A year's cookery

3. Hot cross buns may be ordered of the baker, or they may be made at home. If the latter plan is adopted, an ounce of fresh German yeast will be required. Take three pounds of fine flour, mix a pinch of salt with it, and rub in eight ounces of good butter. Turn the yeast into a basin, and beat it up well with a table-spoonful of moist sugar till it is a liquid. Add a pint and a half of lukewarm water or milk and two well-beaten eggs, and mix all with the flour to make a batter. Sprinkle a little flour over the dough, cover the bowl with a cloth, and let the dough rise before the fire for a couple of hours ; then knead it up well with ten ounces of sugar, half a pound of washed and dried currants, and a little grated nutmeg. Make the dough into buns. Lay these in rows on baking-tins, with an inch or two between each, cut them twice on the top with a knife to make the sign of a cross, and let them rise before the fire for ten minutes. Bake in a quick oven. This quantity will make about three dozen buns. The buns can be toasted and buttered, or made hot in the oven, like teacakes, before serving. April 10th. [Supposed to be Good Friday.) Breakfast. Prawns. Toasted Bacon. Hot Cross Buns, Toasted and Buttered. Cold Buns, Buttered. Brown and White Bread and Butter. Marmalade. Corn Flour Milk. Luncheon. Mutton Croquettes. Sago Pudding. Dinner. Salt Fish. Egg Sauce. Boiled Parsnips. Hashed Mutton. Pigeon Pie. Potatoes. Bice Mould, with Compote of Oranges. Cheese. Breakfast. — Prawns (February 7th); Toasted Bacon (January 19th) ; Hot Cross Buns (Note 3, April 9th) ; Corn Flour Milk (June 19th). Luncheon. — Neat slices can be cut from the cold leg of mutton to make hash for dinner, and the unsightly remnants can be used for the croquettes (January 6th) ; Sago Pudding (March 9th). K Dinner.— Salt Fish. — Take the fish out of the water in which it has been soaked, wash it well, and put it into a fish-kettle with plenty of cold water. Bring it gently to a boil, clear off the scum, and let it simmer till the flesh will leave the bone easily. A piece weighing three or four pounds will take from half to three-quarters of an hour. Drain it, put it on a dish covered with a napkin, garnish with parsley and tufts of scraped horseradish. Send egg sauce to table in a tureen, and boiled parsnips as an accompaniment. Egg Sauce. — Boil three eggs for ten minutes till they are hard. When cold, shell them and cut them up, first in slices and afterwards in dice. Have ready half a pint of melted butter, stir the egg into it, make it hot without allowing it to boil, and serve. Boiled Parsnips (September 30th) ; Hashed Mutton (May 18th) ; Pigeon Pie (May 15th) ; Potatoes (May 12th) ; Bice Mould made yesterday (October 7th) ; Compote of Oranges (December 6th) ; Cheese (June 8th). Things that must not be Forgotten. 1. Make stock of the leg of mutton bone (February 13th). 2. Boil the brine and scald the pan. April Hth. Breakfast. Luncheon. Roiled Eggs. Salt Cod Rechauffe. Potted Pheasant. Brown Betty. Hot Buttered Toast. Dry Toast. Brown and White Bread and Butter. Porridge. Dinner. Vermicelli Soup. Stewed Steak. Baked Potatoes. Greens. Preserved Peaches. Custard. Cheese. Marketing.