The housewife's referee

Bananas au Rhum. — Peel six large bananas cut in halves, place into a basin, and sprinkle over them a little Scotch whiskey and a little chopped lemon peel. Sprinkle castor sugar over this, and let them remain in an hour. Dip each piece in frying butter, and fry till a golden colour. Remove them from the pan, drain and dust them over with icing sugar and put in the oven to glaze ; when done sprinkle THE housewife's KEFEEEE with finely chopped pistachio kernels over them, and serve very hot. Batter Pudding. — One quart of milk; sixteen tablespoonfuls of flour, four eggs beaten very light ; salt to taste. Stir until the batter is free from lumps and bake in two buttered pie plates, or very shallow pudding dishes. Bavaroise with Strawberries and Cream; Eromage bavaroise aux fraises. — Pass two pints of ripe wood-strawberries through a fine hair sieve ; sweeten with half a pound of pounded sugar. Mix in three ounces of gelatine dissolved in a few tablespoonfuls of sherry. When cool, mix with it two pints of whipped cream. Beignets Souffles. — Put in a saucepan two gills of water, a very little salt, a full tablespoonful of sugar, and the same quantity of butter, also a small piece of grated lemon peel ; when nearly boiling remove from the fire, and add enough flour to make a light paste. Stir quickly with a wooden spoon till smooth ; let it cool, add one tablespoonful of vanilla, and break an egg into and stir quickly ; then another egg, and if necessary, add still one more to make it of the right consistency to drop slowly from a spoon. Then add the white of one egg, beaten to a stiff froth. Put aside for two hours, drop a small spoonful at a time into boiling lard. They should puff up light and large, and when golden brown remove from the fat. Roll in powdered sugar and serve hot. Benedictine Jelly. — Take one pound of lump sugar, two ounces of gelatine, half a pint of water, the juice of two lemons, and half a pint of Benedictine liqueur. Put the sugar with a pint of the water into a stewpan, and boil gently for ten minutes by the side of the fire, carefully removing the scum as it rises. Simmer the gelatine in the other half-pint of the water, and skim it carefully. Strain the lemon juice, and add it with the clarified gelatine to the syrup; put in the Benedictine, and bring the whole to boiling point. Let the saucepan remain covered by the side of the fire for a few minutes, then pour the jelly through a bag ; put it into a mould, and set the mould on ice till required. Bird's Nest. — Take a bird's nest mould (a quart size), and put in some liquefied wine jelly, coloured green, and stand it on ice, turn out when cold, and fill the inside with cream eggs, made either in egg moulds, or if there are no egg moulds handy, good-shaped eggshells may be used, thus : Cut off a top at the broad end of the egg, rinse the shell out with cold water after emptying it, and fill it with ivory cream ; or pierce a hole at one end of the egg, and let the contents out, aud then fill it with the cream. Ivory cream is made with good double cream, into which is stirred one ounce of gelatine soaked in sherry or brandy, and dissolved over a gentle fire, and then poured into the egg moulds, and after being set, placed in the nests, and the dish decorated with foliage and flowers.