into the pan, (a
little at a time) and beat the whole very hard. Divide this quantity
into two equal portions, and set it to rise in two pans. Cover it with
thick cloths, and set it on the hearth to rise. When quite light, grease
two loaf-pans with the same butter used for the cakes, and bake it in a
moderate oven, keeping up the heat steadily to the last. It should be
thoroughly done all through. Send it to table hot, cut in slices, but
the slices left standing as in a pound cake at a party.

The Sally Lunn mixture may be baked on a griddle, as muffins in muffin
rings, and split and buttered at table.

In mixing this cake, add neither sugar nor spice. They do not improve,
but spoil it, as would be found on trial. It is the best of plain tea
cakes, if properly made and baked.

DELAWARE CAKES.--This is a plain tea cake. Sift into a pan two quarts of
flour. Cut up half a pound of fresh butter, and rub it into the flour
with your hands. Beat five eggs very light and thick; make a hole in the
centre of the flour, and gradually stir the beaten eggs, in turn with a
pint of milk. Then add a jill of fine fresh yeast. Mix the whole
thoroughly with a broad knife. Transfer it to large square tin pans.
Cover it with a clean flannel, and set it on the hearth to rise. When it
is quite light, and cracked all over the surface, divide the dough into
cakes and bake them in muffin rings, on a griddle or in a stove. If
baked in one large cake, there is a risk of their being made heavy, by
cutting them when hot.

To make sweet cakes with the above mixture, add gradually to the flour
in the pan, half a pound of powdered sugar before you rub in the butter,
and after the eggs and milk. Stir in a wineglass of rosewater, or less,
if it is very strong, (which rosewater seldom is) and also it loses much
of its strength in cooking. Or, substitute the yellow rind and juice of
a lemon, and some powdered nutmeg. They will then be a cake for company;
otherwise, they will be for family teas.

Either plain or sweet they are very good. We rather prefer them plain.
If plain, omit even sugar. Sugar, without other flavoring, gives plain
tea cakes a faint sickly taste, and is better left out entirely, except
for children--and they like any kind of sweetness, however little.

MARYLAND BISCUIT.--Take two quarts of sifted wheat flour, and add a
small tea-spoonful of salt. Rub into the pan of flour a large quarter of
a pound of lard, and add, gradually, warm milk enough to make a very
stiff dough. Knead the lump of dough long and hard, and pound it on all
sides with a rolling-pin. Divide the dough into several pieces, and
knead and pound each piece separately. This must go on for two or three
hours, continually kneading and pounding, otherwise it will be hard,
tough, and indigestible. Then make it into small round thick biscuits,
prick them with a fork, and bake them a pale brown.

This is the most laborious of cakes, and also the most unwholesome, even
when made in the best manner. We do not recommend it; but there is no
accounting for tastes. Children should not eat these biscuits--nor grown
persons either, if they can get any other sort of bread.

When living in a town where there are bakers, there is no excuse for
making Maryland biscuit. Believe nobody that says they are not
unwholesome. Yet we have heard of families, in country places, where
neither the mistress nor the cook knew any other preparation of wheat
bread. Better to live on indian cakes.

HOME-MADE BREAD.--You cannot have good bread without good flour, good
yeast, good kneading, and good baking, all united. Like many other
things, the best flour is always the cheapest in the end. There is none
better than that which comes from the mills of Hiram Smith, Rochester,
New York. All flour should be kept in a dry place, damp being always
injurious to it. Good flour goes farther than that of inferior quality,
and is both whiter and lighter. No skill will avail either in making or
baking bread, if the flour is of bad quality. Flour will keep much
better if, as soon as a new barrel is brought in, the whole of it is
sifted, and divided in several buckets. Flour buckets, made for the
purpose, are short and wide, are broader at the bottom than the top, and
have handles and lids. They are to be had of all coopers. Yeast must
always be of the best quality, strong and fresh. With too much yeast the
bread will be bitter; with too little it will be heavy; with stale yeast
it will be heavy, sour, and dark-colored. If baked too little, it
becomes tough and clammy. We deprecate the practice of putting hartshorn
in bread. It gives it a bad taste; and even if it produces a sort of
factitious lightness, it also renders it tough and difficult to
masticate, however nice it may look. Also, it is very unwholesome.

The oven should be heated in time, to set in the bread as soon as ready.
When once it has risen to its utmost lightness, it will fall and turn
sour if permitted to stand. The only remedy for sour bread is, to melt
a table-spoonful of soda or pearlash in tepid water, and sprinkle it
over the dough, which must then be kneaded again, after it has rested
half an hour. In summer, do not begin your bread over night; it will
certainly be sour before morning. In winter you may do so, but keep it
all night in a warm (though not a hot) place. If the dough freezes, you
may throw it away at once.

To knead, double up your hands, put them deep into the dough, and work
it with your knuckles, exerting all your strength. When the dough sticks
to them no longer, but leaves your bent fingers clean and clear, it is
time to cease kneading, for you have done enough for that time.

Sift into a deep pan, or large wooden bowl, a peck of fine wheat flour,
(adding a large table-spoonful of salt,) and mix the water with half a
pint of strong fresh brewer's yeast, or near a whole pint if the yeast
is home-made. Pour this into the hole, in the middle of the heap of
flour. Mix in with a wooden spoon, a portion of the flour from the
surrounding edges of the hole so as to make a thick batter, and having
sprinkled dry flour over the top, let it rest for near an hour. This is
called "_setting the sponge_," or "_making the leaven_." When it has
swelled up to the surface, and burst through the coating of flour that
covered the hole, pour in as much more lukewarm water as will suffice to
mix the whole gradually into a dough. Knead it hard and thoroughly,
leaving no lumps in it, and continue to knead till the dough leaves
your hands. Throw over it a clean thick cloth, and set it in a warm
place to rise again. When it is quite light and cracked all over the
surface, divide it into loaves, and give each loaf a little more
kneading, and let it rest till it has risen as high as it will. Have
your oven quite ready, and (having transferred the loaves to pans,
sprinkled with flour,) bake them well. Try the heat of the oven by
previously throwing in a little flour. If it browns well, and you can
hold your hand in the heat while you count twenty, it is a good
temperature for bread. If the flour scorches black the oven is too hot,
so leave the oven open a little while till it becomes cooler. As soon as
the bread is quite done, take out the loaves, wrap each tightly in a
clean coarse cloth, damped by sprinkling it with water, and stand them
up on their edges. This will prevent the crust from becoming too hard.
Keep the loaves wrapped up after they are deposited in the bread box.

ROLLS--Are made as above, except that they are mixed with warm milk
instead of water, and a little fresh butter rubbed into the dough.

TWIST BREAD.--Before you put the dough into the baking pans, divide it
equally into long thick rolls, (smaller at the ends) and plait or twist
three together.

BRAN BREAD--Is made like any other, only of bran meal; and in setting
the sponge, put _wheat_ flour into the hole, and add to the liquid half
a tea-cupful of nice brown sugar. Bran bread should look very brown. It
should be eaten fresh. When stale, it is too dry and hard. Bran batter
cakes are made and baked like buckwheat.

RYE BREAD.--Is made like wheat bread, but that it requires more kneading
and baking. Rye batter cakes, made like buckwheat, should have one half
corn meal.

BREAD BISCUITS.--When making bread after the dough has risen very light,
take from it a quart or more; knead into it a quarter of a pound of
fresh butter, and form it into tall rolls. Bake them in an oven, and
when done break them apart, but do not cut them with a knife--or, bake
them in flat biscuits, to be split and buttered. Bread dough, with some
butter added to the mixture, will make plain cakes for children, with
the addition of white sugar, powdered cinnamon, some good raisins,
(stoned,) cut in half, and dredged well with flour, to prevent their
clodding or sinking. A beaten egg mixed into the dough is an
improvement. Children, (accustomed only to plain living,) like these
cakes very well, but they must be light and well baked.

BREAD CAKES.--Take slices of stale wheat bread, that has been well made
and light. There should be enough to fill a pint bowl, closely packed.
Put the bread into a deep dish, and pour boiling water upon it. While
the bread is soaking, mix in a crock or jar a pint of milk, and a pint
of wheat flour. Put the soaked bread into a cullender, and let the water
drain off. When the water is drained away, beat the bread _lightly_ with
a fork, but do not press or mash it. Beat two eggs very light and thick,
and gradually stir them into the flour and milk. Then stir in the bread.
Bake the mixture on a griddle in the manner of buckwheat cakes, and eat
them hot with butter. This quantity is for a small family of four
persons.

