RECIPES FOR COOKING COMMON FOODS PART 2

PROPER COOKING OF CEREALS.

Starchy foods in any form must be well cooked. Gluey, slimy oatmeal, full
of hard lumps of half-cooked grains, the whole forming a raw, horrid
mass, is very different from the smooth, well cooked, easily digestible,
oatmeal prepared by a good cook. Rolled oats are more easily cooked than
oatmeal, as they are already prepared. For four people, put a quarter of
a teaspoonful of salt into four cups of _hot_ water and stir in slowly
one cup of rolled oats, being careful not to allow lumps to form. Cook
for an hour in a double boiler.

_Hominy._--Hominy is seldom well cooked. It is often lumpy and raw, and
yet has a burned taste which comes from being cooked in too little water,
while if too much is used it goes all to soup and can never be made good.
Salt a quart of boiling water, and very carefully stir into it a cup of
hominy. Stir often and add a little water from time to time if it gets
too dry. Cook until every grain is thoroughly done.

_Rice._--Rice is rarely well prepared, the greatest trouble being to get
each grain well cooked without making it mushy. When properly cooked each
grain will be firm and distinct, and at the same time soft and tender.
Wash half a cupful of rice thoroughly, put it in a quart of boiling
salted water, and let it boil for half an hour; then drain it thoroughly
and steam it in a colander for an hour.

_Corn-Bread._--Corn-bread should be something like rice: every particle
thoroughly cooked and soft, and yet not sticking together, so that the
inside is dry and crumbly while the outside is crisp and nutty. The
thinner corn-bread is baked the more perfectly it cooks. It should not be
more than an inch thick and preferably less. A cannon-ball of raw meal,
with only the thinnest of surfaces decently baked, is an insult to a
man's intelligence as well as to his digestion. This is the way to
prepare it properly. Sift a teaspoonful of baking powder into a pint of
corn meal. Mix in a piece of butter the size of a walnut and add sweet
milk until you get a dough that can be kneaded into a cake. Bake in a hot
oven until brown and well done. A little richer corn-bread is made by
heating a pint of sweet milk and pouring it over a pint of corn-meal.
Melt a piece of butter the size of a walnut, beat two eggs, add a little
salt, and mix well into the meal. Put in a shallow dish, and bake about a
half hour in a quick oven.

_Biscuits._--Biscuits should be thin, crisp, delicately browned and free
from flour. The inside of a biscuit should be flaky and dry. Thick,
soggy, heavy biscuits impose a severe task upon digestion. Make the
biscuits about two inches in diameter, and three-quarters of an inch
thick. Bake them brown on both the top and the bottom. It is much easier
to make light, wholesome biscuits with baking-powder than with soda.
Buttermilk biscuits are very delicate and palatable, but not quite so
certain to turn out well. If soda is not properly used you will have a
yellow, evil-smelling compound, or else there will not be enough soda to
make the biscuits rise, and they will be dangerously heavy. To make
soda-biscuits sift one level teaspoonful of soda, one half-teaspoonful
salt, and one quart of flour together three times so as to get the soda
thoroughly well mixed in. Now rub two tablespoons of lard into the flour
and add enough buttermilk to make a soft dough. Roll out into a sheet,
cut into small thin biscuits and bake in a hot oven until well browned.
Baking-powder biscuits are made in the same way, by using two
teaspoonfuls of baking-powder in place of the soda, and sweet milk
instead of buttermilk.

_Yeast._--Put three hops in a pot containing two quarts of cold water.
Place on the stove and see that it boils twenty minutes. Have a pint of
flour in a large bowl and mix into it a tablespoonful of sugar, one of
salt and a teaspoonful of ginger. Strain the water from the hops into
this, stirring constantly. Allow it to cool. When lukewarm put in a cup
of yeast or a yeast-cake.

_Rolls._--At night take one half-cup of lukewarm water, one
half-teaspoonful of salt, three-quarters of a cup of yeast, and enough
flour to make a thin batter. In the morning add to this a pint of milk, a
teaspoonful of sugar, a half-cup of butter and beat in flour until it is
no longer sticky. Set it in a warm place to rise and when well up knock
back. Repeat this process, and when it comes up the third time make it
into rolls. Let it rise once more and then bake it.