Feminine Interests

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 940, 5 April 1930, Page 23

Feminine Interests

What May be Done with A- Packet of Cornflour

MOST housewives keep a packet of cornflour in the store cupboard. It is ttseful alike for sauces, sweets and cakes, also to thicken creamed soups. There are some who consider it dull food, but that is because the cook does not use her imagination.

Auckland hostesses are very keen on * tbosa little biscuits with the split jlmond atop, popularly known as “alB( ,nd biscuits,” which arc among the stock-in-trade of all the home-made calte-sbops. Next time you are giv]nl. a party, suppose you make them voirself —not buy them as you usually jj 0 > They are exceptionally easy of ,roompUshment, and, moreover, from th „ same recipe you can make quite * variety of delicous things. First and foremost you can vary the flavour of the biscuit itself by using vanilla, lemon, ratafia or any o t!i*r essence outside almond—the biscuit taking its name from whatever essence you use. A spot, of icing would perhaps take the place of the usual split almond in any of these instances. Or it you make the biscuits rather small, with a little icing or jam between each two, you might tonvert them into dainty little •‘kisses.”

The mixture rolled out, using a little more flour in the process, also jnakes dainty tartlet cases which, filled with a little crushed fruit and with whipped cream on top, make lovely "party ’ offerings. It may also ho used successfully as casings for cheese cakes or apple shortcake. With the self-same mixture as a basis, you can also contrive attractive "nut slices” by just rolling chopped nuts into it. and with a sharp knife cutting the pastry into “fingers.” Here is the original recipe: FAIR V SHORTBREAD The proportions are Jib butter, 1J cups of flour, £ cup cornflour, 1 egg (both white and yolk), 1 small cup o: less of sifted Icing sugar, a pinch of salt, i teaspoon of baking powder, flavouring. Beat butter, sugar and egg together with flavouring, sift in flour and cornflour with the salt, work all well together. For biscuits roll into little balls between the hands and place two inches apart, on a cold oven tray. Bake .slowly. Blancmange as made in the ordinary manner served with fruit, seems to be a popular standing summer sweet. For a change you may like to hear of three recipes for varying them. Here they are: BLANCMANGE WITH VARIATIONS Marble Blancmange.—Boil one pint milk and one tablespoon sugar and three clean peach leaves, add one tablespoon cornflour mixed to a paste with milk; stir till thick anil simmer a few minutes. Take away half (removing leaves) and stir. dissolved chocolate Into the remainder. Into a wetted mould place alternately white and brown blancmange and leave to set. Turn out and serve with apricot jam and cream. Coconut Blancmange.—To the pudding previously described add one dessertspoon desiccated coconut, and serve with maple syrup. Rainbow Blancmange.—Make double the quantity of blancmange, arranging in layers when cooling, pink then white, then brown (colouring witli cochineal and cocoa), continuing till the mould is filled. Serve with whipped cream. A favourite pudding with children FRUIT BLANCMANGE Make your favourite blancmange, after having stewed half a pound of fruit in season until it is reduced to Mb. Rinse a mould in cold water, and arrange some of the fruit on the bottom. Pour in some of the warm blancmange mixture; then mix the remaining fruit with the rest of the blancmange and pour into the mould. Place in a cold spot to set. Turn out and serve with whipped cream. Here is another hot-day dish which has proved a favourite with many people:— SNOW PUDDING Mix together three tablespoons of cornflour, six tablespoons of sugar and * little salt with a small quantity of

farewell party MILFORD CRUISING CLUB ENTERTAINS The clubhouse of the Milford CruisTh was well patronised on nuriday evening - , when members and supporters met to say au revoir to and Mrs. T. Webster, who are to settle at Wade I vj n , t Presetltin K them with life memp Jewels, and also a framed enlargement of their launch, Rita W„ wtiij " arl >riek said that members a’n? * realise their guests had nost carried the club on their shoulw.i? S. ce fts inception. Mr. Webster suitably replied. M«/' ne ' ,n<l u card tournament a Pleasant time. During the lit, 1 K . M,S - E Woods sang, and ■s Atfsa Forbes gave a figure dance. ; e prizes in the canl tournament ° n k>' Mrs. Oborn and Mr. AN. renee. WOMEN’S INSTITUTES BR ANCH formed at waiuku <lw>*M l>Prct ' iat,ve audience was adth» rn? Waiuku by .Mrs. Irwin, of it w a , K e j n^.it,le Institute, recently, and that to f orm an institute in and « ‘ nrTl A committee was formed b eet ’ n s arranged for the third th. -i, V month. Mrs. Best took Vfr. and the following officers , ele cted:—President Mrs. Scape: Ms o'- M »- Thomson: treasurer. Jfuir committee Mesdnmes MU. vile -Maugham Bisclioff, Barri®WheEd, x.eul and Fitchett,

