PICKLED DAMSONS

Take 4 lbs. loaf sugar, 1.5 pints best vinegar, 2 dozen cloves, and a little mace and cinnamon. Boil all together till the sugar is dissolved, then pour the liquid over 5 lbs. of damsons in an earthenware vessel. Let the pickle stand for twenty-four hours, then pour off the liquid and boil it again. Pour it back over the damsons once more, let all stand for another day, then boil altogether for five minutes and store in jars for use.

PEA SOUP FOR WINTER

One quart split peas, 3 lbs. of shin beef or beef trimmings, 0.25 lbs. bacon, 2 carrots, 2 turnips, 5 onions, 1 head of celery, season to taste, 4 quarts of soft water. Soak the peas overnight in soft water, then boil them in the water till tender; then add the other ingredients and simmer for two hours, stirring occasionally.

A still more economical pea sop, costing about 1.5d. per quart. Take 0.25 lb onions, 0.25 lb carrots, head of celery, 0.75 lb. split peas, a little mint, 1 tablespoonful sugar, salt and pepper, 4 quarts of soft water. Cut up the vegetables and fry them for ten minutes in a little dripping, then pour the water on them, and when boiling add the peas. Simmer gently for three hours; then add the sugar seasoning and mint; boil for fifteen minutes and serve.

SAVOURY BACON ROLLS

1 lb. streaky bacon
salt and pepper to taste
0.5 lb. self-raising flour
4 oz. Dripping or margarine
2 lbs. potatoes, cooked and mashed
water

Prepare the pastry by mixing flour, seasoning, dripping or margarine, and mashed potatoes. Use a little water to bind. Flour a paste-board, and roll the mixture out thin and smooth. Cut the pastry into strips, and lay upon each strip a slice of bacon from which the rind and edge have been cut. Roll up the pastry and bacon quickly, put on a well-greased pan. Bake for half an hour.

HOREHOUND BEER

1 oz. of horehound, 1 oz. of burdock leaves, 5 ozs. of ginger, 0.25 oz. of hops, and the size of a hazel nut of gentian root. Tie all in a cloth, and boil in 5 gallons of water for an hour; then strain and again boil, adding 3 lbs. of brown sugar and 2 ozs. of Spanish juice. Ferment for 24 hours, then bottle.

SAUCE PIQUANT

For cutlets, roast meat, etc. Stew in the bottom of a pan six shallots, a small carrot a small bunch of parsley, thyme, mint, marjoram, and half a bay-leaf, together with 2 ozs. of butter and 2 slices of lean ham. Simmer over a slow fire till the bottom of the pan is covered with a brown glaze. Stir in 2 cloves, 6 peppercorns, 1 blade of mace, half a pint of stock, 4 tablespoons of vinegar, a lump of sugar, a pinch of cayenne, and a pinch of salt. Simmer gently for 15 minutes, skim off all fat, strain through a sieve, and serve very hot. If this sauce is too acid, use less vinegar.

POTATO AND SHRIMP SALAD

1.5 lbs. cooked new potatoes
1 doz. red turnip radishes
1 tablespoonful olive-oil
1 pint shrimp
1 tablespoonful vinegar
a handful of cress or watercress
4 hard boiled eggs
2 tablespoonfuls salad-dressing

Mix the olive-oil and vinegar with pepper and salt to taste on a plate. Have the potatoes cut into tiny squares rolled in the mixture, and then put them into the salad bowl, making them into a mound in the center. Place the cress or watercress round, and decorate with slices of egg and red radishes. Put the shrimps in tiny heaps between. Pour the dressing over the potatoes.

This salad may be varied with small pieces of white pork meat, scraps of chicken, or white fish. Or portions of tinned salmon freed of skin and bone will find a welcome in this salad meal so simple to prepare.

BEEF AND POTATO SURPRISE

0.5 lb. corned beef, lean
6 gherkins
2 lbs. mashed potato
6 onions ( from jar of mixed clear pickles)
6 small tomatoes

Cut the lean beef small. Pile the mashed potatoes in a dish, and surround with a border of diced beef. Cut up the onions in quarters, and stick them in the potatoes. Decorate with small gherkins, and tomatoes also cut in quarters.

GINGER BISCUITS

1.25 lbs. of flour, 1 lb. of brown sugar, 5 ozs. of butter, 1 oz. of ginger, 3 eggs, pinch of volatile.

Method- Sieve your flour and volatile together, add ginger, rub in your butter, make a bay, add in your sugar and eggs, make into dough, pin out, cut with a 4 inch cutter, place on clean greased tins, glaze with egg, place on the center of each biscuit a thin slice of orange peel, bake in a slow oven.

CREAM PUFFS

1 lb. of finest white flour, 12 eggs, 0.75 lb of fresh butter, 1 pint of water.

Method- Boil the water and butter together for three minutes, as it boils stir in the flour rapidly and smoothly, work till light, when coolish work in the eggs one by one, stir them well. It is a mistake to beat them first, as they get spent, when they are all in, the mixture should be like a well-whipped cream, and stand firm. Put out into 20 puffs, round in shape, high and cone form. Do all this quickly, bake and when done make an incision and cut the top carefully. Fill with whipped and flavoured cream, pink or white, dust with icing sugar, which shows white against the pale brown.