For a family of moderate size, take a quart of stale bread, a quart of
milk, a quart of flour, and four eggs.

For a large family, two quarts of bread, two quarts of milk, two quarts
of flour, and eight eggs. This quantity will not be more than sufficient
for a large family, as they will all like these cakes.

If you have not enough of stale bread in the house, send for a stale
loaf, rather than not have the proper proportion for the cakes.

MILK BISCUIT.--Warm a pint of milk on the top of the stove, and cut up
in it half a pound of fresh butter, to soften, but not to melt. Sift
into a pan two quarts of flour; make a hole in the middle of the flour,
and pour into it the milk and butter. Beat two eggs till very thick and
smooth, and pour them in also. Lastly, pour into the hole two
wine-glasses of strong fresh brewer's or baker's yeast; or, three of
good home-made yeast. Mix altogether with a broad knife, till it becomes
a lump of soft dough. Then knead it well on your pasteboard, and make it
into round rolls or balls. Knead every ball separately. Flatten them
with your hand into thick biscuits, and prick every one with a fork. Lay
them separately in buttered square pans, and set them to rise. If all is
right, they will be light in little more than an hour. When quite light,
(risen high and cracked all over) set them in a moderate oven, and bake
them a light brown. They should be eaten quite fresh.

RUSK.--Sift a quart of flour into a pan. Make a hole in the centre, and
pour in a quarter of a pound of fresh butter, cut up and softened in
half a pint of milk warmed on the stove. Beat two eggs very light, and
mix them gradually into the hole in the pan of flour, in turn with a
small wine-glass of rose water; or a table-spoonful of the rose water if
as strong as it should be, adding a large tea-spoonful of powdered mace,
nutmeg, and cinnamon. Lastly, a wine-glass and a half of fresh brewer's
yeast. Mix those articles well into the flour, till it becomes a lump of
soft dough. Knead it well on your pasteboard, and divide it into pieces
of equal size. Knead each piece separately. Form them so as to be tall
and high, when finished. Butter an iron pan, lay the rusks in it side by
side, and set them in a warm place to rise again. When quite light, bake
them in a moderate oven, and sift sugar over them when cool.

DRY RUSKS.--Dry rusks are used for infant's food, and for invalids. They
are made plain, without any butter, spice, or rose water, and after
being once baked are split, and baked over till they are all crisp and
browned on the inside. Use them dissolved, by pouring on a little warm
water or milk, and beat them with a spoon to a thick pap.

CROSS BUNS.--Pick clean a pound and a half of dried or Zante currants;
wash, drain, and dry them on a large flat dish placed in a slanting
position near the fire, or in the sun. It will be still better to
substitute for the currants a pound of Sultana (or seedless) raisins,
each raisin cut in half. When quite dry, dredge the fruit _thickly_ with
flour to prevent their sinking or clodding in the cake. Sift into a deep
pan two quarts of flour, and mix thoroughly with it a table-spoonful of
powdered cinnamon, and three quarters of a pound of powdered sugar. Cut
up three-quarters of a pound of fresh butter, into a large half pint of
rich milk. Warm it till the butter is quite soft, but not till it melts.
Make a hole in the centre of the pan of flour, and pour in the mixed
liquid, adding a jill (or two wine-glasses) of strong fresh yeast. Mix
in the flour by degrees, beginning round the edge of the hole, and
proceed gradually till you have the whole mass of ingredients well
incorporated. Cover the pan with a clean thick towel, and set it in a
warm place to rise. When it has risen high, and is cracked all over, mix
in a small tea-spoonful of dissolved soda. Flour your pasteboard, divide
the dough into equal portions, mix in the plums, and _slightly_ knead it
into round cakes the size of a small saucer. Place them on a large dish,
cover them, and set them again to rise in a warm place for half an hour.
Mark every one deeply with a cross, bake them brown, and when done brush
each bun lightly over with a glazing of white of egg, sweetened with
sugar.

CINNAMON BREAD.--On a bread-baking day, (having made more than your
usual quantity of wheat bread,) when the dough has risen quite light,
and is cracked all over the surface, take out as much as will weigh two
pounds. Mix into it a quarter of a pound of fresh butter, that has been
cut up and melted in a half pint of milk; and also, three beaten eggs.
Incorporate the butter, milk, and egg, thoroughly with the dough, and
then add (dissolved in a little tepid water,) a salt-spoonful (_not
more_) of soda. Have ready mixed in a bowl a pint of _brown_ sugar,
moistened with fresh butter, so as to make a stiff paste, and flavor it
with two heaped table-spoonfuls of powdered cinnamon. Form the cake into
the shape of a round loaf, and make deep incisions or cuts all over its
surface; filling them up with the cinnamon mixture pressed hard into the
cuts, pinching and closing the dough over them with your thumb and
finger to prevent the seasoning running out. Put the loaf into a round
pan, and set it into the oven to bake with the other bread. When cool,
glaze it over with white of egg, in which some powdered sugar has been
dissolved. Send it to table whole in form, but cut into loose slices.
Eat it fresh. All yeast cakes become dry and hard the next day.

This mixture may be baked in a square iron pan, and cut into square
cakes when cool.

WAFFLES.--We are indebted to the Germans for this cake, which, if this
receipt is exactly followed, will be found excellent. Warm a quart of
milk, and cut up in it a quarter of a pound of the best fresh butter,
and stir it about to soften in the warm milk. Beat eight eggs till very
thick and smooth, and stir them gradually into the milk and butter, in
turn with half a pound of sifted flour. Then add two table-spoonfuls of
strong fresh brewer's or baker's yeast. Cover the pan with a clean thick
cloth, and set it in a warm place to rise. When the batter has risen
nearly to the top, and is covered with bubbles, it is time to bake;
first stirring in a wine-glass of rose-water. Having heated your
waffle-iron in a good fire, grease it inside with the fresh butter used
for the waffle mixture, or with fresh lard; fill it, and shut the iron
closely. Turn it on the fire, that both sides of the cake may be equally
well done. Each side will require about three minutes baking. Take them
out of the iron by slipping a knife underneath. Then grease and prepare
the iron for another waffle. Butter them, and send them to the tea-table
"hot and hot;" and, to eat with this, a bowl or glass dish of sugar
flavored with powdered cinnamon.

In buying waffle irons choose them _very deep_, so as to make a good
impression when baked--if shallow, the waffle will look thin and poor.
Those that bake one waffle at a time are the handsomest and most
manageable.

SOFT CRULLERS.--Sift a pound and a half of flour, and have ready a pound
of powdered sugar. Heat in a round-bottomed sauce-pan a quart of water;
and when quite warm, stir the flour gradually into the water. In another
vessel set a pound of nice fresh butter over the fire, and when it
begins to melt, stir it, by degrees, into the flour and water. Then add,
gradually, the powdered sugar, and a grated nutmeg. Take the sauce-pan
off the fire, and beat the contents with a wooden spaddle, (which is far
better than a spoon) till they are thoroughly mixed. Next, having
beaten six eggs till very thick and light, stir them, gradually, into
the mixture, and then beat the whole very hard till it becomes a thick
batter. Add rose-water or lemon juice. Flour a pasteboard, and lay out
the batter upon it in the form of rings. The best and easiest way is to
pass it through a screw funnel.

Have ready on the fire a pot of boiling lard. Put in the crullers,
taking them off the board one at a time, on a broad-bladed knife. Boil
but a few at a time. They must be of a fine brown. Lift them out with a
perforated skimmer, draining back the lard into the pot. Lay them on a
large dish, and dredge them with sugar.

These, if properly managed, are far superior to all other crullers, but
they cannot be made in warm weather.

DOUGH-NUTS.--On baking day, take two pounds of very light bread dough
that has been made in the usual manner. Put it into a broad pan. Rub
into it half a pound of fresh butter, and half a pound of powdered
sugar, and a table-spoonful of mixed nutmeg and cinnamon. Wet it with
half a pint of milk, and mix in three well beaten eggs. Cover it, and
set by the fire to rise again. When quite light, flour your pasteboard,
and make the dough into oval balls; or, you may cut it into diamond
shapes, (handling it as little as possible.) Have ready, over the fire,
a pot of boiling lard. Drop the dough-nuts into it, and boil them; or
fry them brown in a frying-pan. Take them out one by one in a
perforated skimmer, draining back the lard into the pan. Spread them on
a large dish, and sift sugar over them. Eat them fresh; when heavy and
stale they are not fit. This is a German cake.

