186 BULLETIN^ 414, U. S. DEPAETMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



31. Rice boiled (for 60 men). Ingredients used: 5 pounds rice; 3 gallons water. 

 When the water comes to a boil add the rice. When the rice may be mashed with 



the fingers pour into a colander and drain well, after which each gi-ain should be 

 whole and separate. 



32. Rice, fried (for 60 men). Ingredients used: 5 pounds rice; 2 pounds fat; 

 1 potmd onions, diced. 



Boil the rice as in the preceding recipe; place the fat in a bake pan; set on the 

 range and let come to a smoking temperature; add the onions and let them brown 

 slightly; add the rice and stir continually with a cake turner to prevent burning and 

 to mix the gi-ease with it thoroughly. Rice may be cooked in a hot oven and must be 

 stirred every few minutes. About 15 or 20 minutes are required to fry it. 



33. Stewed dried fruit— prunes, apples, peaches, apricots, etc. — (for 60 men). 

 Ingredients used: 5 pounds dried fruit. 



After washing the dried fruit place it in a receptacie with about three times its bulk 

 of water, and set on a part of a range where it will keep hot but not boil. After two 

 hours, remove and season to taste with sugar, cinnamon, cloves, or nutmeg, and a 

 little vinegar. 



34. Pudding, bread (for 60 men). Ingi-edients used: 12 pounds bread crusts; 2 

 pounds dried fruit; 2 pounds sugar; 1 oimce cinnamon; 2 cans evaporated milk; 6 eggs. 



Soak the bread in cold water and squeeze out well with the hands; season well 

 with sugar and cinnamon; mix well, and spread about 1 inch in pans; over this spread 

 about 1 inch of stewed fruit; then another layer of the bread, and over the top spread 

 sugar and cinnamon; bake about forty minutes in a medium hot oven. Serve hot 

 or cold with cream and sauce. This makes an excellent dish and gives an oppor- 

 tunity to use all the scraps of bread on hand. 



SELECTION OF THE COOKS. 



Cooks and waiters chosen from the convict force prepare and serve 

 the food at all camps. Little diificulty is experienced in finding 

 good cooks in almost any group of fifty or more prisoners, and as 

 the men assigned to the kitchen work generally are under less restraint 

 than those working on the roads they accept their duties cheerfully. 

 The larger camps require intelligent men who are reasonably skillful 

 in their work, and for this reason the selection is often made at the 

 penitentiary, the men then being assigned to the camps for the 

 express purpose of cooking. In certain States such men are exam- 

 ined by the prison physicians, who are careful to see that they are 

 not suffering from infectious diseases which would render them dan- 

 gerous as cooks, and while a bacteriological examination is never 

 made, in order to rule out the possibility of their being disease car- 

 riers the prison physicians usually obtain their medical histories 

 and occasionally administer anti- typhoid vaccine. Such careful 

 selection of cooks results in very satisfactory conditions at the camps. 

 The food is well cooked and decently served, the kitchens and mess- 

 rooms and the cooking and eating utensils, are kept clean and in 

 good condition, and a general feehng of pride and satisfaction pre- 

 vails. The plainest foods, when properly cooked and decently 

 served in clean surroundings, are valued much more highly than 

 more elaborate articles of food prepared and served in a sloppy 

 manner. 



