The national course in home economics

Fish cooked in a fireless cooker is delightful. Fish is a food that may be easily cooked over a blaze, but the fireless is especially serviceable for cooking fish when one wishes to find the meal cooked when arriving home, as fish does not become soft nor fall to pieces by standing a considerable length of time in the fireless cookstove. All meats are best cooked in a fireless cooker. The more expensive meats are not necessarily the most nutritious. If the housewife thoroughly understands the right way to prepare the cheaper meats, and has a fireless cook stove, it is possible to have a tender and juicy piece of meat at a comparatively small cost. Meat, although one of the most important foods — and one of the most expensive — is too often ruined in the cooking. By the stove method much of the rich, juicy nutriments are cooked out of the meat, leaving it a hard, leathery fiber. Meats cooked in a fireless stove do not lose in weight, because nothing escapes, and there is no shrinkage from evaporation. It is a recognized fact that the tough meats can be reduced to toothsome tender- 486f FIRELESS COOKERY ness if steamed in a closed roaster for several hours. This is the principle of the fireless cooker. BROWN BEEF STEW. Cut two pounds of beef into small cubes. Roll them in flour. Put two tablespoons of suet in sauce pan, shake it over the fire until it is well melted. Remove the cracklings and throw in the meat. Shake over fire until slightly browned. Draw the meat to one side of the pan, add two tablespoons of flour to the fat. When smooth, add one quart of stock, one teaspoon of salt, one onion, one bay leaf, one small carrot, one saltspoon of pepper and one teaspoon of some good sauce. Place in fireless cookstove for three hours, using two radiators. BEEF AU GRATIN. Put in baking dish a layer of bread crumbs, then some thin slices of fat salt pork, slices of cold cooked beef, onion, parsley and another layer of crumbs, until the dish is full; pour over all any left-over gravy so as to moisten. Bake in the fireless cooker for one hour. Use two radiators. BOILED DINNER. Take three or four pounds of corned beef, cover with cold water and let boil slowly for twenty minutes. Then skim and add a small cabbage, a few carrots, potatoes and turnips and boil for five minutes. Place in the fireless stove for four hours, llse one radiator. ROAST CHICKEN. The time necessary for roasting a chicken depends on the age of the bird. One hour and a half is sufficiently long for a young chicken, but an older one should be roasted two hours, and a very tough chicken three hours. If this course is followed, old chickens will turn out as tender and savory as spring chickens. Prepare the chicken in your usual method for the oven. It will not be necessary to heat the chicken to brown it before it has been placed in the fireless. If both radiators are made very hot the chicken when roasted will turn out nicely browned. The chicken, therefore, can be placed cold in the vessel and placed at once in the cooker for roasting. It is not necessary to open the cooker for basting as the hot steam prevents burning. CHICKEN STEW.