AMERICAN HOME GARDEN. 169 



Pie plant may be easily forced by the following simple proc- 

 ess : Over each of the plants you wish to force place an old 

 barrel, open at both ends, but with a loose head to cover the 

 upper end as occasion may require. Pile fresh stable manure 

 around it, from a foot thick at the bottom to six inches at the 

 top. Put the cover on only in freezing weather, and if your 

 root be large and vigorous, as it should always be for forcing, 

 the growth of long, fine, tender leaf-stem will soon fill the bar- 

 rel. The barrel must be removed as soon as you judge that a 

 fair amount of leaf has been taken from the plant, and the op- 

 eration, which is really a pretty severe taxing process, should 

 not be repeated upon the same plant two years in succession. 

 What are called young plants, in their second and third years, 

 generally produce the finest specimens of growth. To have a 

 constant succession of these, it is only necessary to uncover the 

 crown of an old plant early in the spring, and with a knife 

 separate a portion of the young outer shoots that are just start- 

 ing, taking with them a small piece of the parent root. Set 

 them out and cultivate them as above directed, and in the 

 next two years they will probably produce their largest and 

 best leaf- stems. '?V* 



In gathering pie plant the leaf should not be cut from the 

 plant, but deftly slipped off by a twisting, sideway pull. 



It is used in making puddings, pies, and tarts, and for stew- 

 ing. Its acid is pretty strong, yet not rough ; and it is re- 

 markable that in stewing, especially when the sweetening is a 

 mixture of sugar and molasses, quite a variety of fruit-flavors, 

 as peach, plum, etc., are incidentally brought out, though, so 

 far as I know, no rule, for their production can be given. It 

 may also be remarked that if, after the stem is peeled and cut 

 up into half-inch pieces, boiling water be poured upon it and 

 allowed to stand for half an hour, and then poured off, and the 

 small quantity of water necessary to stew it with be added to 

 it fresh, almost half the ordinary amount of sweetening will be 

 saved, without any great injury to its flavor. Some persons, 

 however, avoid either peeling or scalding it, as calculated to 

 destroy its peculiar gout, especially while young and tender. 



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