COMMON CRULLERS.--The above mixture for dough-nuts will make good
crullers. Flour your pasteboard, lay the dough upon it, roll it very
thick, and cut it into strips with a jagging iron. Take off short
pieces, and twist them into various forms. Throw them into a pot of
boiling lard. When done, drain the lard from them, spread them on a
large dish, and dredge them with powdered white sugar.

The Alpistera is a Spanish cruller, shaped like the five fingers united
at the wrist.

PLAIN DESSERTS.

MOLASSES PUDDING.--Sift into a pan a large quart of yellow indian meal.
Simmer over the fire a quart of milk, a pint of _West India molasses_,
stirred in while the milk is hot. Put the milk and molasses into a large
pan, and mix gradually into them the corn meal while they are quite
warm. Add a large table-spoonful of ground ginger, and a heaped
tea-spoonful of powdered cinnamon. Beat the whole mixture long and
hard, for on that will chiefly depend the lightness of the pudding, as
it has neither eggs, butter, nor yeast. If your batter seems too thin,
add, gradually, a little more corn meal; if too thick, a little more
milk and molasses.

Dip in hot water a large square pudding cloth. Spread it out in a pan,
dredge it well with flour, and then pour the pudding-mixture into it.
Tie it up, making the string very secure, but leave plenty of room
between the batter and the tying place, for the pudding to swell in
boiling, at least one-third. Put the pudding, directly, into a large
pot, and keep it steadily boiling for about three hours. Corn meal
requires long cooking. Turn the pudding twice with a fork. If the water
boils away too much, replenish it from a tea-kettle of hot water, kept
boiling for the purpose. If you pour in _cold_ water the pudding will
become hard and heavy, and be totally spoiled. Do not turn it out and
send it to table till wanted at dinner. Then dip it for a moment in cold
water, untie the string, and transfer it to a dish with a cover. Eat it
with molasses and butter; or make a sauce of drawn butter, flavored with
wine and nutmeg.

This pudding, if properly mixed, well beaten, and well boiled, will be
as light as if made with eggs, (the _West India_ molasses having that
property) and it will cut down rough or open grained, like a very light
sponge cake, unless the batter has been made too thick and stiff, and
not sufficiently beaten, and not allowed space enough to swell in
boiling. If made _too thin_, or not boiled well, the pudding will come
out a soft, shapeless mass. But if all is carefully managed, this (the
least costly of American puddings) will be found excellent for a plain
table, and perfectly wholesome. The flavor will be much improved by
adding to the cinnamon and ginger the grated yellow rind and juice of an
orange or lemon. If your first attempt at this pudding is a failure, try
it again--practice makes perfect.

For a large family, have two quarts of corn meal, two quarts of milk,
and one quart of _West India_ molasses; two table-spoonfuls of ginger,
and one of cinnamon.

What is left may be tied in a cloth, and boiled over again next day, for
half an hour or longer.

MOLASSES PIE.--Make a plain paste, allowing a quart of flour to a
quarter of a pound of fresh butter, and a quarter of a pound of lard.
Cut up the butter into the pan of flour, and rub it into a dough, with a
half tumbler of cold water. Too much water is injurious to any paste,
rendering it tough and hard. Roll out the paste into a sheet, and with a
broad knife spread all over it one-half of the lard. Sprinkle it with
flour, fold it, and roll it out again. Spread on the remainder of the
lard, dredge it slightly, fold it again, and then divide it into two
sheets. Line with one sheet the inside of a pie-dish, and fill it with
molasses, mixed with butter, and flavored with ginger and cinnamon, or
lemon or orange. Put on the other sheet of paste as a lid to the pie.
Crimp or notch the edges. Bake it of a pale brown, and send it to table
fresh, but not hot.

MOLASSES POT-PIE.--Make plenty of paste, allowing to _each quart_ of
flour a small half pound of finely minced suet. Line the pot
three-quarters up the sides with paste, and put in a quart of West India
molasses, flavored with ginger and cinnamon, lemon or orange grating,
and juice. Cover it with a lid of paste, _not fitting closely_ round its
edges, and cut a cross slit in the top. Have ready six or eight extra
pieces of suet paste, cut into squares, and boiled by themselves. When
the pie is done, put these little cakes (ready boiled) into the
molasses, having removed the lid or cover of the pie, and cut it up.
Take out the inside paste, and cut it in pieces also. Serve up the whole
in one large dish.

BATTER PUDDING.--Having beaten eight eggs till very thick and smooth,
stir them gradually into a pan of milk, in turn with eight
table-spoonfuls of flour, added by degrees. Give the whole a hard
stirring at last. Dip a square pudding cloth into hot water, shake it
out, dredge it with flour, and spread it over the inside of an empty
pan. Pour the pudding mixture into it. Gather up the cloth, leaving
ample space for the pudding to swell in boiling, and securing the
string tightly. Put the pudding into a large pot of boiling water, and
boil it fast and steadily for two hours. Turn it with a large fork once
or twice while boiling. When done, dip it for a moment in cold water,
that you may turn it out easily. Send it to table hot, and eat it with
any sauce you like, from molasses, or butter and sugar, to wine sauce.
This, if exactly followed, is the very best receipt for a plain batter
pudding. It may be made of corn meal, or wheat bread-crumbs, (eight
table-spoonfuls to eight eggs, and one quart of milk.) Corn meal
requires with it one or two spoonfuls of wheat flour for this pudding.

We cannot approve of boiling batter puddings in moulds, as they are
rarely allowed sufficient space for swelling, and are therefore tough
and solid. Also, it is frequently very difficult to get a hot pudding
out of a mould.

The above pudding is very nice baked in the dripping pan under a piece
of roast beef or veal.

FRITTERS.--Make the same mixture as for batter pudding. Eight eggs
beaten very light and thick, and stirred gradually into a quart of milk,
in turn with eight spoonfuls of flour; and, when all are united, beat
the whole very hard. In a large frying-pan melt a pound of lard, and
when it comes to a boil, put in with a large spoon a half tea-cupful of
batter. Fry them fast, a panful at a time, and as they require no
stirring they will soon be done. For the next panful, add half a pound
more of lard, and see that it is boiling well all the time. If there is
not enough of lard, or if it only simmers, the fritters will stick to
the bottom, and be heavy, dark, and greasy. Send them to table "hot and
hot," sprinkled with sugar. Eat them with sugar, cinnamon, and white
wine. This is the best possible receipt for plain fritters.

ORANGE FRITTERS.--For frying fruit fritters use nice fresh butter. Peel,
and cut into round slices (not very thin) some fine oranges, removing
the seeds carefully. Put into each fritter (while frying) a slice of
orange, and dredge with sugar. Eat them with sweetened orange juice.
These are fritters for company.

PEACH FRITTERS.--Take large ripe free-stone peaches, the best you can
get. Peel them, cut them in half, remove the stones, and put some loaf
sugar into the cavities from whence you took them. Have ready, in a
large frying-pan over the fire, an ample quantity of nice fresh butter,
boiling fast. Put in the batter, and to every spoonful allow half a
peach, laid on its back. When done take them up separately, and drain
the butter back into the pan. Serve up the fritters dredged with white
sugar. You may color these fritters pink by mixing in the batter a
little prepared alkanet, the chips tied up in a thin muslin bag, and
laid in a small saucer of sweet oil. Stir the colored oil into the
batter; it has no taste, but the color is beautiful. Fritters may be
colored green by mixing in the batter some of the juice obtained from
pounded spinach leaves.

APPLE OR QUINCE FRITTERS.--Pare and core some pippin or bell-flower
apples, or ripe quinces. Cut them into round slices, and fry one in
every fritter. Eat them with sweetened lemon juice. You may make
fritters with a large table-spoonful of any thick marmalade in the
centre. Or, with a large fresh oyster in the middle of each. Or, with a
table-spoonful of minced meat. These, also, are company fritters.

PANCAKES--Are very inferior to good fritters, and much more troublesome
to bake. They are the same ingredients mixed thinner; are also fried in
lard, and must be turned by tossing them over (one at a time) in the
frying-pan.

