Farm and home cook book and housekeeper's assistant

Steamed breads and puddings can be finished in the hay box by placing one vessel within another, half filling the outer vessel with boiling water. Place a wire rack between the bottoms of the two vessels, so that they won't touch and the boiling water can reach all parts. Boston brown or graham breads require only about ^/^ hour over the fire and 5 hours in the hay box. Plum pudding takes about the same time in the box, but should first have an hour's boiling over the fire. Tapioca pudding and rice require only about 5 minutes' cooking and 2 hours in the box. Rice Pudding Put 1 Qt milk, a good i/4 cup each of rice and sugar, 1 tablesp butter, % teasp salt, and the grated rind of a lemon or other flavoring, into a deep pudding pan. Bring the milk to boiling, set the pan in a kettle of boiling water, let boil 5 minutes and remove to the hay box without raising the lid. Leave in 3 hours or longer. Each grain will be whole and separate, but soft as jelly. Steamed Brown Bread To 1 cup each of cornmeal, rye meal and graham flour add 2 teasp soda and 1 of salt, % cup molasses and 2 cups sour milk. Pour into a buttered mold not over % full. Place a rack (tea-stand or iron-stand) in a kettle, set in the bread mold, fill kettle nearly to the top of mold with boiling water, cover and boil % hour on the stove. Remove to hay box and cook for 5 or 6 hours. If fruit bread is wanted, add Vz cup raisins to the mixture. Steamed Berry Pudding Cream ^/^ cup sugar and 1 egg; add % cup milk, 2 teasp baking powder and flour to make as stiff as cake. Stir into this an equal quantity of any sort of fresh, small fruit — berries, cherries, etc. — and pour into buttered pudding mold. Stand in a covered kettle of boiling water and boil ^^ hour to heat the mixture through. Remove to the hay box while closely covered, and cook 2 hours or longer. Serve with cream and sugar or any preferred sauce. Increase the quantities according to the number to be served, as this makes only a small pudding. Brown Betty Mix l^/^ cups fine bread crumbs with 2 cups minced tart apples. Add V2 teasp each cinnamon and allspice, 3 wellbeaten eggs, a lump of butter, sugar to taste, milk to make a thin batter, and turn into a buttered pudding dish. Set in a covered kettle of boiling water and cook on the fire 20 minutes and in the hay box 3 hours. Serve with any preferred liquid sauce. Dried Fruit Sauce First wash well and then soak evaporated peaches, apples, prunes, pears or apricots over night in cold water. In the morning add sugar according to the kind of fruit, boil 5 minutes, then set in the hay box 2 hours. Or, the sugar may be omitted and boiled to a syrup separately and added after the fruit is cooked. Pot Roasts and Boiled Meats Boiled meats or pot roasts or fowl are all improved in flavor by long and slow cooking. For this reason the hay box is admirably adapted for the preparation of such dishes, as there is no escape of steam and aroma. Prepare over the fire in the usual way, boil from % to 1 hour, and finish in the hay box from 3 to 4 hours, sometimes longer, as in the case of a whole ham, when 8 to 10 hours are none too long. Rolled Beefsteak