STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 115 



Another dish suggested by this tomato sauce is a combination of 

 rice and meat. Line a mold with a half-inch layer of cooked rice, 

 fill with chopped meat (lamb or beef) mixed with a tomato sauce, 

 cover the whole with more rice, and steam until well heated, then 

 turn out of the mold and pour more of the sauce around it. 



Some one has said that in the past the New England idea of 

 vegetables included only potatoes, cabbage and turnip and beans 

 and corn. I fancy that if we should go through this State taking 

 a census of the varieties of vegetables used, we should find many 

 families that seldom used any others. The Indians had about the 

 same variety cultivated in this country before the white men came 

 and it is surely time for us to make more progress in this direction. 



There are many persons who have not learned to like asparagus 

 because they have not found out how easy it is to cultivate. It is 

 a valuable vegetable because it comes in a season when there are 

 no other green foods, and an asparagus bed well started almost 

 takes care of itself. Cauliflower, oyster plant, Brussels sprouts, 

 egg plant and mushrooms are all delicious and yet not generally 

 raised by farmers. 



There is one substance in vegetables which is especially neces- 

 sary for us to know about because it is so difficult to cook, and 

 that is the cellulose or woody fibre. The amount varies in different 

 vegetables and in the same vegetable at different stages of its 

 growth. A beet, for example, is quickly cooked in midsummer, 

 but later in the year will require several hours. 



All of our vegetable foods can be served in a variety of ways, 

 though there are but a few different methods of cooking them. In 

 general we may say that vegetables are better if boiled rapidly, 

 while meats are improved by stewing or slow cooking. The potato 

 may be served whole, it may be mashed and made into croquettes 

 or we may cut it up after cooking and heat it in a white sauce, or 

 make it into a soup as we shall do to-night, or serve it cold with a 

 dressing as a salad, and almost any other vegetable may be served 

 in these and many other ways. Most of us would probably agree 

 that if we could have the potato cooked in but one way that would 

 be as a baked potato, but when we have potatoes too imperfect to 

 bake we may boil them, mash them and make into soup or cro- 

 quettes. 



The summer vegetables are not available to-night and therefore I 

 have said little about them. Many times peas, carrots and other 

 vegetables having sweet juices are boiled in a large quantity of 



