RECIPES FOR THE WEEK.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20541, 16 February 1935, Page 26 (Supplement)

RECIPES FOR THE WEEK.

How to Give an Unusual Dinner Party. THREE NOVEL DESSERTS. For an inexpensive first course, we will begin with cream of corn soup, made with fresh or tinned corn and Evaporated milk, with a dash of paprika. Perhaps you would like to stafft with a tomato-juice cocktail, and if so, here is a delicious one which even the children will appreciate:— . Toma to-Juice Cock tail. Four cupfuls tomatoes, 1 cupful water, I teaspoonful salt, 1-8 teaspoonful pepper, 1 tablespoonful sugar, celery tops, 4 or 5 cloves, 1 tablespoon - ful lemon juice, 2 or 3 drops tabasco. Combine all ingredients except lemon juice, and boil slowly for about 15. minutes. Press through sieve, forcing through as much pulp as possible. Cool. Add lemon juice, and place in covered jar in the refrigerator to chill. Then a fish chowder is a tasty dish. Fish Chowder. Four cupfuls fish, 6 cupfuls potatoes cut in sin slices, 1 onion, £ teaspoonful pepper, 1$ tablespoonfuls dripping, 3 tablespoonfuls butter, I tablespoonful salt, 4 cupfuls scalded milk crackers. Brown -the onion in dripping, add potatoes, fish, cut in pieces, and seasoning. Cover, and cook in 3 cupfuls water until potatoes are cooked. Add hot milk, and serve at once over crackers in good sized porridge or soup bowls. For a meat dish tournedos de boeuf a la Bordelaise is tasty:—Cut up about 21b of fillet of beef (middle-cut) into eight neat, oval slices. Trim and season them with salt and pepper, and cook them with butter in a saute pan over a good heat. Turn the slices frequently after they have become slightly brown. Take up the fillets and put them in a hot dish. Pour off the fat in a pan, and add a gill and a half of bordelaise sauce. Heat up and pour over the fillets. Bordelaise sauce is a brown sauce with claret, shallots and chopped parsley. For a green vegetable, spinach is very reasonable, and I find that one never tires of it when it is really well prepared. The secret is to cook it rapidly and not too long, then drain, chop and season to taste, with butter, salt and pepper, and just a little lemon juice. Egg yolk, pressed through a sieve, makes the prettiest garnish, or if another vegetable is preferred, seakale is a good substitute:— Seakale Savoury.—Wash and trim a bundle of seakale and cook in boiling salted water until tender. Drain on a sieve or cloth. Arrange it neatly on a fireproof dish on a slice of toast. Coat it with a well-flavoured white sauce, sprinkle this thickly with grated cheese, a dust of cayenne, and cover all with breadcrumbs. Pour soz of oiled butter over the top and brown in a hot oven. Some Desserts to Choose From. Chocolate Fudge.—Two cupfuls sugar, 2 tablespoonfuls butter, 4 tablespoonfuls cocoa, 1 cupful milk, 1 teaspoonful vanilla essence, and a good pinch of salt. Put the milk in a clean saucapan, add sugar and cocoa, and place over a slow fire and stir to prevent burning. Keep stirring till you find that if you drop a little in cold water "it forms a soft ball which holds together when rolled between the fingers. Now add to the saucepan the salt, vanilla aad butter, let the mixture cool until it may be dented with the fingers, and beat well until it is thick and creamy, then knead. Pour in buttered pan and mark in squares. Chocolate Truffles.—The French are very partial to chocolate truffles, and here is a good recipe: Half a pound of cocoa, 1 small tin condensed milk, 2oz icing sugar, £lb dessicated cocoanut. Put into a brass saucepan the cocoa, sugar and milk, stir over a low fire or gas until it is rather thick, then stir in the cocoanut. Remove from the fire and mould into small, round chunky pieces and plafte on to a dish to cool. Pineapple Tart. —Pare a pineapple and cut into small pieces. Lay them in a deep dish, mix with them half a pound of powdered white sugar, cover the dish, and let it stand ft 11 enough juice has run through the fruit to stew it in. In the meantime make some puffed paste, roll it out, line a couple of soup plates with it. Crimp the edges and bake the paste in a quick oven. Stew the pineapple hi the sugar and its own juice until quite soft, and then put it away to cool. When the pastry in the plates is baked and cold, and the stewed pineapple cold also, fill the shells of pastry with it. Dredge plenty of powdered white sugar over the top and serve.

TO COOK GREENS. Green vegetables are good for health, and they should be served as often as possible. Children sometimes dislike greens because they are not cooked in the right way. They lose their goodness and flavour if they are cooked carelessly. If you grow your own vegetables do not gather them long before you want to use them. If you buy them, choose the freshest possible, cut off all leaver that are not crisp and green, for one slightly withered leaf will spoil the flavour of the lot. Wash them thoroughly in several waters, then leave them soaking in water to whieh salt has been added. Drain the greens well before placing them in a saucepan of boiling water. Spinach should not be soaked for long, and it does not need to be boiled in water, for the moisture on the leaves is. sufficient to cook it. Press the greens well down in che water, bring it once more to boiling point, then let the vegetables simmer until they are cooked. Press and drain them well, and see that not a drop of water remains, then return them to the saucepan, add a lump of butter, and a iljrinking of pepper, and reheat.

PRESERVING HERBS. If one has the time, it is a good plan to preserve her!** from the garden for winter use. Gather parsley, sage, thyme, etc., on a dry, sunny day, wash it well, put it in a colander to drain, then turn it on to trays or sheets of clean newspaper, and put it in a sunny, sheltered corner until it is free from all moisture. A few minutes in a rather hot oven will finish the drying process. When it is so dry that it can be crumpled easily between the fingers, see that all bits of stem are removed, and reduce it to as fine a condition as possible. Then put into clean jars and cover, and keep until required. These dried herbs are most useful for flavourings during the winter months, when the fresh herbs are so scarce. To preserve mint so Chat it is ready for making mint sauce at any time, chop it in the ordinary way, mix it with brown sugar, pack it very tightly in jars, cover with boiling vinogar and cover tightly.