1873.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST, 
34r5 
THE 
%F7~ (For other Household Items, see “ Basket " pages.) 
Fried Potatoes. 
The name Fried Potatoes of course means pota¬ 
toes that are fried, but how different the article in 
different places. The elements, so to speak, pota¬ 
toes and lard, are the same everywhere, but in one 
ease we get a disagreeable fat-soaken 6lice and at 
another a real delicacy. Certain hotels and restau¬ 
rants make a specialty of fried potatoes, and every 
one has heard of Moon’s Saratoga potatoes that 
are eaten as a luxury as one would eat pop-corn or 
bon-bons. The Saratoga and other choice fried 
potatoes are apparently without grease, with a 
crisp surface, a mealy interior, and altogether deli¬ 
cious. “Why can’t we have such?” asks Pater¬ 
Fig. 1.— -POTATO SLICER. 
familias when he returns from a visit to the city or 
a watering-place. The good wife might answer 
that he could have just such if he would go to the 
trouble and expense. The first essential is to have 
the potatoes all sliced of an even thickness. This 
in large establishments is accomplished by means 
of the apparatus shown in figure 1. A board has a 
knife fastened in it after the manner of a sour- 
krout cutter or dried-beef slicer, the edge of the 
knife placed far enough above the level of the 
board to give the required thickness. The peeled 
potatoes are put in a frame which slides back and 
forth over the knife, and this has a follower (shown 
Fig. 2.— WIRE CAGE. 
at one side) to keep the potatoes in place. By 
means of this a large quantity can be rapidly sliced 
and with the greatest uniformity. The next requi¬ 
site is a kettle with an abundance of very hot lard, 
and the next a wire cage like that shown in fig. 2. 
The sliced potatoes are placed in the cage, plumped 
into the hot lard, and at the proper iustant, which 
can only be learned by experience, they by means 
of the cage are all withdrawn at once. A few 
shakes free them from all adhering fat, and if the 
operation is properly done the potatoes may be 
served on a napkin without greasing it. All these 
are necessary in order to have fried potatoes in 
perfection. We have had satisfactory results from 
carefully slicing the potatoes with a knife and let¬ 
ting them drop into ice-water ; taking out a hand¬ 
ful at a time, putting them into a towel, and giving 
it a few jerks to dry them, and then popping them 
into fat, from which as soon as done they were re¬ 
moved by a large skimmer. Then another portion 
was done. The use of ice-water tends greatly to 
preserve the crispness The restaurant of Madame 
Mouquin in New York city is a great resort for 
artists, and the Madame is celebrated for her fried 
potatoes which, probably in deference to the artis¬ 
tic tastes of her visitors, she serves in an elegantly 
crimped form. The knife shown in figure 3 is the 
style that she uses, and it slices the potatoes in 
such a manner that when fried each slice is crossed 
by several crisp bands. Of course, great excellence 
in this as in many other matters is only possible 
where the operation is done upon a large scale, 
but by taking proper pains the home-made article 
can be greatly improved. 
Home Topics. 
BY FAITH ROCHESTER. 
What Shall a Young Woman Do for a 
Living ?—Much is said upon this subject nowa¬ 
days, yet I am asked to say more. Henrietta does 
not know what in the world 
to do to earn money, and 
money she must have. It will 
not do to remain dependent 
upon her father, who works 
too hard now in the effort to 
support his family. Her 
mother docs not need her 
help, as there are younger 
sisters old enough to do the 
home chores. Henrietta is 
free to confess that she wants 
a good deal of money; and 
wishes to feel that she has a 
perfect right to it, or is un¬ 
der obligations to no one for it. She says she 
wishes she had it, but she really dreads to set out 
to earn it for herself; for she does not find her¬ 
self fitted for any business, and she can not find 
in herself a special attraction to any particular 
kind of paying work. 
This young woman will do pretty well as a speci¬ 
men of the average young girl, and I have not the 
least inclination to laugh at her unambitious con¬ 
fessions. I think it would be a misfortune to the 
race if the women generally turned as naturally to 
business and the pursuit of wealth aud fame as men 
do. We love it in them. We see its fitness in the 
general economy. There is much talk now about 
educating young women as well as young men 
with reference to some particular business or pro¬ 
fession, and it is hard to see that anything better 
can be done at present. But all of this talk gives 
me the heart ache, and when I look at my own 
little daughters I am moved to confess this heart¬ 
ache; for I think that if all of us who feel a secret 
misgiving as to the fitness of “business” for 
women, and of women for “ business,” would con¬ 
fess it openly, it would go far toward dispelling 
the clouds that envelop the whole question. I 
don’t want to be counted among those women 
who have become the severe critics of their sex, 
and who persist in trying them by the standard of 
the masculine nature and then declare them “want¬ 
ing.” It is easy to see that there is a great deal 
of shirking duty and unfaithfulness to engagements 
among working people, but I find it in both sexes. 
