186 BULLETIN 414, U. S. DEPARTMENT 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 grain should be 
whole and separate. 
32. Rice, fried (for 60 men). Ingredients used: 5 pounds rice; 2 pounds fat; 
1 pound 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 grease 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). Ingredients used: 12 pounds bread crusts; 2 
pounds dried fruit; 2 pounds sugar; 1 ounce 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 laj^er 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 difficulty 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 feeling 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. 
