FoodNet

The Queen Cook Book: A Careful Compilation of Recipes and Practical ...

1895

Page 120

Presented as published in 1895. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
When going to housekeeping purchase steel silver- plated knives, as they are sharper than the white metal. Pieces of bread should be dried in heater, grated, and kept in tight jar ready for puddings or croquettes. With a little care there will not be many. Clean bottles with shot, soap and ashes; clean the shot for next time. Use spirits of camphor to take out fresh paint, but if dried on persevere with spirits of turpentine. To clean steel knives, cut a raw potato in two, and dip in brick-dust, rub hard. Take one teaspoon of spirits of ammonia to one cup of hot water, to clean coat collars, woolen goods, rusty silk, or spots on carpet. Good to clean silver. Never put new papering over old. It is very easily taken off by putting two or three pails of boiling hot The Queen Cook Book 303 water in the closed room, as often as it stops steaming, till it will peel off; perhaps two days or more. Where it does not peel off easily take a pail of hot water soak paper with a cloth and scrape the wall clear of paste with a sharp scraper till perfectly smooth. Every farmer should purchase a reliable recipe book for his wife's next birthday, or for Christmas — which ever comes first — that his table may be furnished with nourishing food, and in such a variety as to satisfy the cravings of nature. What is lacking at the daily table is sometimes made up out of the stimulus of tobacco and whisky. Farmers should provide all kinds of fresh meats, vegetables, fruits, milk, butter, eggs and cereals for their own table and then raise to sell. Do not save them only for company. Man or woman can not work with profit more than ten hours a day. What is needed on the farm, next to plenty of sleep, is plenty of food and a variety on the table at all three of its spreads. Good sweet bread, meat, fruit, un- skimmed new milk, should be eaten as appetite desires, and not salt meat and fried potatoes, or boiled with the skins on, three times a day. Under the influence of good food and sleep, and the ten-hour law, our skel- eton boys and girls, whose lives are on the farm, would put on flesh and the bloom of youth, and would have some light in their eyes and some happiness in their hearts. Does not the farmer's wife need help in the kitchen, as well as help on the farm } An over wearied body can not keep up a cheerful heart. Ignorant mistresses make poor servants and receive poor service from what would be good material if properly directed. While princesses are taught the rules of cooking and dressmaking and to know how long it takes a woman and a broom to sweep and dust a room, there J 304 The Queen Cook Booh are many daughters in our country who have felt it beneath them to learn the necessary duties of life, and when married have not known whether they were re- quiring impossibilities of their one servant or other- wise. There are so many helps nowadays that no beginner need be discouraged if she keeps patience and perseverance at her side. A cook, if such a per- son has any inherent capacity, can be made a good cook only by an intelligent mistress. Good health in our homes is more to be Considered than sumptuous upholstery, elegant dinners or expensive table service. A beautiful home is a comfortable one. The condi- tion of the mind has more influence upon the bodily health than is generally supposed. It is no doubt true that diseases of the body cause a depressing and mor- bid condition of the mind, but it is no less true that sorrowful and disagreeable emotions produce disease in persons who, uninfluenced by them, would be in sound health. Or, if disease is not produced, the functions are disordered. Agreeable emotions set in mo- tion nervous currents which stimulate the blood, brain and every part of the system into healthful activity; while grief, disappointment of feeling and brooding over present sorrows or past mistakes depress all vital forces.