Virginia Cookery-book

— Best Rice Griddle Cakes.— To Grease a Griddle.— Mrs. Cabell's Batter Bread. — Indian Meal Batter Cakes. — Excellent Muffins. — Breakfast Cakes. — A Favorite Muffin. — Pop-overs. — Delicate Crackers. Muffins. To four eggs, well beaten, add one pint of new milk ; rub three ounces of butter into as much flour as will make the other ingredients the consistence of fritter batter; stir into the flour thus prepared the milk and eggs; add one teaspoonf ul of salt and one table-spoonful of yeast. They may be baked after rising in a warm place for three hours. Use muffin-rings or little tin patty-pans. Eggs 4 Flour 1 qt. New milk 1 pt. Salt 1 teaspoonf ul. Butter 3 ozs. Yeast 1 table-spoonfuL Fly-aways, or Souffle Biscuits. Rub four ounces of butter into one quart of flour, sifted, add a salt-spoonful of salt and make into a paste with milk. Knead well, handling lightly, and roll out till they are as thin as paper and the size of a common saucer; stick here and there with a fork, and bake in a moderate oven until they look flaky and white. Butter 4 ozs. Flour 1 qt. Milk ipt. Salt 1 salt-spoonful. CoBN Battbb Cakbs. One quart of corn meal thoroughly sifted from the bran and two or three eggs, to be made into a very thin batter and baked on a griddle. If boiled rice or small hominy has been left over from dinner, they make a nice addition to these cakes, in which a country negro is sure to excel, and a skilled cook apt to fail. Com meal 1 qt. Milk 2 qts. Eggs 2 or 3. Salt 1 dessert-spoonful. Rice, or small hominy i pt. CORN DODGERS.* Good meal from white corn is the first essential of this fundamental article of Southern diet. Sift the meal and * This plain bread was every day a chosen article of diet with Washington, "the father of his country." The only time the compiler of these recipes ever saw the great Daniel Webster he was interesting himself greatly about these very com dodgers. The journey being from Philadelphia to the White Sulphur Springs, the moment the boundaries of Virginia were struck he and his party, which included two ladies of his family, began to express a lively desire to taste a specimen of this genuinely Southern bread. At every station the request was made of the dusky venders of luncheons, "Can you sell us some corn dodgers?" After many disappointments a plate of small corn-pones was produced at some mix up into dough, with cold water and salt in proportion to the quantity made up. Make up with the hand into long, oval-shaped cakes, and put in a pan to bake. The crust should be brown, and is very sweet. Practice and guess-work might be stated as properly belonging to this recipe, as the real Virginia "aunties" who make it unerringly to perfection are never known to measure. A beginner may safely venture upon the quantities given below : Meal 1 qt. | Water 1 teacupful. | Salt 1 teaspoonful. Ash Cake. Corn meal, salt, and water, just as for com dodgers ; but a large, open fireplace must be at hand, the hot ashes swept cleanly aside, and large, flat pones of dough laid on the hearth just before the fire. When the top of the pones are slightly dried the ashes are drawn completely over them, there to remain until they are well done, which is ascertained by their firmness, after time enough is supposed to have been allowed (say, fifteen minutes). When drawn from the fire the ashes are shaken off, the pones of bread washed, dried a little, and are then ready for use. Very particular people cover the loaves of bread with collard- leaves before the ashes are put over them. A bit of hot ash cake, sent up with a glass of buttermilk fresh from the dairy, is often served to the most delicate ladies, and not only relished, but thought to be peculiarly strengthening.