FoodNetArchive

The new practical housekeeping

1890

Page 557

Presented as published in 1890. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
Salads. — For these procure mustard and cress, borage, chervil, lettuce, parsley, mint, purslane, chives, bumet, nasturtium leaves and buds, fennel, sorrel, tarragon, corn salad, dandelions, chicory, escarole; water cresses, green onions, celery, leeks, lettuce, very young spinach leaves, the tender leaves of oyster plant, fresh mushrooms, young marshmallow shoots, and the fresh sprouts of winter turnips ; also radishes, cucumbers, onions, cabbaffe, very young turnips, green peppers, and fresh tomatoes. Salad vegetables which can be cooked and allowed to cool and then made into salads, are po- tatoes, beets, carrots, cabbage, cauliflowers, turnips, kohl-rabi, artichokes, string beans, green peas, asparagus, Brussel sprouts, spinach, dried haricot beans, Lima beans, lentils, and leeks; among the fruits are apples, pears^ oranges, lemons, muskmelons, currants, gooseberries and barberries. I 640 FBUIT. Raising Tomato Plants, — ^Take btlilding paper (any thick paper will do) , cat in pieces eleven. inches long and three wide ; lay one end over the other and fasten ; and fill with dirt after setting in a dish, (an old waiter is good). Put only one seed in a cup and when large enough to transplant, cut the thread which holds the cup together and set the cup with the dirt and plant in the ground, leaving the cup around the plant to keep cut worms away. Vegetables. — Put into a vessel of any kind, and then pour on a solution of one ounce of salicylic acid to four gallons of pure soft, cold water with one pound salt. All Salad Vegetables, such as lettuce, celery, etc., keep best in a cool dark place ; it is not necessary to keep them in water ; in fact it ia undesirable ; after they are well washed they should be loosely wrapped in a wet cloth and laid on or near ^he ice in the refrigerator : if there is no ice they can be fairly well preserved by the following method ; in a wooden or heavy pasteboard ])ox lay a large towel entirely saturated with cold water, and after the salad is washed wrap the towel about it to exclude the air, close the box, and keep it in a cool, dark place. Every night and morning wash the salad ; removing all decayed leaves, wash the towel in clean, cold water without wringing it, and again wrap the salad in it, and put it awav in the box. In this way the most delicate salad vegetables may be kept fresh tor several days, even in summer. Fnxlt ShtlTM. FrvU 8helve$, made of slats two inches wide and placed one inch apart, should be put op with equal care and neatness, and with eaual regard for convenience and easy access. Their place should be the most airy part of the cellar; the proper width is about two feet, and the distance apart about one foot, with the lowest shelf one foot from the floor. Pears will ripen nicely on the lower shelves under a cover of woolen blankets. The sup- port should, of coarse, be firm and strong. The bottom shelf should be of one board, on which to scatter fine fresh lime to the depth of an inch, changing it two or three times during the winter. Or pack in grain, bar- ley, etc., so they will not touch, or if fruit is fine, wrap each apple in paper and pack in boxes, or glazed jars with covers. Or when packed rignt from the tree, hand pick them and put them in dry flour barrrels,