JUNKET.--Having turned a quart of rich milk, by stirring into it a half
tea-cupful of the water in which two or three square inches of rennet
has been soaked for several hours, set the milk in a covered pitcher, in
a warm place, till it becomes a firm curd, the whey separating from it,
and looking thin and greenish. Keep it on ice till just before it is
wanted for table. Then transfer it to a large bowl, and sweeten it well
with white sugar. Mix in two glasses of sweet wine, and grate over it a
nutmeg. It is very nice with extract of vanilla added to the wine, &c.

It is not a good way to preserve a rennet by cutting it into little
pieces, and keeping it in wine, stirring the wine into milk when you
wish to form a curd. If turned with rennet wine, the curd will never
separate completely from the whey, which will therefore be always thick
and whitish. By using rennet water, the whey will be pure, thin, and of
a light green, and the curd very white and firm. In Philadelphia market,
dried rennets (which will keep a year or two hanging up in a cool dry
closet) are universally used to make curds, and are always to be bought
at small prices. They are cured by salting them, and stretching on a
bent rod. To use this rennet, cut off a small bit, and soak it several
hours, or over night, in a cup of lukewarm water. Then stir this water
into the milk.

MILK POTTAGE OR FARMER'S RICE.--Take some rich milk, and put it on to
boil in a pot of sufficient size. When it has begun to boil, stir in, by
degrees, enough of wheat flour to make it about as thick as the general
consistence of rice milk, and boil it well, stirring it frequently down
to the bottom. Add a few blades of mace, or some powdered cinnamon.
Knead together some flour and fresh butter, forming a lump of white
paste. Divide the paste into small round dumplings about the size of a
cent, and put them to boil with the milk. When the pottage is well
boiled, take it up, and transfer it to a tureen or deep white-ware dish,
and make it very sweet with good brown sugar. Grate some nutmeg over the
surface.

This is an excellent addition to a winter supper-table, and is much
liked by children, for whom it is also good at the end of a plain
dinner. As a substitute for rice milk, it is better and more wholesome
than rice itself.

PLAIN RICE PUDDING.--Pick some rice, carefully removing from it the
husks, and all impurities; and if you find it the least sour or musty,
throw it away, and get some that is perfectly good. Wash it through two
or three waters, till it drains off quite clean. Stir a quarter of a
pound of this rice into a quart of good rich milk. If the milk is poor
and thin, and has been skimmed till it is blue, or mixed with water, the
pudding will be poor accordingly. In the country where cream is easily
to be obtained, add some to the milk which you use for the rice pudding.
Stir in also a quarter of a pound of good brown sugar, and a
tea-spoonful of powdered cinnamon. Set the pudding into an oven, and
bake till a brown skin covers the surface, and the rice is quite soft,
which you may ascertain by lifting a bit of the brown skin from the edge
and trying the rice. Eat it warm or cold. It is usual in the country to
put several of these rice puddings into the oven on baking days.

They will be greatly improved by the addition of two or three beaten
eggs, and a few bits of fresh butter, stirred in with the rice and
sugar. Also powdered cinnamon. Rice is in itself so tasteless, that it
requires good flavoring.

PLAIN BOILED RICE PUDDING.--Pick, wash, and drain a pound of rice.
Moisten it with a quart of milk. Have ready a pound of seedless raisins.
Dredge them well all over with flour to prevent their sinking. Stir them
gradually into the rice and milk. Boil it in a cloth, leaving ample
space for it to swell. Keep the water very hot all the time. Eat it with
butter and sugar, seasoned with ground cinnamon.

RICE CUPS.--Boil in water, in the usual manner, a pound or more of
cleaned rice till it is perfectly soft. Drain it well, and mix it with a
quart of milk, seasoned with a mixed table-spoonful of powdered cinnamon
and nutmeg or mace. Boil it a second time till all the grains are
dissolved into a smooth mass, and their form cannot be distinguished.
Mould it in large tea-cups, pint bowls, or blanc-mange moulds; and when
it has taken the desired form, turn it out on dishes, and serve up with
it a small tureen of wine sauce, or of boiled custard made very sweet,
and seasoned, by boiling in the milk of which the custard was made a
few peach leaves, or some bitter almonds broken up, or a broken-up stick
of cinnamon, to be taken out when it is done.

BREAD PUDDING.--Grate or crumble as much stale wheat bread (omitting the
crust) as will fill a pint bowl when done. Boil a pint of good milk with
a broken-up stick of cinnamon in it. Strain the milk, and pour it
(boiling) over the bread. Sweeten it with three large table-spoonfuls of
sugar. Stir in one or two large table-spoonfuls of fresh butter. Beat
four eggs till very thick and smooth, and add them, gradually, to the
mixture, when it is lukewarm. It will be much improved by the grated
peel and juice of a lemon or orange. Bake it in a deep dish or mould;
sift white sugar over it. Eat it warm, with sweet sauce flavored with
nutmeg.

BREAD AND BUTTER PUDDING.--Cut large even slices of yesterday's bread,
(_leaving on_ the crust) and spread them well with fresh butter. Strew
over them thickly half a pound of Zante currants, picked and washed.
Make a batter of four beaten eggs and a large pint of milk, seasoned
with powdered nutmeg or mace. Pour some of this batter into the bottom
of a deep white dish. Then put on as many slices of bread and currants
as will cover the bottom. Next, add the remainder of the batter, and
finish with slices of bread and butter strewed with currants. Bake till
the batter is set and firm. When done, serve it up warm.

A BROWN BETTY.--Pare, core, and slice thin some fine _juicy_ apples.
Cover with the apples the bottom of a large deep white-ware dish.
Sweeten them well with plenty of brown sugar; adding grated lemon or
orange peel. Strew over them a thick layer of bread-crumbs, and add to
the crumbs a _very few_ bits of fresh butter. Then put in another layer
of cut apples and sugar, followed by a second layer of bread-crumbs and
butter. Next more apples and sugar; then more bread-crumbs and butter;
repeat this till the dish is full, finishing it with bread-crumbs. Bake
it till the apples are entirely done and quite soft. Send it to table
hot. It will be improved (if in the country at cider-making season) by
adding to each layer of apples a very little sweet unfermented cider,
fresh from the press.

This pudding is in some places called an Apple Pandowdy. We believe it
is Brown Betty in the South; Pandowdy in the North. It is a good plain
pudding if the butter is fresh and sweet, and not too much of it. The
apples must be _juicy_ and _not_ sweet. Sweet apples never cook well.

SWEETENED SWEET POTATOS.--The sweet potatos should be all about the same
size, or else so large as to require splitting. Boil them till, on
probing them with a fork, you find them soft all through. Peel off the
skin, and trim off the sharp points of each end. Place them in a large
baking dish, and lay among them some pieces of fresh butter; sprinkle
powdered sugar _profusely_ over them and among them, especially in the
vacancies between the potatos. Set the dish into a moderate oven, and
bake slowly till the butter and sugar are all melted and blended
together, forming a nice crust. They should be eaten not with the meat,
but _after_ it. They make a good supper or luncheon dish, and a plain
dessert at dinner for plain-living people.

Sufficient butter and sugar will make the crust like a thick syrup, when
broken. They should be cooked this way only when in the height of their
season, and perfectly fresh and nice. When sweet potatos are old enough
to decay at the ends, give them up. Large sweet potatos may be first
boiled; then peeled and sliced thick, sprinkled thick with sugar, and
fried in fresh butter or lard; the lard well drained from them as they
are taken up. Eat _them_ with meat.

They are good boiled very soft, peeled and sent to table mashed, (while
hot) with fresh butter--or made into thick flat cakes, and browned on
the top.

It is a great waste to bake sweet potatos whole. If baked enough, (as
they seldom are) they "go all to skin."

APPLE DUMPLINGS.--For dumplings the apples should be large and
juicy--pippins, bellflowers, or the best you can get. Small sweet apples
make very poor dumplings. Having pared the apples, extract the cores
with a tin apple-corer, so as to leave them smooth and whole. Why is it
that so many families "have never had an apple corer in their house?"
They cost, at the utmost, but twenty-five cents, are to be had at all
the tinsmiths' and furnishing stores; and they screw out an apple core
in a minute; saving time and trouble. The apples being ready, make a
nice paste in the proportion of a small pint of finely-minced suet, to a
large quart of flour; one-half of the suet rubbed into the pan of flour,
(adding _a very little_ water) the other half sliced thin, and spread
all over the sheet of dough after it is rolled out; then folding it, and
rolling it out again. Cut the sheet of dough in as many circular pieces
as you have apples, allowing them large enough to close entirely over
the top, and rolling it thick enough to hold the apple securely without
danger of its breaking through. Put an apple on every piece of paste,
and fill with brown sugar the hole from whence the core was taken.
Squeeze on the sugar some fresh lemon juice, with the grated yellow
rind; or, add some powdered nutmeg or mace, or some rose-water. This
will make them very nice. They should be boiled in small cloths kept
clean for the purpose, dipped in hot water, and sprinkled with flour,
and room left for the dumpling to swell. Put them into a pot of boiling
water, and boil them steadily for near an hour. Serve them up very hot,
as they become heavy when cold. Eat with them butter and sugar, or cream
sauce.