When one thinks how differently man and woman 
stand related to the outside world as laborers and 
providers in those happiest of all human relations, 
the conjugal and parental, one feels how much 
harder it must be for the feminine nature to bind 
itself to steady daily manual or even intellectual 
labor, for woman’s best and most characteristic 
work is of another kind. Alas ! It must be 
done by a large majority of women, and 
we who have daughters should see to it that 
our girls, as well as our boys, are fitted by 
the training we give them to earn their daily 
bread whenever it becomes necessary or expedient 
for them to do so. Young girls must face this neces¬ 
sity bravely, whether they have any ambition for a 
“career” or not. They have come into a world 
where each one must do a part or become a hin¬ 
drance to the rest, and work of any kind, faithfully 
done, will prove a blessing to the sincere soul. 
Fig. 3.— CRIMPED POTATO KNIFE. 
I like Miss Alcott’s story—“ Work ”—because I 
tbiuk it “ true to nature ” that Christie should not 
speedily find some great work that would make 
her famous among women; but that she should 
try different things as they presented themselves 
to her when waiting, making some blunders, and 
meeting the trials of sickness and lack of work 
and discouragement generally, and finding out at 
last that it is better to be a good, true woman than 
to make any great noise in the world. I commend 
this book to Henrietta, but I suspect that the most 
helpful book for young women yet written is Mrs. 
Diaz’s “Lucy Maria.” This judgment is given, 
however, before reading the whole story. 
The majority of women who must earn their 
own living turn to the needle, the school-room, 
and the kitchen, and I think it the most natural 
thing in the world, since it is so plain to them that 
if they should find their conquering hero and marry . 
him, and have a home and family of their own, all 
that they have learned and practiced in their voca¬ 
tion as seamstress, teacher, or housekeeper may 
be very helpful in the new experience. There is a 
complaint that the ranks of sewing womeu and fe¬ 
male teachers are crowded , but it is hard to find 
skillful and painstaking seamstresses, and the high 
prices they command when found, above the pit¬ 
tance earned by the average se\ving woman, show 
how scarce they arc. Wo need more “ live" teach¬ 
ers, too. There is no probability of there ever 
being a glut in that market though every vacancy 
in the schools should have a hundred disappointed 
applicants. But the teacher’s work is one for 
which a person ought to have a decided genius. 
There is certainly a demand for kitchen labor, but 
it is usually hard work, and not attractive to Amer¬ 
ican girls at present. Educated American girls do 
enter upon the work sometimes, bravely meeting 
or defying the prevailing laws of caste, but I think 
they usually find it a pretty hard road to travel. 
Few of our girls are physically fit for the house¬ 
hold labor of a family where only one servant is 
kept. I have had considerable opportunity to see 
this from the servant’s standpoint lately, and I see 
that even the strong Swede aud Norwegian servant 
girls soon break down or lose much of their in¬ 
herited strength after they come to this country 
and go out to service. Sometimes the housework 
for a family is pleasant, healthful, and remunera¬ 
tive ; and the only hard thing about it theu is that 
invisible but quite perceptible barrier that caste 
sets up between mistress aud maid, and which will 
remain, I fear, until the golden rule has been more 
perfectly expounded by the public teacher and 
shall come to be practiced by us all. Henrietta 
might do many worse tilings than to fill the place 
of a faithful housemaid. 
There is a demand for skillful nurses for the sick, 
and the wages are said to be good. The work is 
sometimes easy and pleasant, sometimes hard and 
very disagreeable. Some course of training is 
necessary, but a girl really in earnest could soon 
work into a good position in that vineyard. 
I do not need to mention all the kinds of work 
that women may do with propriety and profit. It 
often seems to them that the fact that they are 
women keeps them out of lucrative situations, and 
no one can settle just how much that has to do 
with it until some other questions are settled, or 
rather some experiments tried; for instance, the 
effect of the ballot in woman’s hand, perhaps, and 
more especially the effect of a style of dress that 
does not hinder the working woman both physi¬ 
cally and mentally. 
The New Dress Reform Movement.— Speak¬ 
ing of woman’s dress, let me express a little of the 
joy and hope a working woman feels on hearing of 
the new movement for a reform in woman’s dress. 
The new movement is unlike the old one in almost 
every respect, and I believe it will be unlike that 
in the rapid and complete revolution it will soon 
work in the department ot fashions. The leaders 
in the work do not seem to be as sanguine as this, 
nor do they seem to aspire to be leaders. They 
only lead as President Lincoln did, going ahead as 
the masses behind press them up. 
