FARMERS HOUSEHOLD TOPICS

THE SOUTHERN FARMER
TOPICS FOR THE HOUSEHOLD.


SAUCE FOR GAME – One saltspoon of salt, half to two-thirds saltspoon of cayenne, one dessertspoon of lemon juice, one dessertspoon of pounded sugar, two dessertspoons of Harvey and three of port wine. To be well mixed, heated and poured over the bird, it having been previously sliced in several places, so that the sauce may mix with its own gravy. The bird to be put in the dish without anything.

LYONNAISE POTATOES – Take your boiled potatoes, let them get cold, and slice them thin, and cut the slices once or twice across; take one onion and slice that very thin, and cut it once across, dividing the circles of the onion so that they no longer hold together. Just put a piece of butter in a pan and fry it brown. Say, for a peck of potatoes, two onions – not more. When your onion is fried, put in a little more butter, and brown onion and all together; serve hot; salt and pepper slightly.

ROAST FOWL – The German way. Truss the fowl for roasting, stuff the breast with veal stuffing, and fill the body with chestnuts boiled tender, peeled and roasted; split it, and put it to roast at a brisk fire. Have a dozen more roasted chestnuts peeled, stew them in a pint of gravy, season it with pepper and salt, and thicken it with a piece of butter rolled in flour. Boil until it is smooth. Fry half a dozen sausages, pour the sauce into the dish, place the fowl in it, and the sausages around the fowl. Garnish with slices of lemon.

ENGLISH MINCE MEAT – Of scraped beef or tongue (cooked), free from skin and strings, weigh two pounds, four pounds of suit, picked and chopped. Then dry six pounds of currants, rub them in a cloth first, to clean them.; raisins, stoned and chopped, two pounds; three pounds of apples, the peel and juice of two lemons, one nutmeg, quarter of an ounce of cloves, ditto mace, ditto pimento, in finest powder. Put the whole into a deep jar, and keep covered in a dry, cool place. Half the quantity is enough for a very large family. Have citron, orange, and lemon peel ready, and put some of each in the pies when made. English mince pies are made in pattypans. Brandy and wine.

BAKED CHICKEN PIE – To make the crust, use on-half pound of butter to every pound of flour, and three teaspoonfuls of baking powder; chop one-half of the butter into the prepared flour until it is well mixed in. Add a little ice-cold water, and work it into a stiff dough. Roll it into a thin sheet, and spread on one-half of the remaining butter, fold it up, and re-roll it. Then spread on all of the butter; fold again as before, and roll out thin. Cut it the size required for the pie. Line the bottom and sides of a well-buttered earthen cake-pan or pudding-dish with the crust. Then, to a large, tender chicken, add almost half a pound of salt pork. Have the pork chopped fine, and lay on one layer of pork. Pepper it, using no salt, and cover with pieces of chicken.; then another layer of pork, and so on until the chicken is used up. Have three hard-boiled eggs chopped up and added with the chicken. Before laying on the top crust, place a few small lumps of butter about the top, and add water enough to make as much gravy as may be desired. Cut a star or other ornament on the top, and bake for an hour in a slow oven.

TO MAKE COFFEE. – A gentleman from Ceylon states that the custom there to make coffee was as follows: Put sufficient ground coffee into cold water over night; in the morning strain off; then heat. He adds his testimony that coffee made under this plan is excellent in flavor, and those who are bilious will not find the evil effect produced by the old method.

CHICKEN PIE – Boil the chicken until tender, salt to the taste, make a crust with one quart flour, two small tablespoons lard, one teaspoon salt, one teaspoon soda, two of cream tartar, sifted with the flour; two cups sweet milk. Work the lard in the flour as quickly as possible, and make the dough as soft as you can roll out. Line a deep dish with the crust, put in the chicken, with the large bones removed, one small teacup of the chicken broth, a little salt and pepper; cover with the crust, and bake one hour. Serve with gravy made form the chicken broth.

FRITTERS – OYSTER – Beat two eggs very light; then stir in two tablespoons cream or milk, three tablespoons sifted flour, a pinch of salt. Dip the oysters in this, and fry in hot lard. CLAM – Take twenty-five clams and stew them in their own liquor. Salt and pepper them slightly. Cook for fifteen minutes slowly. Drain the clams, chopping them as fine as possible, removing all the hard portions first. Make a batter of four eggs, with a half-pint of sifter flour and a pint of milk. Get it as smooth as possible. Mix the clams with tit. Use butter for frying. A small addition of parsley is excellent. PEA – Cook a pint, or three ups, more peas than you need for dinner. Mash while hot, seasoning with pepper, salt, and butter. Put by until morning. Make a batter of two beaten eggs, a cup of milk, quarter of a teaspoon soda, half a teaspoonful of cream tartar, and half a cup of flour. Stir the peas into this, beaten very hard, and cook as you would griddle cakes. BRAIN – Half pint of milk, quarter of a pound of flour, two eggs, half light teaspoonful of salt, a saltspoonful of white pepper, and a teaspoonful of chopped parsley. Stir the milk gradually into the flour and salt and the well-beaten yolks of the eggs, parsley and pepper, then the whites of the eggs. Drain all the salt and water from the brains, break them up thoroughly with a fork, and then put them in the batter, beating them well in. Fry them by the tablespoonful in boiling drippings or a mixture of lard band butter with an expenditure of sixty-five cents, or with wine seventy-five cents, if you use wine for the stew, you have three dishes, sufficient for quite two days’ dinner for six people.

WHEN AN EGG IS FRESH – An egg is said to be fresh, when in the summer it has been laid only a couple of days, and in the winter three to six. The shells being porous, the water in the interior evaporates and leaves a cavity of greater or less extent. To determine the exact age of eggs, dissolve about four ounces of common salt in a quart of pure water, and then immerse the egg. If it be only a day or so old, it will sink to the bottom of the vessel, but if it be three days old it will float in the liquid. If more than five it comes to the surface, and rises above in proportion to its increased age.

STORING ONIONS
A dry, cold, airy loft is the best for storing onions. Do not let them lie more than two or three bulbs thick, and often look them over and pull out bad ones. Do not remove any of the outer rind, but what comes off in the handling. They also keep well in ropes and hung up, the easiest way to make them which is to tie them on a hay or straw band, which is better than a stake. This plan is useful where shelf room is scarce; but the points to observe are a cool, airy situation, warmth and moisture being more inimical to their keeping than frost.

A common sized tumbler holds half a pint. A tablespoonful is equal to sixty drops, or half an ounce of liquids. Four teaspoonful are equal to one tablespoonful.

TO BROIL A STEAK – Always butter your gridiron, cook the steak quickly over a bright fire, turning as often as they drip. Lay upon a hot dish, season with butter and salt, cover with heated platter.

To beat the white of eggs quickly, add a pinch of salt, which will cool and freshen them, as the cooler the eggs are, the quicker they will froth.