cold water. Boil three breakfast cups of water and pour on to the cornflour and sugar. Boil together for three minutes. Beat up the whites of three eggs stiffly and lightly stir into the cornflour, mixing all together. Flavour as liked. Pour into a mould and leave till set. Turn out on a pretty dish. Make a steamed custard sauce with the yolks of eggs and serve with the snow pudding. A dish cf nicely stewed apples, apricots or peaches served with the above pudding is an improvement. Another favourite is TAPIOCA AND CORNFLOUR MOULD Take lioz. of medium tapioca, wash o. two or three times in cold water and mix it with loz. of cornflour; add to it half a pint of cold water, let it soak for half an hour or longer, then add one pint of milk and simmer Quite gently in a double saucepan for half an hour, stirring until it thickens and occasionally afterward. Clean and seed l£oz. of raisins and shred aoz. of candied peel, add these, with sugar to taste. Rinse out a china mould in cold water and pour the mixture into it.. It should be sufficiently stiff to turn out neatly, and yet be • very creamy and moist in texture. If flavouring is used instead of the raisins and peel, allow about eight drops of lemon, vanilla or almond. Lastly, here is a sweet the children will love: ORANGE AND CORNFLOUR SWEET First, make a creamy custard as : follows: Take of cornflour, 1 pint of milk, Joz. of butter, two eggs, lioz. of sugar, \ teaspoon essence of vanilla. Mix the cornflour to a smooth consistency with a little of the milk. Bring the rest of the milk to the boil. Pour the mixed cornflour into the , milk, whisking vigorously, and boil for six minutes. Add the butter and the egg yolks beaten well with the sugar, stirring continuously. Remove from the fire. Beat up the egg whites to a stiff snow with the vanilla, and stir lightly to the slightly cooled mix- ; ture. Allow it to get cold. When cold remove the skin, whisk again, and pour over shredded oranges placed either in a pretty glass dish , or in custard glasses.

FRENCH MUSTARD Take 4oz. of mustard, 2oz. of curry powder, IT cups of sugar, i cup of flour, and 1 pint of vinegar. Mix them all well together, and put away in airtight bottles. If you wish to make a larger quantity, just increase each ingredient.

LADY DIANA BRIDGEMAN HAS SURPRISE WEDDING THREE DAYS’ ENGAGEMENT CONTRAST WITH ABBEY SPLENDOUR One of the most interesting and

dashing figures in the “younger set” of English society, Lady Diana Bridgeman, daughter of the Earl and Countess of Bradford, chose a wedding recently in keeping with her love of surprise.

Her engagement had been announced for only three days when she arrived at Prince’s Row Registry Office, and was married to Sir Robert Abdy in ten minutes. Only five people were present, in- ■ eluding the bride’s parents and Mr. Terence Philip, witness for the bride- - groom, who waited with Sir Robert ! Abdy for a quarter of an hour before • the bride arrived. TWEED BRIDE One of Lady Diana’s, first public appearances was as bridesmaid to Prin- . cess Mary, Countess of Harewood. At the stately ceremony in Westminster Abbey she wore a long gown of silver tissue and silver lace, reaching to her feet, and a veil of tulle. At her own wedding she had a beige satin shirt blouse and tweed skirt, beneath a tweed coat belted with red, and had a red pull-on felt hat to match. She carried a sable stole over her arm. Lady Diana left with her bridegroom Cor Victoria to catch the lunch-time boat train to the Continent. ARTIST, POET, ACTRESS Lady Diana is a most versatile person. She rides often and fearlessly to hounds, studies art at the Slade School, writes poetry, and acts in amateur productions. She is short and . slim, with a vivid and interesting face. Sir Robert Abdy is the divorced j husband of Iya Abdy, and the owner I of art and antique shops in London I and Paris.

