The housekeeper's guide to preserved meats, fruits, vegetables, &c

Nurses know how the little thing rebels against it and spits it out, but it is the nurse’s fault. Nature’s food is sweet, and salt an acquired taste, as we learn from our old friend “ Friday.” 'When beef-tea is given to infants use sugar instead of salt, and no difficulty will be then experienced in getting the little patient to take it. When a considerable amount | of nourishment is ordered, after the arrowroot is made eggs can be added i and beaten in. When the food is for ! invalids' it is best only to add the yolks of the eggs. There are several forms of ARROWROOT PUDDING, which can be made as I have already described by pouring boiling water on to some moistened arrowroot. Eggs can then be added or not according to whether the pudding is required rich or otherwise. ! The pudding can then be poured into a mould or put in a pie-dish and baked for rather less than an hour in the oven. When it is baked some nutmeg should be grated over the top. The flavourings before mentioned in arrowroot for invalids can be used. When lemon-peel is used, the peel can be boiled in the milk or water, or lumps of sugar can be rubbed on the outside of a lemon and the sugar used to sweeten the arrowroot. When arrowroot pudding is put in a mould and afterwards turned out on to a glass dish it can be served with jam round, which also helps to set off the appearance of the dish. Little heaps of greengage, apricot, and raspberry jam placed round the base of the dish is a great improvement. The top of the mould can sometimes be ornamented with jam, but this depends on the shape of the mould. ARROWROOT, TO THICKEN WITH.— Arrowroot is often used for thickening soups, gravies, etc. Cooks should bear in mind that although the soup or gravy may look plenty thick enough while boiling, yet when it begins to get cool it will get thinner, and therefore, especially in the case of gravy when they use arrowroot for thickening, they must make it thicker than they afterwards want it to be, or in other words they must allow for its getting thinner. For thickening soups and gravies I think cornflour superior to arrowroot. There are various dishes to be made from arrowroot, such as arrowroot blanc-mange, arrowroot cream, arrowroot drops, arrowroot fritters, arrowroot jelly, arrowroot sauce, arrowroot souffle, etc. , receipts for making which will be found in Cassell’s Dictionary of Cookery. ASPARAGUS. — Asparagus is now sold in tins, and is one of the best of preserved vegetables, as it is quite equal in flavour to fresh. The best method of serving preserved asparagus is to warm it up in i tire tin. Then when hot cut off the top | of the tin and have ready a piece of j toast in a vegetable dish. Take out the asparagus gently and avoid breaking off | the points. Lay the asparagus with the points on the toast and the stalk part resting on the edge of the dish half one side and half another. See if any asparagus tops have been left in the tin, and if so take them out and put them on the centre of the asparagus. Some melted butter or white sauce can be handed round with the asparagus, but should never be poured over it, as many persons prefer to eat it quite plain. Some also like butter simply oiled. One very nice way of eating asparagus is as