YOUR CLUB AND MINE

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 248, 10 January 1928, Page 5

YOUR CLUB AND MINE

AN OPEN PAGE

Bach Tuesday afternoon a corner will be reserved for original contributions of general interest to womenfolk- The subject matter is for you to choose—whatever topic Interests you may also be of Interest or amusement to others, whether it be about your hobbies, experiences, or merely amusing musings about the ordinary round of the day. A book prize is offered weekly for the best effort, which should be brief, plainly written, and sent to “Your Club and Mine,” THE SUN, Auckland.

The prize has been awarded this week to' Miss K. Knight for the following article:

CAMP COOKERY

HOLIDAY EXPERIENCES A woman gets fed up with cooking when she is at home, and she does not always feel quite pleased with the prospect of camp cooking. No stove, smoke getting in her eyes, pots tipping into the sand and spilling all the good things, are not features that she likes to dwell upon. And she usually gets someone else to do the cooking. The most obliging man usually gets nabbed—when he is not looking, for men hate cooking in the smoke. Frank did our cooking, for the first part of the holiday. The first day he smoked the tea. The billy lid fitted very tightly, so he boiled the water without putting the lid on, so that he would not need to burn his fingers getting it off. He had a thousand excuses for the smoked, beastly mess he called tea. “Billy tea is not the real thing unless it is smoked,” he said. “You want plenty of the dried driftwood flavour in real billy tea.” “I don’t,” I assured him. “I hate dried driftwood in tea. There is a correct place for everything, and tea is not the place for smoke.” ,

“You are too fussy. I don’t mind if it is smoked.” j “Sure?” “Quite sure. Women are too fussy for anything. You will suck cigarettes through your nose without turning a hair, but you grouse about smoke in the tea.” “If you do not mind smoky tea, I will take a cup of that out for you, but you must make some more for us. We all hate smoky tea,” I said decidedly. Frank sniffed, and poured the contents of the billy into the sand. The next brew was better, and the funny part of it all was that I noticed a very cautious Frank spilling his smoky tea into the grass. He said a cockroach was drowned in it. Then our cook cooked marrowfat peas. His instructions were for four hours’ boiling over a gentle fire, timed to be ready at 12.30. At twelve o’clock they had just come to the boil. At one o’clock they had baked hard to the billy, while Frank threw rocks down the cliff into the sea. They (the peas) had been on all morning, cook said, but he had forgotten to light much of a fire. Perhaps they had not boiled. Ahd, in any case, they were spoilt, so why worry whether or not they would have been done if they had escaped burning. Blowflies visited the ham. Cook wanted a little bundle of sandwiches to take fishing on his morning off, so he helped himself to ham, and left the cover off. The state of the ham when I went to it the next day is not to be described. But it was the pancakes that de--cided the issue of the new cook. Frank used to boast about the pancakes he made in his cow-spanking days, so he was asked to show his skill over the camp fire. The first one flopped into the fire in the turning-over process. It was hauled out of the ashes, cooked on the other side, and dumped on to my plate. I am afraid my nose showed my distaste for the ashy concoction. “What is the matter with it?” Frank demanded. “It is a bit —a bit—well, a bit ashy, Frankie.” “Good Lord, that won’t hurt you. Anybody would think ashes were poison. “But they are not really nice, dear.” “Poof! Nice!” I did not dare to say any more about ashes, and started to eat. My knife went through the pan-

t/caianu c«u i> lii lYiaiuu. cake, but the fork would not. I made desperate signs across the grass to one of the other men, and he came to the rescue. “Ask him,” I whispered, “if he found the baking powder.” Frank was amazed. “Whatever do you want baking powder in pancakes for?” “You mean there is none in?” “Of course not. You don’t need baking powder when you have eggs.” I heaved a big sigh, and tipped the pancake over the bank. And we got a new cook for the next meal. Certainly he did strain the potatoes out of the billy along with the water, but he used baking powder in his batter mixtures, and he catered a little bit for palate. But oh! the joy when his wife cooked the tea! Even Frank enjoyed that meal, and mumbled something about the inferiority of cooks. And I thought: “Poor she things—why ever are they so foolishly capable?” K. M. KNIGHT.