MOORE’S RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
SEPT. 24 
Jo mystic (Kconomg. 
TO COOK MUSHROOMS. 
Our friend Josh Brown has asked for 
modes of cooking this fungus. No one has 
sent us any reply. We know there are oth¬ 
ers who will be glad to learn, through the 
IIuralNew-Vorkkb, how to do it. Hence 
wo copy from an English paper the follow¬ 
ing modes: 
The peasants of a great portion of Europe 
eat mushrooms raw with salt and dry bread, 
and wholesome and good they are. The 
true flavor of mushrooms, nevertheless, is 
greatly Lightened by cooking; and cook 
them how you may—a broil, a stew, ora fry, 
with the simple addition of butter, salt, and 
pepper, and they are excellent. There is 
one rule that should always bo observed in 
whatever mode they are cooked, and that 
is that they should be served up quickly 
and hot. The following modes of cooking 
mushrooms may prove useful at this season 
of the year.: 
Mushrooms an Gratin.—Take twelve 
large mushrooms about two inches in diam¬ 
eter, pare the stalks, wash, and drain the 
mushrooms on a cloth; cut off and chop the 
6talks. Putina quart stew-pan an ounce 
of butter and half an ounce of flour; stir 
over the fire for two minutes; then add one 
pint of broth; stir till reduced to half the 
quantity. Drain the chopped stalks of the 
mushrooms thoroughly in a cloth; put them 
in the sauce with three tablespoonfuls of 
chopped and washed parsley, one tablespoon 
of chopped and washed shulot, two pinches 
of salt, a small pinch of pepper; reduce on a 
brisk tire for eight minutes, put two table¬ 
spoonfuls of Oil iu n saute pan; set the 
mushrooms in, the hollow part upwards; 
till them with the flue herbs, and sprinkle 
over them lightly a tablespoonful of rasp¬ 
ings; put in a brisk oven for ten minutes, 
and serve. 
Curried Mushrooms.—Peel and remove 
the stems from a dish of full-grown mush¬ 
rooms, sprinkle with salt, and add a very 
little butter; stew them gently in a little 
good gravy or stock. Add four tablespoon¬ 
fuls of cream, and one teaspoonful of curry 
powder, previously well mixed with two 
teaspoonfuls of wheat, flour; mix carefully, 
and serve on a hot dish, with hot toast and 
hot plates attendant. Mind the "curry 
stuff" is good, says an Indian friend, and 
not too much of it. The word “curry," by 
itself, it seems, being merely the Tamul 
word for “ meat.” The large horse mush¬ 
room, when halt or three parts grown, and 
curried in this fashion, will be found to be 
delicious. 
To Pot Mushrooms.—The small open 
mushroooms suit best for potting. Trim 
and rub them; put into a stew-pan a quart 
of mushrooms, three ounces of butter, two 
teaspoonfuls of salt, and half a teaspoonful 
of Cayenne and mace mixed, and stew for 
ten or fifteen minutes, or till the mushrooms 
are tender; take them carefully out and 
drain them perfectly on a sloping dish, and 
when cold press them into small pots, and 
pour clarified butter over them, in which 
state they will keep for a week or two. If 
required to bo longer preserved, put writ¬ 
ing paper over the butter, and over that 
melted suet, which will effectually preserve 
them for many weeks, if kept in u dry, cool 
place. 
To Pickle Mushrooms.—Select a num¬ 
ber of small, sound, pasture mushrooms, as 
nearly as possible alike in size; throw them 
for a few minutes into cold water; then 
drain them; cut off the stalks, and gently 
rub off the outer skin with a moist flannel 
dipped in salt; then boil the vinegar, add¬ 
ing to each quart two ounces of salt, half a 
nutmeg sliced, a drachm of mace, and au 
ounce of white pepper-corns; put the mush¬ 
rooms into the vinegar for ten minutes over 
the fire; then pour the whole into small 
jars, taking care that the spices arc equally 
divided; let them stand a day, then cover 
them. 
Another method.—In pickling mush¬ 
rooms, take the buttons only, and while 
they arc quite close, cut the stem off even 
with the gills, and rub them quite clean. 
Lay them in salt and water for forty-eight 
hours, and then add pepper and vinegar, in 
which black pepper and a little mace have 
been boiled. The vinegar must be applied 
cold. So pickled they will keep for years. 
Mushroom Stems, if young and fresh, 
make a capital dish when the supply of 
mushrooms is limited. Rub them quite 
clean, and after washing them in salt and 
water, slice them to the thickness of a shil¬ 
ling, then place them in a saucepan with 
sufficient milk to stew them tender; throw 
in a piece of butter and some flour for 
thickening, and salt and pepper to taste. 
Serve upon a toast of bread, in a hot dish, 
and add sippets of toasted bread. This 
makes a light and very delicate suppor dish, 
and is not bad sauce to a boiled fowl. 
Breakfast Mushrooms.—Clean a dozen 
or so of medium-sized, place two or three 
ounces of nice eleau beef-dripping in the 
frying pan, and with it a tablespoonful or 
more of nice beef gravy. Het the pan on r« 
gentle Are, and as the dripping melts place 
in the mushrooms, adding salt and pepper 
to taste. In a few minutes they will be cook¬ 
ed, and being soaked in the gravy and serv¬ 
ed upon a hot plate, will form a capital dish, 
in the absence of gravy, a sow peon of “ex- 
tractum earn is” may be substituted. 
