Household Hints.

King Country Chronicle, Volume III, Issue 141, 22 March 1909, Page 3

Household Hints.

Mince and Tomatoes. —Take four good sized tomatoes. Scoop out the middle of them, and mix the pulp with twice the quantity of cold minced mutton, chicken, rabbit, or beef. Flavour this with onion, pepper and salt. Then staff the tomatoes with the mixture. Bake for ten minutes in a .hot oven. To Roast Meat.—The usual period of time allowed for roasting beef is •boot fifteen minutes to the pound and fifteen minutes over. Matton requires the same amount of time, but lamb can do with three minutes less. Poutlry requires about thirteen minutes, veal sixteen to seventeen minutes, and pork at least twenty minutes to the pound. If you cook with a gas stove see that your oven is very hot before placing your joint inside. Leave the gas full on for about ten minutes, and then lower to about onethird of its former volume. Tripe and Tomatoes. —This is an uncommon way of cooking tripe. Wash and cut a pound of good tripe into thin strips. Mince a Spanish onion and fry in two ounces of butter, add the strips of tripe, and fry until a nice brown. Sprinkle in the pan with flour. When the flour is brown add two or three tomatoes, cut up, and a cupful of hot, brown gravy or water with a little meat extract dissolved in it. Cover down the pan, and simmer gently for three-quarters of an hour. Sprinkle a little grated cheese on the top, and serve very hot.

Mutton and Rice.—Line a buttered baking dish with a wall of cooked rice about half an inch thick. Fill the centre with cold roast or boiled mutton chopped rather fine and freed from bone and gristle. Season with salt, pepper and a little onion juice and gravy to make slightly moist. Cover with a layer of rice and bake half an hoar in a moderate oven. Remove the cover, spread lightly with melted butter and allow the top to become a delicate brown. Serve very bot with tomato sauce.

French Tart.— This is an elegant dish, and can be made with very little trouble. Make a good apple tart, and when cold, cut out a round piece of the top crust. Beat three-pennyworth of cream to a stiff froth with a little sugar. Heap it on the centre of the tart, put tiny dice of the crust on this again to garnish and then serve. You will have a delicious dish at very slight expense.

Chocolate Sandwich Cake.—Quarter lb of hatter, 10oz. of sugar, 9oz of flour, three eggs, ljoz of; powdered cocoa, one level teaspoonful of cream of tartar, half level teaspoonful of carbonate of soda, half breakfast cupful «>f milk. Sift the flour cocoa, cream of tartar, and Carbonate of soda, twice through a sieve together. Beat the butter and sugar to a cream, then beat in the eggs one by one. Now add the milk, mixing it well in and lastly stir in the flour, cocoa, etc. Bake, in two sandwich tins well buttered and lined with paper, in a moderate oven, for about three-quarters of an hour. Turn out into a sugared paper, and when cold place a little of this icing between and the rest smoothly pprcad over the top.

Black Crurant Gin. Cut off the stalks and snuffs of fine, sound black currants. Put a teacupful of picked fruit into a wine bottle, add a teacupful of caster sugar, fill the bottle with gin. Skake once a day for a few days, and after three months strain off the ing into clean bottles. This is fit for drinking after three months but greatly improves by keeping.

To Preserve Eggs.— Pour six quarts of boiling water on three pounds of lime, one ounce of cream of tartar, and half a pound of salt. When quite cold pour this over the fresh eggs, which have been carefully arranged in jars, and see tlfet there are none uncovered. Tie the jars over with thick paper, and stand on shelf in cool larder or store room.

To utilise lace curtains which have bad their day, cut out the worked wreaths and flowers from which the more delicate net has worn away.. Apply these to squares of velvet or satin, for use as cushion covers. Mounted on olive or metallic green velvet, or some soft wood brown shade, the effect is excellent. The back of the cushion may be made from silk of a corresponding tone. The kernels of fruit stones, such as plums, peaches, nectarines, steeped in brandy .make a delicious flavouring for light puddings and cakes. * • Don't forget that cucumbers make delicious sandwiches for afternoon tea in hot weather. They are cool, delicious and inexpensive. Lemon is invaluable at this season when the hands are so easily sunburnt. Keep the halves when the juice has been sqeezed, and atfer washing rub the hands with them. Marigold flowers are useful as a flavouring for soups and gravies. Gather tbem on a fine day, dty in oven till crisp, then powder and bottle for use. The flowers of the old English marigold should be used. Ice may be kept quite well if wrapped in a thick piece of house flannel, and then rested on an upturned basin. In very hot weather, it can be wrapped In paper, outside the flannel, to keep it cool. To Dry I'eai for Winter Use. — This is a German method for preserving peas, and I think you will find it successful. Allow a heaped teaspoonful of caster sugar to each quart of shelled peas. Sprinkle the peas with the sugar and lay them on a paper on a baking tin, and allow tbem to remain at the mouth of the oven until they arc quite dry. When cold, place the peas in a jar, tie over with paper, and keep in a dry place. These peas when cooked are like fresh green peas.