The Pocumtuc Housewife, a Guide to Domestic Cookery as it is Practised in ...

Some people consider it economical to heat Ovens with fagots, brush and light stuff. Hard wood heats it quicker and hotter. Take four foot wood split fine, and pile it criss-cross so as to nearly fill the oven, and keep putting in. A Roaring fire for an hotir or more is usually enough. The top and sides will at first be covered with black soot. See that it is aU burned off. Rake the coals over the bottom of the Oven and let them lie a minute. Then sweep it out clean. If you can hold your hand inside while you count Forty it is about right for flour bread; to count twenty is right for Rye and Indian. If it is too hot, wet an old broom two or three times and turn it round near the top of the oven till it dries; this prevents pies and cake from scorching on top. When you go into a new house, heat your oven two or three times to get it seasoned, before you use it. Bake the Brown bread first, then flour bread and Pies, then Cake or puddings, and last Custards. After everything else is out put in a pan of apples. Next morning they wiU be deliciously baked. A pot of Beans can be baking back side, out of the way with the Rest. If bread runs short before baking day comes, light cakes can be baked in the bake Kettle or the tin Baker. Draw out a solid mass of coals, set the bake-kettle, over it, put in your biscuit, put on the lid, and cover it with a thick layer of coals. Srea^ Bread when taken out of theovenjis^unprepared for the stomach. It should ripen before it is eaten. It goes through a Change similar to that in newly brewed beer. During this Change it sends off a large portion of carbon or unhealthy gas, and imbibes a large portion of Oxygen or healthy gas. Bread not only has onefifth more nutriment, according to the computation of physicians, after ripening, but imparts a much greater degree of cheerfulness. He that eats old ripe Bread will have a much greater flow of Animal spirits than he would were he to eat imripe bread. It should always ripen where the air is pure, never in a cellar, or a close cupboard, nor in a bedroom. Emptins. Nothing raises Bread so well as good lively beer emptins. If it is saved every time the beer keg is emptied you will always have a fresh supply. Some small families do not brew every week. In that case make a Batter of water in which hops have been boiled, thickened with flour and grated potato. When it is lukewarm put in a cup of emptins. Bottle it when it gets well a working. This will keep a fortnight or more. Always think to make more yeast before your supply is gone or soured, so that you have none to raise with. Only a shiftless housewife is willing to borrow of her more provident neighbor, except in an emergency. Rye and Indian Bread. Miss Louisa Stbbbins Put six or eight quarts each of Rye meal a^d Indian meal and a little salt into the bread trough and stir them together. Wet with milk and a pint of emptins, making it very stiff. Let it rise over night, mould it into loaves in the morning, and bake it on the bottom of the oven, not in pans. Put it way back with the bread slice so as to be out of the way. The longer it bakes the swedter it tastes. Stewed Pumpkin stirred in with the milk is good. Flour Bread Should have a sponge set the night before. Make a thin batter of flour and water with a mashed potato if you like, and add a cup of Emptins. If this sponge looks frothy in the morning it is a sign your bread will be good. Stjr in more flour. Knead it up pretty stiff and put in well greased pans. Let it rise until the loaves begin to crack, then bake an hotir. Raised Biscuit Are made much like bread except that a little shortening is used and they are allowed to get lighter. In winter biscuit dough can be kept on hand a long time. When company comes, cut off a piece, mould it up and bake it.