LEMON RICE

Boil one cupful of rice in a quart of mild until very soft, add to it while hot the yolks of 3 eggs well beaten the grated yellow rind of 2 lemons, 8 tablespoons of sugar, and a pinch of salt. If too hot add a little cold milk. Turn it into a pudding dish and cover with a meringue made with the whites of the eggs and 6 tablespoonsful of sugar whipped to a firm snow. Brown very delicately in a slow oven, and serve very cold. A cheap but delicious pudding.

BEEF CROQUETS

An excellent way to cook cold beef. Mince your cold beef (not too much fat) with a small onion. Season to taste with salt, pepper, and a little mace. Crumble half a slice of bread, add a dessertspoonful of flour, mix well together and bind with a beaten egg or a little milk. Roll into balls, dip them in flour or browned bread crumbs, and fry in butter or good fresh dripping. Serve with brown gravy, or with butter browned in the pan after cooking your croquets, adding water, flour for thickening, and a teaspoonful of meat extract.

RASPBERRY ROLLS

2 eggs, 2 oz. of castor sugar, 2 oz. of flour, quarter teaspoonful of baking powder, raspberry jam, 1 teaspoonful of milk, 4 drops of essence of lemon.

Method- Put the eggs and sugar into a basin, beat briskly for ten minutes. Mix the flour and baking powder together on a plate; add gradually to the eggs and sugar and milk. Pour into a dripping tin greased and lined with paper bake at the top of a hot oven five to seven minutes. Spread a piece of kitchen paper on a board, shake sugar over, turn the cake on to this, tear off the greased paper, cut the edges all round, spread the jam over, slightly warmed, roll up quickly. Cut across the middle.

FLOWER SALAD

2 lettuce
9 nasturtium leaves
0.25 lb. chopped nuts
9 nasturtium blossoms
9 nasturtium seeds (pickled)
3 tablespoonfuls salad-dressing

Pull the outer leaves of the lettuce to pieces after washing and drying them. Arrange in a shallow bowl. Then tear into narrow strips the nasturtium leaves and the hearts of lettuce, and mix them. Strain the seeds from the pickling vinegar, and add to the chopped nuts. Pile in little heaps, add the lettuce mixture, and pour on the dressing. Place the nasturtium blossoms between the tiny piles of nuts and seeds, and serve at once.

MUTTON STEW

Take 1.25 lbs. of lean nick of mutton, and trim off the fat. Cut a medium-sized white cabbage into quarters, place in a pan with the mutton, and cover both with cold water. Season with salt and a few peppercorns. Bring to a boil, and then simmer gently for two hours.

ONION SAUCE

Peel a couple of onions, and boil them until quite tender, then chop finely. Melt 1 oz. butter in a saucepan, and stir in 1 oz. flour. When quite smooth, and quarter pint of water and quarter pint of milk, and boil well. Then add the chopped onions and seasoning, and boil again.

CHICKEN CURRY

Remains of cold roast fowls, 2 onions, 1 apple, 2 oz. butter, 2 teaspoonsful curry powder, 1 teaspoonful flour, half pint brown gravy, 1 tablespoonful of lemon juice. Slice the onions, mince the apple, cut the fowl, and cook to a nice brown in the butter; add the curry powder, flour, and gravy, and stew gently for twenty minutes. Add the lemon juice, and serve with boiled rice.

FISH CAKES

Soak half a pound of bread in milk until quite soft, then squeeze as dry as possible, and beat with a fork until quite fine. Remove all skin and bone from the fish, and break into small pieces; mix with the bread, add pepper, salt, grated lemon rind and a little ground mace, an egg beaten and butter melted. Make into small flat cakes, brush them over with egg, cover them with bread crumbs, and fry in very hot butter a nice brown

BREAD AND BUTTER PUDDING

Put slices of bread and butter into a pie dish, use 2 ozs. of currants, a portion sprinkled between each layer and on the top; pour a beaten egg and 1.5 oz. of sugar in 1 pint of milk over the bread and butter, and bake in a moderate oven for about one hour. This pudding is better for standing a little time after it is made before being baked.

GARDEN OF EDEN PUDDING

Mix three-quarters of grated bread with the same weight of shred suet; 1 lb. of apples, half a lb. of currants, 4 eggs and the rind of half a lemon chopped fine. Mix all well together, and boil for three hours in a pudding basin. Serve with melted butter sauce. A fine pudding for parties and special days.

LEMON CHEESE CAKES

Quarter of a pound of butter, 1 lb. loaf sugar, broken into small pieces, 6 eggs, leaving out 2 whites, the rind of 3 lemons grated, and the juice of 3 lemons. Put the butter into a saucepan with the sugar, rind and juice of lemons, then add the eggs. Stir until it thickens like honey. When cold put into pots and tie down till wanted for baking. Use good, short, flaky, pastry and bake in a hot oven in small patty-pans.