SALMON MAKES TASTY DISHES

A tin of salmon can be turned into a variety of appetising meals and now that summer is over, cold mayonnaise gives place to hot dishes. Salmon patties are particularly delicious, and can be made easily, according to this recipe by Miss A. Gibbs, who lias the Diploma of the Sydney Technical College. Ingredients: One small tin salmon, 1 rounded dessertspoon butter, one rounded dessertspoon flour, A cup milk, lemon juice, salt and cayenne, Alb rough puff pastry. Method: Make a thick sauce by melting the butter in a saucepan; next add the flour and stir till j smooth. Cook about one minute, add | the’ milk all at once, and stir till it j thickens. Remove gristle, and mix I the salmon with the sauce. Flavour j with the salt, cayenne and lemon • juice. For the pastry use £lb plain flour, one level teaspoonful baking powder, pinch salt, 4oz. fat (butter) or any good fat may be used, £ pint water. Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt, drop in pieces of fat about the size of a small nut (but do not rub it in. as in short crust). Add the water steadily, make rather a soft dough, turn on to a floured board, knead very little, roll into a long oblong sheet, fold in three, then the i opposite way in two. Next, roll the | pastry out thinly. Use two plain cutj ters. the smaller one the same size ; as the top of the # tins: the other one 1 should be two sizes larger. Cut out 12 rounds with the smaller cutter ! tor the tops, then the same uu.mber ; with the larger cutter. Line some ; i greased r;eat patty tins with the I i larger rounds, wet round the edges of j I the pastry with a brush, till with the ■ j salmon mixture, place tops on. brush j with egg glazing or milk, and bake ; in a hot oven about 15 minutes. Serve on a d’oyley and garnish with lemon and parsley.

CHAIRS OF TODAY

DESIGNING FOR THE MANY ELIMINATION OF FAULTS The most cursory examination of the history of chairmaking would lead one to believe that not only do no two generations think alike, but that no two generations sit alike, says an overseas writer. Almost every decade produces another and quite individual type of chair, and it would j sem that the perfect proportions guaranteed to give perfect repose have not yet been found. During the last half-century no article of general use, which at the same time can be classed both as an article of commerce and an object of art, has undergone a greater transformation than the chair. The evolution of machinery, which made possible the production of an infinite number of exactly similar objects. destroyed the local styles, and i where a craftsman once made a painstaking copy of an ancient model, ! or created a new shape to his own ! liking, several machine-made chairs j could be bought at a lower cost. This should have increased rather than decreased the importance of the designer, for where an article is destined to be reproduced in hundreds and sent to many parts of the couutry, or even all over the world, and thus form part of the life of many people, it would seem that its making were of greater importance Ilian that , of an individual object which could | only influence a few, .

Unfortunately, the result was entirely opposite, for the mania for copying the antigue had begun. Originally a revolt against the bad taste and low standard of design which were prevalent in the latter part of the last century, this return tt) the past merely enabled the moderately poor to acquire pretentious but shoddy copies of objects created for the rich in a different epoch, and intended for a different purpose than : that to which they were now put. The result was complete sterility in the world of decorative and applied art/and the only really creative work of that period was directly connected with the machine. Thonet created the chair of bent wood, which from that time became the standard chair the world over for offices, factories and general everyday use. In our day Gropius created the chair of bent metal tubing, which bids fair to rival the btent wood chair in popularity. The necessity, however, of finding new styles which would be suitable to the new architecture, and the new ; decoration which this architecture im- | posed, was soon realised, and with the : decline of imitation Baroque, Gothic. , and Tudor, 'came the beginnings of the New Art movement. Since then many styles have been : born and died; the clumsy type of chair which is generally associated with this revival has almost disappeared. and the search for simplicity lias begun. A growing realisation on the part .of the designers of the type of home for which the majority of chairs is destined lias manifested itself in the • production of innumerable shapes which, although roomy and cemfort- , able, take up the least possible space, j and are neither subserviently antique [nor boastfully; modern, . i