Virginia Cookery-book

Stew as many peaches as you choose, allowing a quarter of a pound of sugar to one of fruit ; mash it up smooth as it cooks, and when it is dry enough to spread in a thin sheet on a board greased with butter, set it out in the sun to dry, and when dry it can be rolled up like leather wrapped up in a cloth, and will keep perfectly from season to season. School-children regard it as a delightful addition to their lunch of biscuit or cold bread. Apple and quince leather are made in the same fashion, only a little flavoring of spice or lemon is added to them. These leathers are made in the valley of Virginia, and seldom seen elsewhere in the State. Butter Taffy. This may be made by first melting in a shallow vessel a quarter of a pound of butter, adding to it one pound of brown sugar ; stir them together fifteen minutes, or until a little of the mixture, dropped in cold water, will break clear between the teeth vidthout sticking to them. Extract of lemon, pineapple, or vanilla should be added for flavoring just before the candy is done. The taffy, when taken from the fire, should be poured into a shallow dish, which must be buttered on the top and edges. By drawing a knife across it when partially cold, it can be broken into squares, 18* Cocoa-nut Conbs. Beat to a froth two eggs; add gradually a small cup of sugar, one cup of cocoa-nut grated, one spoonful of flour; make into cone shape by rolling them. Put on buttered sheets of tin; cover with letter-paper, and bake five minutes in a quick oven. Let them cool before removing from the tin. First-Rate Molasses Candy. One gallon of good, fair molasses, five pounds of brown sugar, and a quarter of a pound of butter ; boil together until they candy well ; then pour out in buttered dishes, and pull until very white. It is crisp, and uncommonly good. Chocolate Caramels. Not quite half a pound of Baker's Chocolate, one pound and a half of brown sugar, a quarter of a pound of butter, a teacupful of cream; cook steadily for thirty minutes after it begins to boil; put in a table-spoonful of vanilla just before taking it off the fire. Delightful Cough Candy. Break up a cupful of slippery-elm bark, and let it soak for an hour in water poured over it in the measuring-cup. Half fill a cup with flaxseed, and fill up to the brim with water, leaving it to soak the same time as the slippery-elm. When you are ready to make the candy, put one pound and a half of brown sugar in a stewpan over the fire; pour the water from the slippery-elm and flaxseed over it, straining the last, and stir constantly until it boils and begins to turn back to sugar; then turn it out, and it will break up into crumbly, small pieces. For preachers or teachers who use their voices too much, it will be found an admirable and agreeable medicine, the taste being peculiarly pleasant. It is highly recommended to any one subject to throat affections. The best flavor for it is a little lemon-juice. CHAPTER XXVI. FRITTERS, PANCAKES, ETC. French Fritters. — Bell Fritters. — Rice Fritters. — Puff Fritters. — Apple Fritters. — Spanish Fritters. — Snow-flake Sauce. — Benyville Fritters.— Quaking Pudding.— Pancakes.— Scotch Pancakes. Fbench Fbittbbs.