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- Frontmatter
- Preface
- Introduction
- Equipment and Supplies
- General Kitchen Necessities
- Preparing and Mixing Utensils
- Cooking Utensils
- Staple Supplies
- Handling the Recipe
- Directions for Measuring
- Regulating the Heat
- A Few Definitions
- Some Useful Suggestions
- Recipes
- Soups
- Fish
- Meats
- Poultry
- Vegetables
- Salads and Salad Dressings
- Pastry
- Puddings
- Cakes, Cookies, Etc.
- Ice Cream and Ices
- Hot Beverages
- Cereals
- Eggs
- Hot Breads and Griddle-Cakes
- Fruits
- White Sauces
- Index
- About This Digital Edition
Warm food should never be put in the ice-box, but should stand outside until it becomes cool.
Two or three yards of clean white cheese-cloth should always be kept in the kitchen. It will be found useful for many purposes.
In using a double-boiler, it is important to see that the lower compartment is always kept about half full of boiling water. As the water boils away, more should be added from time to time.
Use a small soft brush or a piece of tissue-paper wadded up into a soft ball for buttering baking-dishes. If the pans are heated slightly just before buttering, the process is made much easier.
Twenty minutes or so before meal-time, the dishes required for serving hot food should be placed on the warming-shelf or in the warming-compartment of the stove, so that they will be thoroughly warm when the meal is ready to serve.
The tissue-paper wrappings of oranges, grapefruit, etc., should always be straightened out and placed on a hook in the kitchen, for use in draining fried food, in wiping out greasy pans and dishes before washing, and in numerous other ways.
A jar or bowl in which to pour all fat and drippings left from cooking meat, especially bacon and other forms of pork, should be kept conveniently at hand. This fat may be used for frying eggs, potatoes, etc., and may also be used instead of butter in making muffins and in greasing muffin-pans.
Bits of stale bread and crackers should always be saved, and from time to time rolled out on a bread-board into crumbs. These crumbs are useful in many ways. When ready to use them, they may be “buttered” if desired, by adding one tablespoon of melted butter and a quarter-teaspoon of salt to a half-cup of crumbs, and mixing well together.
To separate the white from the yolk of an egg when each is to be beaten separately, crack the shell, then pull the shell apart and pour the contents back and forth from one half of the shell to the other, allowing the white to drop off gradually into a bowl while still keeping the yolk in the shell. When nothing is left in the shell but the yolk, this should then be put into another bowl. If the white is beaten first, it will not be necessary to wash the beater before beating the yolk.
When frying anything in “deep fat,” from two to three pounds of fat should be used, and the kettle containing the fat should be set over a slow fire at least ten minutes before the frying process begins. The fat must be carefully watched and handled, as a serious accident can easily be caused by its spilling or catching fire. It should never be smoking hot for cooking; tests should be made from time to time with small bits of the material to be fried, and the heat regulated on the basis of these tests. The moment all the material has been fried, the kettle should be taken off the fire and set in some safe place to cool for a few minutes. Then pour out the fat through a fine strainer or piece of cheese-cloth into a bowl or jar kept for this purpose. After it is thoroughly cold, the fat should be placed in the ice-box.
