The girl's own cookery book

If we wish to make a coffee soufflé, instead of the vanilla souffle, the recipe for making which I have given, we should have to substitute very strong coffee and cream for the milk and vanilla. It may, however, be useful if I give the details for making another very delicious dish, lemon souffle. Clean a fresh lemon, peel the rind off very thinly, being very careful not to take the thick white pith, which IS always bitter, put it into a stewpan with half a pint of milk till the flavour is extracted, then strain it ; melt an ounce of butter in a small stewpan ; stir in two dessert-spoonfuls of flour and one dessert-spoonful of arrowroot, and when quite smooth and well cooked, add a dessert-spoonful of castor sugar, and, very gradually the milk. When the sauce is thick and smooth, add the yolks of three eggs, one at a time, as in the first instance, and the whites of four eggs, and steam or bake the soufflé according to the directions already given. PIES AND TARTS. Oaths, I imagine, like making pastry. Indeed, in a girl’s mind, a cook is usually a person who can make a pie. If we try to persuade a girl to practise cookeiy, and she is inclined to yield to our persuasion, the first thing .she will do to show her willingness will be to offer to make some pies. On the whole 1 think she would act very sensibly in doing this. Making pastry is very pleasant work, and when pies are well made and well baked they are very satisfactory things to look at as well as to eat and they exist as tangible proofs of the skill of the maker. Somehow a pie is not so fleeting and evanescent as a stew or a soup. These are generally demolished as soon as they are accomplished facts, and in the course of a couple of hours their glory is a thing of the past ; but pies remain (for a short time only). They are carried off into the larder, and are allowed to go cold, and the cook can if Pies and Tarts. she likes pay them a visit and look at them and feast her eyes on the work of her hands. We will therefore spend a little time in talking over the methods to be adopted in making pastry ; and first we have to consider our utensils and materials. A good cook always collects together everything that she is likely to want before she begins to work. By this means she saves time. If she were to put her hands into the flour, and then leave it and clear them while she fetched a rolling-pin or a dish, she would be half as long again over her business as she needed to be. She is wise when she “ lets her head save her heels as the saying is, — by first thinking over and then collecting her utensils and ingredients, and putting them in one place, so that they will be at hand when wanted. In order to make pastry it is necessary to have a pastry board, a rolling pin, a flour dredger, a knife, some flour, salt, butter, or sweet dripping, water, an egg or two, a little sugar, and, if approved, some baking-powder. There must be also a clean basin, some pie dishes, tartlet tins, baking sheets, and either meat, fruit, jam, or whatever else is intended to constitute the contents of the pies or tarts. With these contents, however, I have at present nothing to do. I shall confine myself entirely to the pastry.