Miss Parloa's kitchen companion

When caramel is used for coloring soups and sauces, add only a few drops at a time, as it spoils a delicate soup to add a drop too much. One of the safest and most satisfactory colorings for soups and sauces is Madame Perrin's Pate Française. This French paste comes in small tin boxes, each containing twenty-five little caramels. One caramel dissolved in two quarts of soup will give it a rich brown color, or a small piece of a caramel will give just the bit of color that a sauce may lack. The boxes cost twenty-five cents apiece. This paste is for sale at Lidgerwood's, corner of Broadway and Thirteenth Street, New York. In Boston it may be obtained of S. S. Pierce & Co., or of Raymond & Fox, both on Tremont Street. How to Get Onion Juice. Pare an onion, and cut it into four pieces. Put one or two of these pieces in a wooden lemon-squeezer, and squeeze hard. One large juicy onion will yield two table-spoonfuls of juice. Of course, if only a teaspoonful of juice be required, only one-quarter of the onion need be squeezed. The lemon-squeezer must not be used for anything else. If one has not an extra squeezer for this purpose, the juice may be obtained by pressing the onion on a coarse grater, or by bruising the onion with the blunt edge of a knife, and then pressing hard with the flat blade. Neither of these methods last mentioned will extract more than a table-spoonful of juice from a large onion. How Garlic Vinegar is Made. Pare and slice a dozen cloves of garlic ; put them in a preserving-jar with one pint of vinegar ; cover, and set away for two weeks ; then strain into a bottle. One teaspoonful of this vinegar added to a potato salad gives it a delicate flavor of garlic. How to Make Tarragon Vinegar Put two bunches of fresh tarragon in a quart preservejar ; fill the jar with white-wine vinegar ; cover, and set away in a cool, dark place for two or three weeks. At the end of that time strain the vinegar, and bottle it. Fill the jar with fresh vinegar, and put away. It will be ready for use in a month, but it need not be strained until the first quantity has been used. This vinegar is a great addition to any kind of salad and to many sauces. The Way to Make Chervil Vinegar. Chervil vinegar is made like the tarragon, and is used in the same way. An Easy Way to Kill a Lobster. When a live lobster is required for broiling or other purposes, this will be found a simple and comparatively painless mode of killing it. Run a long narrow-bladed knife into the tail at the third joint from the end, having the blade slant downward. This will cut the spinal cord, and death will quickly follow. How to Preserve Lobster Coral. At some seasons of the year it is difficult to get the coral of the lobster. Indeed, during the summer it is almost impossible to get enough to color a soup or sauce. When a large quantity of coral is found in a lobster, all that is not required for immediate use should be put into a jar and covered with vinegar. It will keep a long time. When it is to be used, soak it for one hour in water, and then for an hour in milk. Wipe it dry, and use it the same as if fresh. How to Dry Parsley and Chervil.