PEACH DUMPLINGS.--Take large fine free-stone peaches. Peel them, cut
them in half, and extract the stones; fill the sockets with white sugar,
and put the two halves together. Make a nice suet paste, or, if more
convenient, of butter, but it must be quite fresh, and very nice. Allow
half a pound of butter to a large quart (or a pound) of sifted flour.
Rub half the butter into the pan of flour, and make it into a dough,
with a very little cold water. Too much water always makes tough heavy
paste. Then roll the paste into a sheet, and put on it with a knife the
remainder of the butter in regular bits. Fold it, roll it out again, and
divide it into circular pieces. Lay a peach on each. Gather up the dough
over the top, so as to form a well-shaped dumpling. Boil them in cloths
for full three-quarters of an hour or more. Eat them with cream sauce.

Dumplings of raspberries, or blackberries, may be made as above. Also,
of gooseberries or currants, made very sweet. Quinces preserved whole
make excellent dumplings.

APPLE PUDDINGS--Are made like large dumplings, with suet paste, and
flavored with lemon, or rose, or nutmeg. The apples must be sliced. The
pudding should be tied in a cloth; put into a pot of fast-boiling water,
kept steadily boiling for two hours or more, and sweetened with brown
sugar as soon as it is taken up, cutting a round piece of paste out of
the top, and putting in with the sugar a small piece of fresh butter.

Large puddings may be made in this manner of stoned cherries, damsons,
or plums, or of gooseberries, or currants--allowing plenty of fruit, and
making it very sweet; besides sending sugar to table with it.

ROLLED PUDDING.--Have ready a quart or more of apples stewed with _very
little_ water, sweetened with brown sugar, and flavored with lemon or
rose. Prepare a nice suet paste. Roll it out, and cut it into a square
sheet. Spread it _thickly_ with the stewed fruit, (not extending the
fruit quite to the edges of the dough) and roll it up as far as it will
go. Close it nicely at each end. Tie it in a cloth, dipped in hot water
and floured, and put it into a fast-boiling pot. Boil it well. Cut it
down in round slices. Eat it with butter and sugar beaten together, or
with cream sauce. You may make this pudding of any sort of thick
marmalade, spread over the sheet of paste; or, with ripe uncooked
currants, raspberries, or blackberries, mashed raw, sweetened, and
spread on thickly. This pudding is the same that common English people
call a "Jack in a blanket;" and sometimes "a Dog in a blanket." The
_blanket_ is supposed to mean the paste; the _dog_ is probably the
fruit.

FRUIT POT-PIES.--These are made in a pot lined with paste, interspersed
with small squares of the same dough, and covered with a paste lid. The
filling is of dried apples, peaches quartered, blackberries,
raspberries, ripe currants, or gooseberries; all well sweetened, and
cooked in their own juice, with a small tea-cupful of water at the
bottom to "start them." Both fruit and paste must be perfectly well
done.

Fruit pot-pies are easier made and cooked, than fruit puddings or
dumplings. We recommend them highly for plain tables. They require more
sugar when they are dished. A large _bain-marie_ is excellent for
cooking any sort of pot-pie, the water being all in the outside kettle.

PLAIN BAKED CUSTARD.--Boil a quart of milk, with a small bunch of green
peach leaves in it, or a half dozen of peach kernels broken up. When the
milk has boiled well strain it into a broad pan, and set it away to
cool. In a shallow pan beat six eggs till very light, thick, and smooth.
Stir them, gradually, into the milk, in turn with a tea-cup of white
sugar, and a tea-spoonful of powdered cinnamon or mace. Transfer the
mixture to a deep white dish, set it into the oven, and bake it till
the top is well browned, but not scorched. When done, set it away to
cool, and grate nutmeg over the surface.

BOILED CUSTARD.--Make exactly the above mixture; but instead of baking,
boil it in a porcelain lined sauce-pan, stirring it all the time. As
soon as it comes to a boil, take it immediately from the fire, or it
will curdle. Put it into a glass or china pitcher, and set it to cool. A
_bain-marie_ is excellent for boiled custard.

If custards are baked in cups, set them in an iron pan half full of warm
water. If too hot, or kept baking too long, they will be tough and
porous, and have whey at the bottom. So they will if the milk is warm
when the eggs are added. Good custards will cut down to the very bottom
as smooth and firm as the best blanc-mange.

APPLES BAKED WHOLE.--Never bake apples without paring and coring. They
will be found nearly all skin and core, and are troublesome and
inconvenient to eat. Have fine large apples; take off a thin paring, and
extract the core with a tin corer. Fill up the holes with brown sugar.
Place the apples, side by side, in a square tin pan, set them in an
oven, and bake them till, when tried with a fork, you find them soft all
through. Send them to table warm, but not burning hot. If you have
country cream to eat with them, so much the better.

BAKED PEARS.--Take good-sized pears. Small ones are not worth the
trouble of cooking. Peel them, split them in half, and remove the core,
the stem, and the blossom end. Strew them well with brown sugar, and lay
them on their backs in a large baking dish. A narrow slip of the yellow
rind of lemon or orange, (cut so thin as to look transparent,) will be a
great improvement, laid in the hollow of each pear. Also the juice
squeezed. Put into the dish sufficient molasses or steam-syrup to well
cover the pears. Place them in an oven, and bake them till they are
soft, but not till they break. If you have no lemon or orange, season
them with ground ginger or cinnamon.

The great pound pears are baked as above, with the addition of port wine
and a few cloves, and colored red with a little cochineal.

COUNTRY CHARLOTTE.--Slice or quarter some fine juicy apples, having
pared and cored them. Put them on a large dish, sweeten them well with
brown sugar, set them in the oven, and bake them till soft enough to
mash smoothly. Then cut some slices of bread, butter them slightly, and
dip every one in sweet cider fresh from the press. Let them soak in the
cider a short time, but not till they break. Take them out of the
cider, spread every one thickly with the mashed apple, (sprinkling on
more sugar) and send them to the dinner table in a deep dish or pan.

A PLAIN CHARLOTTE.--Stew very nicely any sort of ripe fruit, (currants,
gooseberries, blackberries, stoned cherries, or stoned plums,) and as
soon as you take them from the fire make them very sweet with brown
sugar. Prepare some large slices of buttered bread, with the crust pared
off. Cover each slice thickly with the stewed fruit. Lay some in the
bottom of a deep dish, and stand up others all round its sides. Fill up
the dish with the same, and sift white sugar over the surface.

It may be made of sliced sponge-cake, spread thickly with stewed dried
peaches.

GOOSEBERRY FOOL.--This foolish name signifies an excellent preparation
of gooseberries; stewed, mashed, and made very sweet with brown sugar.
Have ready in another dish a good boiled custard. When all has become
cool, mix well together in a large bowl the stewed gooseberries and the
custard, and season the mixture well with nutmeg. It will be found very
good.

Any other "fool" may be made in the same manner, of stewed fruit and
boiled custard. It saves the trouble and expense of making paste, or
can be prepared at a shorter notice. It is good either at dinner or
tea.

We hope somebody will think of a better name for it.

POTATO PASTE.--Boil three moderate-sized potatos till very soft. Then
peel and mash them fine and smooth. Put them into a deep pan, and mix
them well with a quart of flour and a half pint of lard; or what is
better, with that quantity of beef dripping, or the dripping of fresh
roast pork. Never for any sort of crust use mutton dripping. Having
mixed the mashed potato, dripping, and flour into a lump, roll it out
into a thick sheet. Sprinkle it with flour, and spread over it evenly a
thin layer of dripping or lard. Fold it again, and set it in a cool
place till wanted. It is good for meat pies, and for boiled meat
pudding, or any sort of dumplings.

