CRACKERS AND CHEESE TOASTED.
Butter some zepherettes and sprinkle thickly with grated Parmesan cheese, bake in a quick oven, or toast on a gridiron; serve hot.
CRACKERS WITH CREAM CHEESE AND GUAVA JELLY.
Spread zepherettes with cream cheese and dot with Guava jelly.
WELSH RAREBIT.
Half a pound of American cheese, two butter balls, two eggs, half a teaspoonful of mustard, a saltspoonful of salt, a dash of cayenne pepper, half a cup of milk and an even saltspoonful of soda. Cut the cheese fine, melt the butter in a chafing dish or spider, stir the mustard, salt and pepper with it, then add the cheese and milk; when the cheese is dissolved add the eggs slightly beaten and stir until it thickens. Serve on toast.
CHEESE SOUFFLÉ.
Melt one tablespoonful of butter in a spider, add to it a slightly heaping tablespoonful of flour and one cup of hot milk, half a teaspoonful of salt, a dash of cayenne pepper and one cup of grated Parmesan cheese; then add the yolks of three eggs beaten light, remove from the fire and let it cool; then add the whites of eggs beaten stiff, turn into a pudding dish, bake twenty-five minutes and serve immediately.
CHEESE STRAWS.
Take two ounces of flour and three ounces of Parmesan cheese grated (it is better to buy the cheese by the pound and have it grated at home), and two ounces of butter. Rub the butter into the flour, add the cheese and a little salt and cayenne pepper, and make into a paste with the yolk of an egg; roll the paste out in a sheet about an eighth of an inch thick and five inches wide and cut in narrow strips; bake in a hot oven about ten minutes.
PÂTE À CHOU FOR SOUPS.
Put a gill of milk and an ounce of butter into a saucepan over the fire; when it comes to the boiling point add two ounces of sifted flour; stir with a wooden spoon until thick and smooth, then add two eggs, one at a time, beating briskly; remove from the fire and spread out thin, cut in pieces, the size of a small bean, put them in a sieve, dredge with flour, shake it well and fry in boiling fat until a nice brown. Add to the soup after it is in the tureen.
A FILLING FOR PATTIES.
Break two eggs in a bowl, add a little salt and white pepper, a few drops of onion juice and four tablespoonfuls of cream, beat slightly; turn into a buttered tin cup, stand in a saucepan with a little boiling water in it on the stove, cover and cook until stiff—about three or four minutes—remove from the fire, turn out of the cup. When ready to use cut in half-inch slices and then into stars or any fancy shape preferred, or into dice. Make a cream sauce thicker than for other uses, that it may not run through the pastry; put them in the sauce, bring to the boiling point and fill the patties just as they are to be served.
GRUEL OF KERNEL FLOUR OR MIDDLINGS.
Put a pint of boiling water in a saucepan over the fire; mix two heaping teaspoonfuls of the flour with a little cold water and stir into the boiling water. Let it boil twenty minutes, add a little cream to it and salt. Very nutritious.
KOUMYSS.
Dissolve a third of a cake of compressed yeast in a little tepid water; take a quart of milk, fresh from the cow, or warmed to blood heat, and add to it a tablespoonful of sugar and the dissolved yeast. Put the mixture immediately in beer bottles with patent stoppers, filling to the neck, and let them stand for twelve hours where bread would be set to rise—that is, in a temperature of 68 or 70 degrees—then stand the bottles upside down on ice until wanted.
HOME-MADE BAKING POWDER.
Procure from a reliable druggist one-half pound of the best bicarbonate of soda, one pound of cream of tartar and one-half pound of Kingsford's cornstarch. Mix thoroughly and sift three times, put up in small tins. The best baking powder.
One ounce of Mexican vanilla bean, two ounces of loaf sugar, eight ounces of French rose water, twenty-four ounces of alcohol 95 per cent. Cut up the bean and pound with the sugar in a mortar, sift and pound again until all is a fine powder. Mix the alcohol and rose water; put the vanilla in a paper filter, pour over it a little of the liquid at a time until all is used; filter again if not all is dissolved. Paper filters may be obtained at any of the large drug stores. The extract may be darkened by using a little caramel.
VANILLA SUGAR.
Half a pound of loaf sugar, half an ounce of Mexican vanilla beans. Cut the beans very fine, pound in a mortar with the sugar; sift and pound again until all is fine. Bottle and cork tight and keep in a dark place.
SPINACH FOR COLORING.
Pound some spinach in a mortar, adding a little water; squeeze through a cheese cloth, put in a saucepan over the fire, bring to a boil; when it curdles remove from the stove. Strain through a very fine sieve; what remains on the under part of the sieve is the coloring. It is used for coloring pistache ice cream, jellies, etc.
TOMATO PASTE FOR SANDWICHES.
Skin and cut small three large tomatoes, cook until tender and press through a sieve fine enough to retain the seeds; return to the fire, add two ounces of butter, two ounces of grated bread crumbs and two ounces of grated Parmesan cheese. When it boils stir a beaten egg quickly into it, remove at once from the fire. It must not boil after the egg is added, as it will curdle. Turn the mixture into a bowl and when cold, if it is not for immediate use, cover with melted butter.
CHEESE PASTE FOR SANDWICHES.
Boil two eggs hard, separate the yolks from the whites, mash the yolks smooth and chop the whites very fine; mix and put through a vegetable press, then add butter the size of a small egg and three heaping tablespoonfuls of grated American cheese. Beat together until it is a fine, smooth paste. If not salt enough add a little, and also dry mustard, if liked.
