This is best, to my thinking, when made as under:--Smooth two or three tablespoonfuls groats in a basin with a little milk or water. Pour on boiling milk or water--a cupful to each spoonful of groats--stirring the while. Return to saucepan and cook gently for 10 to 15 minutes, or in double boiler for about half an hour.
Manhu Wheat or Barley Porridge.
Take 1 part of the flaked wheat or barley to 2 parts water. Have the water boiling and salted to taste. Add the cereal all at once, and boil for 5 minutes; only stir sufficiently to keep it from burning. It may now be served, but is better if steamed half an hour or so longer in double boiler.
Serve with milk or cream and sugar, or salt as preferred. When served with stewed fruit this makes a very wholesome dish. A mixture of the wheat and barley makes a very good porridge.
The value of
Provost Oats
for porridge is too well known to need comment here. I would only remind everyone that Provost Oats are prepared from the finest Scotch grain, and Scotch oats are the finest in the world. But Provost Oats is not the only product upon which Messrs Robinson & Sons rest their fame. More recently they have put upon the market a very fine cereal food known as
Provost Nuts.
This is a highly concentrated and nutritious and sustaining food, but can be digested very easily, and so is suitable in one form or other for every one.
It is a grain food scientifically prepared from a combination of wheat, barley, and malt. Being cooked and ready for use it may be served simply with a little cream, milk, or stewed fruit; or cyclists or other travellers may munch them dry, and so compa.s.s the simple life right away. Besides _au naturel_, however, they may enter with advantage into quite a variety of dishes--to thicken and enrich soups, to take the place of bread crumbs in savouries, and to contrive quite a number of new and excellent puddings. Recipes for the latter are given, p. 108, and I am sure they need only be tried to become first favourites.
Kornules
are a somewhat similar preparation, and can be used in the same way.
HEALTH FOODS DEPOT and REFORM FOOD RESTAURANT.
RICHARDS & CO., 73 N. Hanover St., EDINBURGH.
NUT b.u.t.tERS.
It will soon be impossible to even enumerate the many excellent varieties of Nut b.u.t.ters and vegetarian fats upon the market. One of the first really good fats available, and one which has stood the test of time and compet.i.tion, is
Cocoa Nut b.u.t.ter,
put up by the London Nut Food Co., one of the earliest and most enterprising firms to whom we are indebted for doing so much to make easy the path of food reform. This is a hard white fat, very pure and sweet, suitable for use in place of cooking b.u.t.ter, lard, or dripping. It is especially good for frying all kinds of cutlets, fritters, &c., and being of a firm consistency, can be flaked in a nut mill or grater to be used in place of suet. In baking also it will be found very convenient to flake in this way, as it only requires to be stirred through the flour, instead of the more tedious process of "rubbing in." To
Mapleton, Manchester,
belongs, I think, the credit of producing the first really dainty and palatable
Table Nut b.u.t.ters,
and his enterprise, we are glad to see, is justified by his success, he having recently acquired land, works, plant, &c., in the country, where the manufacture of the various nut foods can be carried on under ideal conditions. This must appeal to all food reformers, who realise that clean, dainty food cannot be produced amid dirty, insanitary surroundings.
Mapleton"s Table Nut Margarine
(as these goods which resemble b.u.t.ter, and yet are not dairy b.u.t.ter, must now be called) is of remarkable purity and excellence, a north country dairy farmer declaring that he would not have known it from good fresh b.u.t.ter!
Readers will sympathise with the manufacturers of pure foods who are, in obedience to an arbitrary Act of Parliament, obliged to label their goods "Margarine." It is a comfort, however, to know that the name is all these goods have in common with the often objectionable fats which come under this comprehensive t.i.tle.
The Nut Cream b.u.t.ters
are for table use also. They have the distinct flavour of the nuts from which prepared--walnut, almond, hazel, cocoanut, &c. The latter is, I believe, an exclusive specialty, and is useful in practically every variety of cakes, scones, puddings, and sweets. It supplies the place both of b.u.t.ter and flavourings. Recipes for Cocoanut Sauce, Cocoanut Icing, Cocoanut Custard, &c., will be found in the book, but it can be used in any other recipes at discretion.
Cooking Nutter, a soft, white fat, and Nutter Suet, a hard make suitable for baking, are among the other notable products of this firm.
Nuttene,
manufactured by Messrs Chapman, Liverpool, is another fat of undoubted excellence. It can be used in all departments of cookery in place of lard, dripping, suet, or b.u.t.ter. This firm also produces Cashew, Walnut, Almond, and Nut Table b.u.t.ter of great delicacy and fine flavour.
Especially worthy of mention are the various Nut b.u.t.ters manufactured by
R. Winter, Birmingham.
They are put up in several varieties--Nutarian Almond Margarine, Nutarian Walnut Margarine, Nutarian Cashew Margarine, Nutarian Table Margarine, Nutarian Cocoanut Margarine, and Nutarian Lard for cooking. There are no finer b.u.t.ters on the market, and as this firm sends a 5s. parcel of their goods carriage paid one can easily sample them. These Nutarian b.u.t.ters are put up in 1/2 lb. and 1 lb. carton tins--an exceedingly handy form.
Cashew Nut b.u.t.ter, 6-1/2d. per 1/2 lb., 1s. per 1 lb., is a first favourite.
Quite a different cla.s.s of b.u.t.ters, but equally valuable in extending the resources of food reformers, are those put up by the International Health a.s.sociation.
Almond b.u.t.ter
is very suitable for invalids and those of weak digestion. It is light, delicate, and nourishing, and can be diluted to use as a b.u.t.ter, cream or milk. The
Nut b.u.t.ter
is made from cooked nuts only, and may be added to soups and savouries of every description with advantage both to nutrition and flavour. It contains all the valuable properties of the nut--proteid as well as fat.
Mapleton"s Brown Almond b.u.t.ter is also very useful in enriching soups, gravies, &c.
For Goods of Guaranteed Purity send to
Richard & Co."s Health Food Stores,
73 North Hanover St., EDINBURGH.