VERY PLAIN PIE-CRUST.--Sift a quart of flour into a pan. Mix together,
with a knife, a quarter of a pound of fresh butter, and a quarter of a
pound of lard, and when they are well blended mix them with the flour,
and form them into a dough with as little water as possible--the water
being very cold. Use ice water in summer. Avoid touching the paste with
your hands, but use a knife almost entirely. If your hand is warm, do
not rub butter into flour with it, but manage all the mixing with a
knife. If you have a cool hand, you may rub the butter into the flour,
and reserve the lard to spread all over the sheet of dough. Roll it out
lightly. Dredge with flour, fold it, spread on the lard, and roll it
again. Divide it into two pieces, and roll out each of them. Trim the
edges nicely, and make them to fit your pie-dish. If one is for bottom
crust, roll it out thinnest towards the centre, having for this part of
the process a very small rolling-pin, but a finger long. Grease with
lard a deep dish, or soup plate, and line it with the bottom crust. Fill
it up with the fruit you intend for the pie, sweetened well with brown
sugar, and heaping the fruit high in the centre. Cover it with a lid of
paste, trim, and notch the edges neatly, and make a cross slit in the
top; set it in the oven, and bake it steadily till it is a light brown.
When it seems to be done, lift up a small piece at one side to try if
the fruit is soft. Apples for pies should be pared, cored, and sliced
very thin. If green, stew them before they are baked.

If you have saved enough of the dripping of roast beef, veal, or pork,
(skimmed and put away in a covered crock) it will be good shortening for
common pies--far superior to salt butter, and much lighter. Salt renders
pastry hard and heavy.

Never use suet for _baked_ paste. It is only for dumplings and pot-pies.
Bread dough, or any dough made with yeast, is not good when boiled,
becoming tough and leathery, and being very unwholesome.

Except in very plain country places a fruit pie, with two crusts,
(under and upper) is now seen but rarely. _Meat_ pies, or birds,
however, should have two crusts. The gravy is a great improvement to the
under one. English people usually make their fruit pies with a top-crust
only, putting a turned down tea-cup under the centre of the lid to
collect the juice, (of course removing the cup when the pie is cut.) It
is a good method in a country where the cost of flour is high.

Too much economy in the shortening will infallibly make the crust very
poor, hard, heavy, and unwholesome. If you cannot afford dessert paste,
do not attempt pies at all; but substitute a plain charlotte, or slices
of bread and butter, covered with stewed fruit, sweetened, and laid in a
deep dish.

COMMON FRUIT PIES.--Make the paste as above. For baking, use only apples
that are juicy, and rather sour. If green, stew them before they are put
in the pie, and make them very sweet with brown sugar. Peaches should be
peeled and quartered, leaving out the stones. Of cherries, take the
large red juicy pie cherries. Black cherries, (when baked) go all to
stones, and they are not worth the trouble of cooking, though very good
when eaten from the trees. Currants must be carefully stripped from the
stems, and made very sweet. Gooseberries must be "top and tailed," and
require great sweetening; so do cranberries. Blackberries make good
plain pies, and are very juicy if ripe. All pies should be well filled.

Pies may be made of ripe wild grapes, stewed in molasses or maple sugar.

EXCELLENT PLAIN PASTE.--Sift into a deep pan a quart and a pint of the
best superfine flour. Have ready (set on ice, and covered with a thick
double cloth) a pound of the very best fresh butter. When you want to
use it, cut it into four quarters. Cut one quarter into very little
bits, and with a broad knife mix it well into the flour, adding, by
degrees, a very little water, no more than half a tumbler. Some flour,
however, requires more water than others. Avoid touching the dough with
your hands, in case they should be warm. Take out the lump of dough,
dredge it with flour, and lay it on your pasteboard. Keep on a plate
near you a little extra flour for sprinkling and rolling. Roll out the
sheet of dough very thin, having floured the rolling-pin to prevent its
sticking. Place, with a knife, the second quarter of butter in little
bits all over the sheet of paste, at equal distances. Then fold it
square, (covering the butter with the corners of paste) dredge it, and
roll it out again to receive the third quarter of butter. Repeat this
again, till all the butter is in; always rolling very fast, and pressing
on _lightly_. You will see, towards the last, the paste puffing into
little blisters all over the surface; a sign of success. When the last
layer of butter is all in, roll the whole into a large sheet; roll it
round like a scroll, and put it away in a cold place, but not so cold
as to freeze it, for it will then be spoiled. When you are ready for it
bring it out, cut it down, and roll out each piece ready for use. There
is no better family paste than this, for all sorts of pies; meat or bird
pies, especially.

LEMON BREAD PUDDING.--Mince very fine a quarter of a pound of beef suet.
Have ready a pint and a half of finely-grated bread-crumbs. Prepare the
yellow rind of a large lemon, grated off from the white skin beneath,
and squeeze the juice among it. Mix together in a deep pan the
bread-crumbs and suet, adding four or five table-spoonfuls of powdered
sugar, and a tea-spoonful of mixed spice, cinnamon, nutmeg and mace.
Beat in a broad shallow pan five eggs till very smooth and thick. Add
them gradually to the other ingredients, a little at a time. Have ready
a square pudding-cloth, scalded and floured. Pour in the mixture, and
tie the cloth tightly, but not closely, as room must be left for the
pudding to swell in boiling. Put it into a pot of hot water, and boil it
steadily for two hours. Send wine sauce to table with it--or cold sauce,
of beaten butter, and sugar, and nutmeg.

If you use butter instead of suet, you can bake this pudding.

PLAIN PLUM PUDDING.--This is for a small plain-living family. Chop very
fine half a pound of nice fresh beef suet. Stone a half pound of very
good raisins, or use the sultana or seedless sort. Dredge them well on
all sides with flour to prevent their sinking to the bottom. Grate the
yellow rind of a large fresh lemon, and strain the juice into the saucer
on which you have grated the rind. It will be still better if you use
the rind and juice of an orange as well as of a lemon. Put into a bowl
half a pint of grated bread-crumbs, and a heaped table-spoonful of
flour, and pour on them a half pint of boiling milk. Beat in a shallow
pan four eggs till very thick and light. Mix the suet gradually into the
bread, adding alternately the beaten egg, (a little at a time) the lemon
and orange, and four heaped table-spoonfuls of sugar. Lastly, stir in by
degrees, the raisins, well floured. Put the mixture into a square
pudding-cloth spread out into a deep pan, and dipped in boiling water.
Tie it securely, leaving room to swell. Boil it three hours.

Eat with it a sauce of butter, sugar, and nutmeg, beaten together.

FINE DESSERTS.

THE BEST PUFF-PASTE.--To a pound of the best fresh butter allow a pound
of the finest flour, sifted into a deep pan. Have on a plate some
additional sifted flour for sprinkling and rolling in. Divide the pound
of butter into four equal parts, and three of those parts divide again
into two portions. Mix the first quarter of butter into the mass of
flour, cutting it with a broad-bladed knife. If your hands are naturally
warm, avoid touching the dough with them, as their heat will render it
heavy. Paste, to be very good, should be made on a marble slab. All
well-furnished kitchens or pastry rooms should be provided with
marble-topped tables, and marble mortars. Add gradually to the lump of
dough a _very little cold_ water, barely sufficient to moisten it with
the first quarter of butter, and mix it well with the aid of the broad
knife; but proceed as fast as you can, and do not work with it too long.
Too much water will render it tough, and too much working will make it
heavy. Then sprinkle the marble slab with some of the spare flour, take
the lump of paste from the pan, and roll it out into a sheet. Divide one
of the portions of butter into little bits, and with the knife disperse
them equally all over the sheet of paste. Then sprinkle it again with
flour, fold it up so as to cover the butter, and roll it out again.
Proceed in this manner till you have got in all the butter, rolling
always lightly, and you will soon see the surface of the dough puffing
up in little blisters, a sign that it is becoming light. Besides the
first mixing in the lump, the butter will then be put in with what are
called six turns. When baked, you will see that every turn makes a layer
or sheet. If you choose to multiply them, you may make nine sheets. We
have seen twelve. All this must be done fast and lightly. Then put away
the paste to cool for ten minutes before arranging it in the dishes.
This quantity will make two pies or four tarts. In baking, let the oven
be hot, and keep up a steady heat, so the paste may not fall after it
has first risen. When pale brown, it is done.

