PICKLED PLUMS or DAMSONS.--The fruit must be large, fine, fully ripe, and with no blemishes. To every quart of plums allow a quarter of a pound of loaf-sugar powdered, and a pint of the best cider vinegar.
Damsons being more acid will require half a pound of sugar. Put the fruit with the sugar and vinegar into a preserving kettle, adding little bags with some broken pieces of cinnamon and some blades of mace, and, if you choose, a few cloves. Give them one boil up, and skim them well.
Put them warm into stone jars, and cover them closely at once. By winter they will be fit for use.
_Another way._--Is to pack a jar more than three-fourths full with layers of ripe plums or damsons; and thick layers of powdered sugar between. Fill up with cold vinegar, and cover them tightly.
PICKLED CHERRIES.--Take large, fine, red cherries, perfectly ripe, and cut the stems about an inch long. Put the cherries into jars with layers of powdered sugar between each layer of fruit, interspersing them with little, thin muslin bags of broken cinnamon, mace, and nutmeg. The jars should be three-quarters full of cherries and sugar. Fill up with cold vinegar, and cover them closely.
TO KEEP STRING BEANS AND GREEN PEAS.--String the beans, (which should be full grown but not old,) and cut them into _three_ pieces--not more.
Pack them in wide-mouthed stone-jars; a layer of beans and a thin layer of fine salt. The day before they are to be cooked, take out a sufficient quant.i.ty, and soak them at least twenty-four hours in a pan of cold water, changing the water several times, till it no longer tastes salt. Having drained them well, boil the beans till quite tender.
Then take them up, drain off the water thoroughly, so as to have the beans as dry as possible. Next put them into a sauce-pan, with a piece of fresh b.u.t.ter and a little black pepper. Cover the pan, and stew them in the b.u.t.ter till they almost come to a boil.
Green peas may be kept in a similar manner. They should be fresh and young. When you take them out of the salt, soak them, as above, for twenty-four hours or more; changing the water till it tastes quite fresh. Boil them soft; then drain them, and stew them a while with b.u.t.ter and pepper.
You may, while boiling, add a _very little_ soda to the peas or beans.
This will green and soften them. Too much soda will give them a disagreeable taste, and render them unfit to eat.
SCOTCH SHORT-CAKE.[453-*]--Take a pound of Zante currants; and, after they are well picked and washed, dry them on a large dish before the fire, or on the top of a stove. Instead of currants, you may use sultana or seedless raisins cut in half. When well dried, dredge the fruit profusely with flour to prevent its clodding while baking. Have ready a tea-spoonful of mixed spice, powdered mace, nutmeg, and cinnamon. Sift two quarts of flour, and spread it to dry at the fire. Cut up a pound of the best fresh b.u.t.ter; put it into a clean sauce-pan, and melt it over the fire; shaking it round and taking care that it does not burn. Put the flour into a large pan, and mix with it a pound of powdered white sugar. Pour the melted b.u.t.ter warm into the midst of the flour and sugar; and with a large spoon or a broad knife mix the whole thoroughly into a soft dough or paste, _without using a drop of water_. Next sprinkle in the fruit, a handful at a time, (stirring hard between each handful) and finish with a tea-spoonful of spice, well mixed in. Let all the ingredients be thoroughly incorporated.
Strew some flour on your paste-board; lay the lumps of dough upon it, flour your hands, and knead it a while on all sides. Then cut it in half, and roll out each sheet about an inch thick. With a jagging-iron cut it into large squares, ovals, triangles, or any form you please, and p.r.i.c.k the surface handsomely, with a fork. b.u.t.ter some square pans, put in the cakes, and bake them brown.
For currants and raisins, you may subst.i.tute citron cut into slips and floured. This cake will be found very fine if the receipt is _exactly_ followed. In cold weather it keeps well; and packed in a tin or wooden box, may be sent many hundred miles, for Thanksgiving-day, Christmas, or New Year"s.
It is still more Scotch made of fine fresh oatmeal, sifted and dried.
When in London, the author has eaten Scotch cake sent from Edinburgh, and made as above, but of oatmeal.
[453-* This receipt, though inserted somewhat out of place, is too good to be omitted.]
RICE WAFFLES.--Take a tea-cup and a half, or a common sized tumbler-full and a half, of rice that has been well boiled, and warm it in a pint of rich milk, stirring it till smooth and thoroughly mixed. Then remove it from the fire, and stir in a pint of cold milk and a small teaspoonful of salt. Beat four eggs very light, and stir them into the mixture, in turn with sufficient rice flour to make a thick batter. Bake it in a waffle-iron. Send them to table hot; b.u.t.ter them; and eat them with powdered sugar and cinnamon, prepared in a small bowl for the purpose.
THE INDIAN MEAL BOOK.
HINTS ON HEATING OVENS, AND BAKING.--Brick ovens are generally heated with dry f.a.gots 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 ma.s.s 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 then depositing them 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 sc.r.a.ping, with a broad knife. If it is well sc.r.a.ped after every cake is taken off, it will not want greasing, as there will be no stickiness. Otherwise, some b.u.t.ter 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 b.u.t.ter, lard, or nice beef or veal-dripping may be subst.i.tuted, 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 saltiness, 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. These 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 quant.i.ty 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 gla.s.s 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 rinse 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 gla.s.s 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 or 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--brewers" or bakers"
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 endeavouring 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, sal-eratus, 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 nor 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 r.e.t.a.r.d their rising.
INDIAN BREAD, OR PONE.--Four quarts of Indian meal sifted.--A large half pint of wheat flour.--A heaping 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 ma.s.s 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 paste-board, 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, coa.r.s.e towel, previously 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; 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, sal-eratus, 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 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.
INDIAN RYE BREAD.--Two quarts of Indian meal. Two quarts of rye meal.--Three pints of milk or water. Two teaspoonfuls of salt.--Half a pint of strong fresh yeast. Having sifted the rye and Indian meal into 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 ma.s.s 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, subst.i.tuting wheat for rye flour.