DOMESTIC

New Zealand Tablet, 5 February 1920, Page 41

DOMESTIC

(By Maureen.)

Pickled Onions.

Take half a peck of small onions, peel, and pub in about one cup of salt. Pour over enough boiling water to cover the onions. Let stand one night; drain, and repeat the same night. Then cover with cold sharp vinegar and spice, using whole spice. Let them stand a week before using. Cucumber Sweet Pickle.

Select required quantity of cucumbers, pare, take out the seeds, then cut in quarters lengthwise. Put in salt and water (about one handful of salt to one quart of water). Let them soak for 24 hours. Take them out, and wash them with fresh water, and then soak in vinegar.

Pickled Red Cabbage.

Slice up the cabbage finely and place it in a colander; sprinkle each layer with common salt. Let the strips ..drain for two days, then put them in a jar and cover with boiling vinegar. If a spice is used, it must be put in with the vinegar in the proportion of loz of whole black pepper and Tjoz of allspico to the quart.

Pickle of # Small Vegetable.

Take young cauliflowers cut into small pieces, nasturtium pods, French beans, or young runners, and lay them in a stone jar, pouring over them a boiling brine composed of 6oz salt to a quart of -water. The next day drain them off and shake gently in a clean cloth, and put them in a dry jar. Pour over them the following pickle, which must have come to the boil and have remained boiling for one minute. To each quart of vinegar put loz black pepper, loz crushed ginger, loz shallots, Loz salt, loz allspice, and a pinch of cayenne. Cover the jar -for two days, drain off the liquor, boil it up, and throw in the young vegetables for a minute. Replace them in a jar and cover tightly with a bladder or a parchment paper. Peach Marmalade. Peel, stone, and cut up ripe peaches quite small. Take Jib sugar to each lib of fruit, and one teacup of water to each lib of sugar. Place on fire, and while it boils skim it clear; then put in the peaches, let them boil finite fast, stir and mash them until the whole is a thick, jellied mass, then put into glass jars.

Apple; Fritters.

One teacup sweet milk, one tablespoon sweet light dough dissolved in milk, three eggs beaten separately, one teaspoon salt, one and a-half teacups flour, one tablespoon sugar, and the grated peel of one lemon, peeled apples sliced without the core. Drop into hot lard with a piece of apple on each one; sprinkle with powdered or spiced sugar. Let stand after making, and they will be lighter.

Preserved Pears.

Small pears are best adapted to the process of preserving. Boil a pint and a-half of water with 31b of sugar to a syrup. Peel the pears, and put them into this, stew very slowly until tender, adding a flavor of cloves and cinnamon. Lift out the pears very carefully and put them into jars, with syrup to scarcely cover them. More syrup will run from the pears. Store the pears in airtight jars, kept in a cool place. . Peach Jam. :'.'>:;

Peaches for jam should be the yellow-ifleshed preserving variety. Split the peaches in halves, remove stones, crack them, and put the kernels aside. Weigh the fruit, put an equal amount of preserving sugar into the preservingpan, 'add a-pint of water to each lib of sugar, and boil to a syrup. Now put in the fruit, boil very gently until it is quite tender, but not broken, then lift it out carefully with a spoon, and put it into pots. Boil syrup rapidly until it sets quickly when tested on a cold plate, pour it over the fruit cover closely, and store in a cool, dry place. Green peaches gathered just before they are ripe make a delicious jam.

Household Hints.

Common alum melted in an iron spoon over a coal fire forms a very strong cement for mending glass, china, metal, or breakages of all kinds, and articles so mended may be washed without fear of coming to pieces.

A convenience for taking hot pans or dishes from the oven is a flat, wooden shovel made of any thin board; a stout shingle will answer. Shave one end down rather thin and narrow it slightly, and shape the other end into a handle with a hole in the end to hang it by near the stove. This device may save some burns.

A few drops of vinegar rubbed into the hands after washing clothes will keep them smooth, and take away the spongy feeling they have after being in water for a good while.