SHELLS.--For shells take the best puff paste, and line with it large
deep plates, the size of a soup-plate. They should have broad rims.
Notch the edges of the paste handsomely with a sharp penknife, and be
careful not to plaster on, afterwards, any bits by way of mending or
rectifying an error. When baked, every patch in the border will show
itself plainly. Bake the shells entirely empty, till pale brown all
over. When cool fill them, _quite up the top_, with whatever marmalade
or stewed fruit you have prepared for the purpose. In this way (baking
them empty,) the shells are thoroughly done, and not clammy and heavy at
the bottom, as they always are when filled _before_ baking. The fruit
requires no other cooking, having been done once already. Sift white
sugar over the surface. If for company whip some cream, sweeten it, and
flavor it with lemon, orange, pine-apple, strawberry or vanilla, and
pile it on the surface of the shell before it goes to table.

Small tarts may, in this way, be baked empty, for patty-pans, and filled
with ripe fruit, such as strawberries, raspberries, or grated
pine-apple, made very sweet, and creamed on the top--or you may fill the
shells with any sort of sweetmeats, either preserves or marmalade, or
with mince-meat. Shells may be made thus, and filled with stewed
oysters, or reed-birds, cooked previously, and served up warm; or with
nicely-dressed lobster. You may make lids for them of the same paste
baked by itself on a shallow plate, and when taken off fitting well as a
cover to put on afterwards before sending to table.

BORDERS OF PASTE.--These are made of fine puff-paste cut into handsome
patterns, or wreaths of leaves or flowers. They are laid round the broad
edge of the deep plate that contains a rich pudding, such as lemon,
orange, almond, cocoa-nut, pine-apple, &c.; the dish being full down to
the bottom and up to the top, and having no paste but the border round
the edge. They must be baked in the dish on which they come to table,
and not in tin or iron, as the pudding cannot be transferred. At
handsome tables, a pudding baked with a paste _under_ it (lining the
dish,) is now seen but seldom.

Instead of wreaths, you may make a puff-paste border by laying a thick
evenly cut band of paste round the flat rim of the dish, and notching
it, forming with a penknife small squares about an inch wide, and
turning one square up and one square down alternately, _cheveux de
frize_ fashion. Or you may make the squares near two inches wide and
turn over one corner sharp, leaving the other flat. This looks pretty
when baked, if the paste is _very puff_.

LEMON PUDDING.--To make two puddings take two fine large ripe lemons,
and rub them under your hand on a table. Grate off the thin yellow rind
upon a large lump of loaf sugar. Cut the lemon, and squeeze the juice
into a saucer through a strainer, to avoid the seeds. Put half a pound
of powdered white sugar into a deep earthen pan, (including the sugar on
which you have rubbed the lemons) and cut up in it half a pound of the
best fresh butter, adding the juice. Stir them to a light cream with a
wooden spaddle, which is shorter than a mush-stick, and flattened at one
end; that end rather thin, and rather broad. Beat in a shallow pan,
(with hickory rods) six eggs, till very thick and smooth, and stir them
gradually into the mixture. Have ready some of the best puff-paste, made
in the proportion of a pint or half a pound of very nice fresh butter to
a pint or half a pound of sifted flour. Take china or white-ware dishes
with broad rims. Butter the rim, and lay round it neatly a border of the
paste. _Put no paste inside the dish beneath the mixture._ Fill each
dish to the top with the pudding mixture, and set it immediately into
the oven. It will bake in about half an hour When done, and browned on
the surface, set it to cool, and send it to table in the dish it was
baked in.

Fine puddings are now made without an under crust, but merely a handsome
border of puff-paste laid round the edge, and helped with the pudding.
Sift sugar over the surface. This quantity will make one large pudding,
or two small ones.

To almost all puddings the flavor of lemon or orange is an improvement.
A genuine _baked_ lemon pudding, (such as was introduced by the justly
celebrated Mrs. Goodfellow,) and is well known at Philadelphia dinner
parties, must have _no flour_ or bread whatever. The mixture only of
butter, sugar, and eggs, (with the proper flavoring) and when baked it
cuts down smooth and shining, like a nice custard. Made this way, they
are among the most delicious of puddings; but, of course, are not
intended for children or invalids. We have already given numerous
receipts for _plain_ family desserts. In this _chapter_ the receipts are
"for company." The author was _really_ a pupil of Mrs. Goodfellow's, and
for double the usual term, and while there took notes of every thing
that was made, it being the desire of the liberal and honest
instructress that her scholars _should learn in reality_.

ALMOND PUDDING.--Blanch in hot water a quarter of a pound of shelled
sweet and two ounces of bitter almonds, and as you blanch them throw
them into a bowl of cold water. When all are thus peeled, take them out
singly, wipe them dry in a clean napkin, and lay them on a plate. Pound
them one at a time in a marble mortar till they become a smooth paste,
adding frequently a few drops of rose-water to make them light and
preserve their whiteness, mixing the bitter almonds with the sweet. As
you pound them, take out the paste and lay it in a saucer with a
tea-spoon. Without the rose-water they will become oily and
dark-colored. Without a few bitter almonds the others will be insipid.
The almonds may be thus prepared a day before they are wanted for use.
Cut up a large quarter of a pound of fresh butter in a large quarter of
a pound of powdered sugar, and stir them together with a spaddle till
very light and creamy. Add a large wine-glass of mixed wine and brandy,
and half a grated nutmeg. Beat, till they stand alone, the whites only
of six eggs, and stir them gradually into the butter and sugar, in turn
with the pounded almonds. Stir the whole very hard at the last. Put the
mixture into a deep dish with a broad rim, and fill it up to the top,
laying a border of puff-paste all round the rim. Serve up the pudding
cool, having sifted sugar over it.

_Boiled Almond Pudding_--Is made as above; only with whole eggs, both
yolks and whites beaten together. Boil it in a _bain-marie_ or in a
thick square cloth, in a pot of boiling water. When done, turn it out
and send it to table warm. Eat it with sugar, wet with rose-water.

_Orange Pudding_--Is made exactly like lemon pudding; the ingredients
in the same proportion, and baked without an under crust, having a
border of puff-paste all round the edge, and sent to table in the dish
it was baked in. These fine-baked puddings should have no addition
whatever of bread-crumbs or flour. They should cut down smooth and
glassy.

_Boiled Lemon or Orange Pudding_--Make the foregoing mixture either with
two lemons or two oranges, adding to the other ingredients a half pint
finely-crumbled sponge cake. Boil the mixture either in a _bain-marie_
or a thick pudding cloth, and serve it up warm. For sauce, have ready
butter and sugar beaten to a cream, and flavored well with lemon or
orange, and grated nutmeg.

COCOA-NUT PUDDING.--Break up a ripe cocoa-nut. Having peeled off the
brown skin, wash all the pieces of nut in cold water, and wipe them dry
on a clean napkin. Then grate the cocoa-nut _very fine_ into a pan, till
you have a quart. In a deep pan cut up a quarter of a pound of fresh
butter, and add a very light quarter of a pound of powdered white sugar.
Stir together (with a spaddle,) the butter and sugar till they are very
light and creamy, and add a grated nutmeg. Beat, (till they stand alone)
the _whites only_ of six eggs; the yolks may be reserved for soft
custards. Stir the beaten white of egg gradually into the pan of butter
and sugar, alternately with the grated cocoa-nut, a little at a time of
each, and a glass of mixed brandy and white wine. Stir the whole very
hard. Fill with it a broad-edged deep white dish, and lay a puff-paste
border all round the rim. Bake it light brown, and when cool sift white
sugar over it, serving it up in the dish it was baked in.

_Boiled Cocoa-nut Pudding._--For this make the above mixture, and boil
it in a mould, or in a _bain-marie_, with the water in the outside
kettle. Eat it either warm or cold.

SWEET POTATO PUDDING.--Wash, boil, and peel some fine sweet potatos.
Mash them, and rub them through a coarse sieve--this will make them
loose and light. If merely _mashed_ the pudding will clod and be heavy.
In a deep pan stir to a cream a quarter of a pound of fresh butter, and
a quarter of a pound of powdered sugar; adding a grated nutmeg, a
tea-spoonful of powdered cinnamon, a half glass of white wine, and a
half glass of brandy. Beat in a shallow pan three eggs, till very thick
and smooth, and stir them into the mixture of butter and sugar,
alternately with the sweet potato. At the last mix all thoroughly with a
very hard stirring. Put the mixture into a deep dish, and lay a border
of puff-paste all round the rim. Set the pudding immediately into a
rather brisk oven, and when cool sift white sugar over it. For two of
these puddings _double_ the quantities of all the ingredients.

