388 
RURAL HOURS. 
ding ; griddle- cakes, made with eggs and milk ; hoe-cake, or In- 
dian bread, baked in shallow pans ; samp or hominy, corn coarse- 
ly broken and boiled ; Jonikin, thin, wafer-like sheets, toasted on 
a board ; these are all eaten at breakfast, with butter. Then we 
have the tender young ears, boiled as a vegetable ; or the young- 
grain mixed with beans, forming the common Indian dish of suc- 
cotash ; the kernel is also dried, and then thoroughly boiled for a 
winter vegetable. Again, we have also Indian puddings, and 
dumplings, and sometimes lighter cakes for more delicate dishes. 
The meal is also frequently mixed with wheat in country-made 
bread, making it very sweet and nutritious. Besides these differ- 
ent ways of cooking the maize, we should not forget parched or 
" popped" corn, in which the children delight so much ; and a 
very nice thing it is when the right kind of corn is used, and the 
glossy yellow husk cracks without burning, and the kernel bursts 
through pure, and white, and nicely toasted. A great deal of 
popped corn is now used in New York and Philadelphia by the 
confectioners, who make it up into sugar-plums, like j^ra/mei? 
Acres of " popping corn" are now raised near the large towns, 
expressly for this purpose ; the varieties called rice- corn, and 
Egyptian corn, are used, the last kind being a native of this coun- 
try, like the others. 
The word sapaen has sometimes been supposed of Indian origin. 
It is not found in any dictionary that we know of, though in very 
common use in some parts of the country. Vanderdonck speaks 
of the dish "Their common food, and for which their meal is 
generally used, is 2^cip, oi' mush, which in the New Netherlands is 
named sa2)aen. This is so common among the Indians that they 
* 111 1653. 
