VEGETABLE VARIETY

New Zealand Listener, Volume 31, Issue 791, 17 September 1954, Page 32

VEGETABLE VARIETY

HE busy housewife is apt to | get into a routine with vege- | tables — boiled, baked or steamed is the usual way. So here are some ideas for "perking them up" without much fussing} or time. For instance, a touch of made mustard in white sauce, or even butter, served with cabbage or cauliflower or any green leafy vegetable gives it a new Zest. Onion Butter This, too, is a simple zest giver, for cooked carrots or small beetroot, boiled tender and strained, as well as for cooked greens. Just saute 4% cup minced onion in 1% cup butter for 5 or 6 minutes, and pour over. For cabbage, cauliflower or lima beans, add also a dash of curry powder or made mustard. Yorkshire Leeks Scald leeks in boiling water, strain. Slowly stew in milk till done. When tender, dish up, thicken the liquor with butter, cornflour, etc. Then stir in, when off fire, an egg yolk or a little cream. Pour over leeks and decorate with tiny rolled rashers of bacon. Leek Pudding Make suet crust of 1% Ib. flour, % lb. finely shredded suet, 12 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoonful baking powder, and water to mix. Line pudding basin with this. Wash 6 medium-sized leeks, and cut into inch lengths. Fill lined basin with these, season with pepper and salt, add 1 oz. butter. Put on lid of suet crust, cover with butter paper, and steam about 3 hours, Serve with beef gravy. Spinach — With bacon: Fry a little cut up bacon golden brown in saucepan before adding the washed spinach (no water). Cook till tender, drain and mix well; add, if liked, a little grated horseradish. With beetroot: Melt a little butter in saucepan, and in it heat up a cupful of finelychopped hot beetroot; mix this with your freshly-cooked, chopped spinach, together with 1-2 chopped, hard-boiled eggs, about 2 tablespoons vinegar, pepper and salt to taste; make all very hot together. Parsnips in Tomato Sauce Slice 2 Ib. pared parsnips crosswise and cook in a small quantity of salted water till tender. In the meantime put into saucepan a medium onion (sliced) and % cup diced celery, 3142 cups canned (or home-preserved) tomato pulp, 1 teaspoon salt, a bay leaf, ¥% teaspoon pepper, 1 dessertspoon sugar, and 3 or 4 cloves. Simmer all this with lid on, for about 1% hour. Then add strained, cooked parsnips and simmer together for a few minutes. This is a very tasty vegetable dish served with either hot or cold meat, sausages or liver, or bacon, or with fried fish. Buttered Celery and Beets | Cook small-sized beets, rub off the skins under cold water, and chop them coarsely. Boil some celery in very little salted water, strain, and chop it finely, having about half as much celery as | beet. Fry some finely-chopped onion in a little butter (or clean fat) until tender but not brown, add the chopped beetroot and celery, season to taste with salt -and pepper, and add about 2 tablespoons vinegar. Make very hot quickly and serve. ‘ Onion Cheesies Boil sufficient large, peeled, whole onions until just tender, Strain care-

fully (not to break them) and place in a shallow baking dish. Cut a wide cross in the top of each, and sprinkle a few drops of thick plum or tomato sauce

in each cross, Then press 2 tablespoons of grated (processed) cheese into each cross. Bake in a moderate oven (about 350 degrees) for about 40 minutes or until the cheese is melted and golden brown, Pumpkin Tasty Steam about 2 Ib. pumpkin in water until tender; drain, add 2 large tablespoons cooked rice, and mash together, adding 2 tablespoons butter, pepper and salt to taste, and 1 teacup milk or cream. Beat 2 egg yolks and stir these in with 2 oz. grated cheese. Turn mixture into baking dish, ‘sprinkle with a generous layer of grated cheese, and a layer of breadcrumbs, with a few bits of butter scattered on top. Bake until nicely browned on top. Very tasty. Stuffed Spanish Onions Peel onions, cut a slice from top of each, and scoop out a part of centre, leaving a thick wall all round. Cover with salted boiling water and boil slowly 10 minutes; lift out carefully, invert and let drain. Take equal amounts of any kind of cold cooked meat, minced fine, and breadcrumbs. Chop up the portion taken from the onions, cook in a spoonful of butter until slightly coloured, then mix with the meat and crumbs, season with salt and pepper; add for each cupful 3 tablespoons melted butter. Fill the onions now with this mixture, place close together in a baking dish or casserole, pour in stock or water ¥% inch deep. Cover closely, and bake in moderate oven until onions are very tenderat least an hour. Then uncover, sprinkle with buttered crumbs and brown. Candied Mint Carrots Parboil sufficient washed and scraped carrots for 10 minutes in boiling salted water. Split them down lengthwise, unless very small and young. Arrange in casserole, sprinkle with brown sugar, and finely-chopped mint. Dot with generous knobs of butter. Bake in hot over Y an hour.