HINTS FOR THE HOUSEWIFE

Dominion, Volume 18, Issue 150, 21 March 1925, Page 15

HINTS FOR THE HOUSEWIFE

DOMESTIC JOTTINGS : BEAUTY IN VINEGAR. There are several beauty treatments that can be given with the help of a little vinegar. If your hands are rough and red, they will soon becomo soft and white if treated to a vinegar pack for a night or two. Get some fine oatmeal and mix it to a paste with ordinary vinegar. Spread tins paste over the hands and sleep in loose-fitting gloves, with a small holo cut in the palms for ventilation. This mixture is wonderfully effective. A water-softener for toilet purposes can be made from vinegar and a little simple tincture of benzoin, which will not only soften the water, but will perfume it beautifully. Put half a pint of vinegar in a bottle. Add to this, a few drops at a time, an ounce of simple tincture of benzoin. Shake the botttle frequently while adding the benzoin. Then cork tightly, and leave for 10 days or a fortnight, shaking every day. When required, add a teaspoontul to a basin of water and two tablespoonfuls to a bath.

TO REMOVE SCORCH MARKS. Sometimes light sponging with peroxide of hydrogen will remove the | scorch marks from silk, but this is not I alf.-ays effective. A preparation which has been strongly recommended for scorch marks on linen, is prepared as follows, and would probably be effective on silk also: —Quarter pound Fuller’s earth, quarter pound washing soda, one pint vinegar, two onions. Peel and slice the onions and pound them up. ;Add the vinegar and' Fuller’s earth, and mix well. Then add the washing sc/la. Put the mixture into an enamel saucepan and simmer gently for ten minutes. Strain and bottle. The mixture will keep for any length of time, and a little of it should be applied to the scorched place before washing.

TO WASH LINENS AND* VOILES. It is as well to wash two or three frocks together, as the same bran bag will then "do” for all. Take about four handfuls of ordinary bran and tie in a loose muslin bag. Put the bag in an enamel bucket of clean kerosene tin fitted, bucket fashion, with a handle. Fill the bucket with cold water and bring the water to boiling point. Boil for five minutes and -then empty the bran water into the washing bowl. Add cold water as required, and wash the frocks as usual with plenty of soap, rinsing the bran water thoroughly through them. Meanwhile put the same brang bag on to boil with another fresh bucket of water, and by the time the frocks have received their first wash this water will be warm enough to rinse- them in. There is no need to let this second water come to the boil, as the bran will permeate It quite sufficiently by just heating in it. Rinse the frocks well in this and squeeze them as dry as possible. Hang them on the line inside out and iron while still slightly damp. If the frocks get too dry they will have to be "sprinkled” and left rolled up for an hour or two before being ironed. When this is done, however, the material loses some of its stiffness. This method is excellent for washing muslin or lace curtains.

r HOME COOK CUCUMBER CUPS. - Required; One good-sized cucumber, a small tin qf salmon, mayonnaise cauoe, beetroot, cayenne, salt, and lettuce. Choose a straight cucumber, peel and cut it into two-inch lengths. Steam these until tender, but do not let them become pulpy, scoop out the centres and trim the edges a little, to make them look like cups. Put into cold place on a hair sieve, leave unt 1 perfectly cold. Mix some salmon with the mayonnaise, season, add a dash of cayenne, and fill the cups with the mixture. Place a piece of beetroot, cut into fancy shapes, in each cup, and dish on a bed of small lettuce leaves or dressed watercress. _ Note. — The amount of salmon required depends on the size and number of til? cups, but two or three ounces should prove ample for one cucumber.

CUCUMBER WITH PARSLEY , SAUCE. Two medium-sized cucumbers, half a pint of white sauce, one ounce _of butter, the yolks of two eggs, half a teaspoonful of finely-chopped shallot, or onion, half a teaspoonful of finelychopped parsley, salt, and pepper. Pare the cucumbers, put them into boiling water, cook for about ten minutes, then drain well and cut them into slices about one inch in thickness. Heat the butter in a stewpan, put in the sliced cucumber, shallot or onion, and a good seasoning of salt and pepper, toss over the fire for a few minutes, then add the white sauce. Just before boiling point is reached, add the yolks of eggs and parsley, stir and cook gently until the eggs thicken, then season, to taste, and serve.

POTTED FISH. Ingredients.—l-21b. of any kind of cooked fish, salt, cayenne, 2 teaspoonfuls of anchovy sauce, pepper, } teaspoonful of powdered mace, clarified butter. Method.—Free the fish from skin and bone and pound it thoroughly in a mortar; add the butter, mace, cayenne, salt, pepper, and anchovy essence gradually. Sufficient butter must he added to make the mixture moist and smooth. Press it into small jars and cover with clarified butter. Leave in a cool place for 12 hours, when it may be used. Useful breakfast or supper or for making into sandwiches. PASSION FRUIT HONEY. A delicious preserve closely resembling honey in flavour and appearance may be made as follows: —Take several dozen ripe (not shrivelled) passion fruit, according to quantity of honey desired : boil for ten minutes in just sufficient water to ooyer. Take out; remove the shells (which will come off like egg-shells) ; then add to the pulp an equal quantity of ripe tomatoes cut 1 small. Return the mixture to the t water in which the passion fruit w’as | boiled and boil until tender. Strain - as for jelljr; add sugar in proportion i of three-quarters sugar to one of liquid. Boil for half to three-quarters of an hour, skimming well. Pot and i tie down.