492 STANDARD KECEIPTS. 



milk and sweet cream, the gravy being thickened with flour; allow it to 

 boil once; that is all the cooking it requires. A dish of dried beef, 

 properly cooked, served with toast, baked potatoes, and boiled eggs, is 

 a very nice provision for breakfast or a dinner prepared in haste. When 

 too salt, it can be remedied by soaking, after cutting and before, and 

 adding a little white sugar while cooking, to restore the sweetness lost 

 by soaking. Sugar cured beef is much nicer than that cured with salt 

 alone. 



To Cure Bacon. The reputation of the Hampshire bacon is owing 

 entirely to the care with which it is cured. The hogs, which are fatted 

 on peas and barley meal, are kept fasting for twenty-four hours at least 

 before they are killed; they are used as gently as possible in the act of 

 killing, which is done by inserting a long-pointed knife into the main 

 artery which comes from the heart. The hair is burned off with lighted 

 straw, and the dirty surface of the skin scraped off. The carcass is 

 hung up after the entrails have been removed, and the next day, when 

 the meat has become quite cold, it is cut up into flitches. The spare- 

 ribs are taken out, and the bloody veins carefully removed; the whole is 

 then covered with salt, with a small quantity of saltpetre mixed with it. 

 Sometimes a little brown sugar is added, which gives a pleasant sweet- 

 ness to the bacon. The flitches are laid on a low wooden table, wliich 

 has a small raised border at the lower end. The table slants a little, so 

 as to let the brine run off into a vessel placed under it, by a small open- 

 ing in the border at the lower end. 



The flitches are turned up and salted every day; those which were up- 

 permost are put under, and in three weeks they are ready to be hung up 

 to dry. Smoking the bacon is no longer as common as it used to be, as 

 simply drying in the salt is found sufficient to make it keep. Those 

 who from early association like the flavor given by the smoke of wood, 

 burn sawdust and shavings in a smothered fire for some time under the 

 flitches. 



When they are quite dry they are placed on a board rack for the use 

 of the family, or are packed with chaff into chests till they are sold. 



To Keep Butter Sweet. To every twenty pounds of butter take 

 three pounds salt, one pound loaf sugar, one-quarter pound pulverized 

 saltpetre; mix and put a layer of butter about eight inches thick; then 

 sprinkle on a light covering alternately, until your cask is full. 

 Pack in air-tight casks. Butter packed in this way will keep sweet 

 for two or three years. 