_White Potato Pudding_--Is made exactly as above. Chestnut pudding
also--the large Spanish chestnuts, boiled, peeled, and mashed.

_Fine Pumpkin Pudding_--Also, allowing to the above ingredients a half
pint of stewed pumpkins, squeezed dry and rubbed through a sieve.

_Cashaw Pudding._--A similar pudding may be made of stewed cashaw, or
winter squash.

PINE-APPLE TART.--Take a fine large ripe pine-apple. Remove the leaves,
and quarter it without paring, standing up each quarter in a deep plate,
and grating it down till you come to the rind. Strew plenty of powdered
sugar over the grated fruit. Cover it, and let it rest for an hour. Then
put it into a porcelain kettle, and steam it in its own syrup till
perfectly soft. Have ready some empty shells of puff-paste, baked either
in patty-pans or in soup plates. When they are cool, fill them full with
the grated pine-apple; add more sugar, and lay round the rim a border of
puff-paste.

QUINCE PIES.--Wash well, pare, and core some fine ripe quinces, having
cut out all the blemishes. Put the cores and parings into a small
sauce-pan, and stew them in a little water, till all broken to pieces.
Then strain and save the quince water. Having quartered the quinces, or
sliced them in round slices, transfer them to a porcelain stew-pan, and
pour over the quinces water extracted from boiling the cores and
parings. Let them cook in this till quite soft all through. Make them
very sweet with powdered sugar, and fill with them two deep soup plates
that have been baked empty, with a puff paste border round the rims.
Fill them up to the top, (they are already cooked) and sift sugar over
them--or, you may pile on the surface of each some ice-cream. You may
cook the quinces whole, and lay one on each tart.

FINE APPLE PIES--May be made in the same manner, flavored with the
grated yellow rind and juice of a lemon. The apples should be fine juicy
pippins. If done whole, lay one on each patty-pan tart, and stick into
the core hole a slip of the yellow rind of lemon, pared so thin as to be
nearly transparent.

A MERINGUE PUDDING.--Rub off upon a large lump of _sugar_ the yellow
rind of two fine ripe lemons, and mix it with a pound of powdered loaf
sugar, adding the juice. Whip, to a stiff froth, the _whites only_ of
eight eggs; and then, gradually, beat in the sugar and lemon, adding a
heaped table-spoonful of the finest flour. Spread part of the mixture
thickly over the bottom of a deep dish, the rim of which has been
bordered with a handsome wreath of puff-paste, and baked. Lay upon it a
thick layer of stiff currant or strawberry jelly. Then fill up the
dish, and set it, a few minutes in a rather cool oven to brown slightly.
This pudding is for dinner company. If you use oranges, omit half the
grated peel.

You may flavor the meringue with vanilla. Split, and break up a small
vanilla bean, and boil it in a _very little_ cream till all the vanilla
flavor is extracted, the cream tasting of it strongly. Then strain it
well, and mix the vanilla cream with the white of egg. Or, a little
_home-made_ extract of vanilla will be still better. This is obtained by
splitting and breaking up some vanilla beans, and steeping them for a
week or two in a bottle of _absolute_ alcohol; then straining the
liquid, transferring it to a clean bottle, and keeping it closely
corked. Very little of what is called "Extract of Vanilla" is good, and
it is more expensive than to make it yourself. Also, what is generally
sold for essence of lemon is very inferior to real lemon juice.

JELLY OR MARMALADE PUDDING.--Divide the paste equally and line two
puff-paste shells. Bake them empty; and while baking, beat till very
light and thick, the yolks of six eggs. Mix the beaten egg with a
liberal portion of any nice kind of fruit, jelly or marmalade, and boil
it ten minutes in a sauce-pan, stirring it well. Take it up and set it
away to cool. When cold, fill with it the baked shells. Fill them up to
the top with the mixture, and before they go to table sift powdered
white sugar over the surface of the puddings.

CHEESE PUDDING.--Take a quarter of a pound of excellent cheese; rich,
but not strong or old. Cut it in small bits, and then beat it (a little
at a time) in a marble mortar. Add a quarter of a pound of the best
fresh butter. Cut it up, and pound it in the mortar with the cheese,
till perfectly smooth and well mixed. Beat five eggs till very thick and
smooth. Mix them, gradually, with the cheese and butter. Put the mixture
into a deep dish with a rim. Have ready some puff-paste, and lay a broad
border of it all round the edge, ornamenting it handsomely. Set it
immediately into a moderate oven, and bake it till the paste is browned,
and has risen very high all round the edge of the dish. Sift white sugar
over it before it goes to table.

It is intended that the cheese taste shall predominate. But, if
preferred, you may make the mixture very sweet by adding powdered sugar;
it may be seasoned with nutmeg and mace. Either way is good.

It may be baked in small patty-pans, lined at the bottom and sides with
puff-paste. Remove them from the tins as soon as they come out of the
oven, and place them on a large dish.

This pudding is very nice made of rich fresh cream cheese; the rind, of
course, being pared off. Cream cheese pudding will require sugar and
spice--that is, a heaped tea-spoonful of powdered nutmeg, mace, and
cinnamon, all mixed; two ounces of fresh butter, and six eggs.

FLORENDINES.--These are made of any sort of fruit, stewed in its own
juice or in sweetmeat syrup, but when practicable, without any water. A
pint of this fruit is mixed with half a pint of fresh butter, and half a
pint of powdered sugar stirred together to a light cream, and then mixed
with three well-beaten eggs, and the fruit stirred in alternately with
the beaten butter and sugar. Have ready baked shells of puff-paste,
ready to be filled with the mixture. The fruit may be apples, quinces,
peaches, gooseberries, currants, raspberries. Cranberries, gooseberries,
and currants, require additional sugar, as they are naturally very sour.
If you use plums or cherries for any sort of cooking, stone them first.

PEACH PIES.--Take a sufficient number of fine juicy freestone peaches.
Clingstones are very hard and insipid when raw, and still more tasteless
when cooked. Peel the peaches and quarter them, having removed the
stones. Stew them in their own juice, and while hot make them very sweet
with white sugar. When you put them to stew, place among them a bunch of
fresh green peach leaves, to be removed when the peaches are done. Or,
cook with them some peach kernels, blanched in hot water, to be picked
out when the stewing is finished. Peach leaves or kernels communicate a
flavor which to most persons is pleasant. Have ready some puff-paste
shells; baked, and beginning to cool. Fill them to the top with the
stewed peaches, and pile on them some whipped cream sweetened, and
flavored with noyau or rose-water.

A FRUIT CHARLOTTE.--Have ready a large fresh almond sponge cake, or lady
cake. Cut a round or circular piece to fit the bottom of a great glass
bowl. Also, about twelve or fourteen oblong slices, to stand up all
round to line the sides. Have ready two quarts or more of ripe
strawberries or raspberries. Mash the fruit to a jam, and having made it
very sweet with white sugar, spread it thickly over the pieces of cake.
Lay the circular piece of cake in the bottom of the bowl and stand up
the others all round the sides, all close to each other or wrapping over
a little. Proceed to fill the bowl with the fruit; and when half way up,
put on another layer of sliced cake spread with fruit. Then fill up with
fruit to the top. Have ready a quart of whipped cream flavored with
vanilla or bitter almonds. Heap it high on the bowl, and set it in a
cool place till it goes to table. This is a very fine article for a nice
dessert, and can be prepared at a short notice, and without going down
stairs, as it requires no cooking.

For the whipped cream, you may pile the bowl with any sort of white
ice-cream ready made, and if there is no fresh fruit in season,
substitute marmalade or fruit jelly.

If you have no large bowl you may serve up this charlotte in glass or
china saucers, laying in the bottom of each a circular slice of cake
spread over with ripe fruit or marmalade. Fill up with the same, and
finish with whipped cream, or ice-cream heaped on the top.

VANILLA CUSTARDS.--Split a vanilla bean, break it into small bits, and
boil it in a half pint of milk, till all the flavor of the vanilla is
extracted. Strain it through a very fine strainer, cover it, and set it
aside. Boil a quart of rich milk, and when it comes to a boil set it
away to cool. Beat eight eggs till very thick and smooth, (and when the
milk is cold) add that which is flavored with vanilla, and stir it in