Miss Parloa's kitchen companion

Almost any kind of fish may be used for a chowder, but nothing is quite equal to cod or haddock when either may be had fresh. White fish is always preferable to any dark fish. For a chowder for six persons use a fish weighing four pounds, a quart of pared and thin-sliced potatoes, a quarter of a pound of salt pork, two goodsized onions, half a dozen crackers (Boston butter crackers are best, though any kind of plain crackers will do), two quarts of water, one pint of milk, one table-spoonful of flour, and salt and pepper to suit the taste, — perhaps four teaspoonfuls of salt and half a teaspoonful of pepper. Put the potatoes into a large stew-pan with one quart of the cold water, and boil for ten minutes. After freeing the fish of skin and bones, cut it into small pieces. Spread these upon a platter, and dredge them with salt and pepper. Cut the pork into bits, and cook in a frying-pan until brown ; then add the onion, sliced very thin, and fry slowly until it turns light brown. Spread the pork and onion on the fish, and cover until ready for use. Stir the flour into the fat remaining in the frying-pan, and cook until smooth and frothy ; then gradually add the milk, and boil up once. By this time the potatoes will probably have boiled ten minutes. If not, wait until they are cooked, and then add the fish, pork, and onion to them. Add, also, the second quart of water, boiling hot, and cook for three minutes; then turn the thickened milk from the frying-pan into the stew-pan. Split the crackers, and put them into a tureen. Let the chowder boil up once, and after satisfying yourself that it is sufficiently seasoned, turn it into the tureen. In case it be inconvenient to get milk for the chowder, use an extra, but scant, pint of water. If one choose, the potatoes, fish, onion, and pork all may be prepared some time in advance of the cooking, which, in that case, will take only about twenty minutes. The potatoes must be covered with cold water, and the fish be kept in a cold place until the time for cooking. *Clam Chowder. For six persons use one quart of clams or thirty of good size, one pint and a half of thin-sliced potatoes, three pints of water, one pint of milk, one large onion, three ounces of fat salt pork, two table-spoonfuls of flour, one table-spoonful and a half of salt, half a teaspoonful of pepper, and six Boston crackers. Wash the clams in the cold water, and turn both water and clams into a colander that has been placed over a bowl. Now cut the soft parts of the clams from the hard, and put them away in a cold place. Chop the hard parts rather fine, and put them in a stew-pan. Strain through a napkin the water in which the clams were washed, and add it to the chopped parts. Cover the stew-pan, and cook slowly for half an hour. Now cut the pork in thin slices, and fry slowly for ten minutes ; then add the onion, cut fine, and cook for ten minutes longer, stirring frequently, that it may not burn.