Mushroom Roup.—Take a good quan- 
tity of mushrooms, cut off' the earthy end, 
and pick and wash them. Stew them with 
some butter, pepper, and salt in a little 
good stock till tender; take them out, and 
chop them up quite small; prepare a good 
stock as for any other soup, and add it to 
the mushrooms und the liquor they have 
been stewed in. Boil all together, and 
serve. If white soup be desired, use the 
white button mushrooms and a good veal 
stock, adding a spoonful of cream or a little 
milk, as the oolor may require. 
Mushrooms and Toast.—Peel the mush¬ 
rooms, and take out the stems. Fry them 
over a quick lire. When the butter is melt¬ 
ed take oil'the pan. Squeeze the juice of a 
lemon iuto it, Let the mushrooms fry 
again for some minutes. Add salt, pepper, 
spices, and a spoonful of water, in which a 
clove or garlic, having been cut into pieces, 
has soaked for half an hour; let it stew. 
When the mushrooms arc done make a 
thickening of yolks of eggs. Pour the mush¬ 
rooms on bread fried in butter, and laid in 
dish ready for them. 
Baked Mushrooms.—Peel the tops of 
twenty mushrooms; cut offu portion of the 
stalks, and wipe them carefully with a piece 
of flannel dipped in salt. Lay the mush¬ 
rooms in a tin dish, put a small piece of but¬ 
ter on the top of each, and season them 
with pepper and salt. Set the dish in the 
oven, and bake from twenty minutes to half 
an hour. When done, arrange them high in 
the centre of a very hot dish, pour the 
sauce round them and serve quickly a V d as 
hot as you possibly can. 
Mushrooms a la Creme. — Trim and 
rub half a pint of button mushrooms’, dis¬ 
solve two ounces of butter rolled in flour in 
a stew-pan, then put in the mushrooms, a 
bunch of parsley, a teaspoonful of salt, half 
a teaspoonful each of white pepper and of 
powdered sugar, shake the pail round for 
ten minutes, then beat up the yolks of two 
eggs, with two tablespoonfuls of cream, 
and add by degrees to the mushrooms; in 
two or three minutes you can serve them in 
the sauce. 
Mushrooms on Toast.—Put a pint of 
mushrooms into a stew-pan, with two 
ounces of butter rolled in flour; add a tea- 
SDOonful of salt, half a teaspoonful of white 
popper, a blade of mace powdered, and half 
a teaspoonful grated lemon; stew till (lie 
butter is all absorbed, then add ns much 
white roux as will moisten the mushrooms; 
fry a slice of bread in butter, to lit the dish, 
and as soon as the mushrooms are tender 
serve them on the toast. 
To Stew Mushrooms:—Trim and rub 
clean a half pint of large button mush¬ 
rooms; put into a stew pan two ounces of 
butter, shake over the fire until thoroughly 
melted; put in the mushrooms, ateaspoou- 
ful of salt, half as muoh pepper, and a small 
piece of mace pounded; stew till the mush¬ 
rooms are tender, then serve them on a hot 
dish. They are usually sent in as a break¬ 
fast dish, thus prepared in butter. 
Mushrooms a la Provencale, —Take 
mushrooms of good size. Remove the 
stems, and soak them in olive oil. Cut up 
the stems with a clove of garlic and some 
parsley. Add meat of sausages, and two 
yolks of eggs to unite them. Dish the 
mushrooms, and garnish them with the 
forcemeat. Sprinkle them [with flue oil, 
and dress them in an oven, or in a four dc 
ea rn pa y lie. 
Mushrooms Eu Ragout.—Put iuto a 
stew-pan a little stock, a small quantity of 
vinegar, parsley, and green onions chopped 
op, salt, and spices. When this is about to 
boil, the mushrooms being cleaned, put 
them in. When done, remove them from 
the lire, and thicken with yolks of eggs. 
Mushrooms with Bacon.—Take some , 
full-grown mushrooms, aucl having cleaned i 
them, procure a few rashers of nice streaky 
bacon, and fry it in the usual manner. 
When nearly done, add a dozen or so of 
mushrooms, and fry them slowly until they 
are cooked. In this process they will ab¬ 
sorb all the fat of the bacon, and with the 
addition of a little Ralt and pepper, will form 
a most appetizing breakfast relish. 
Mushrooms En Caisae.—Peel the mush¬ 
rooms lightly, and cut them into pieces. 
Put them into oases of buttered paper, 
with a hit of butter, parsley, green onions, 
and shalots chopped up, salt and pepper. 
Dress them on the gridiron over a gentle 
lire, and serve in the cases. 
HOW TO PICKLE PORK. 
The first essential is a good sweet barrel 
—not a molasses barrel, but a now barrel, 
made from well-seasoned white oak staves 
without any sap in them. If there is any 
sap in the staves the brine will leak through 
and the pork will be spoiled with rust. 
Good salt is another requisite for pickling 
pork. Halt known in the West as “ground 
alum,” or the salt made at Syracuse, N. Y., 
is good. 
When the hogs are killed and the flesh 
perfectly cold (not frozen). Lay the hog on 
his side and cut straight down the center 
of the back until the knife strikes the bone. 
Then turn him on his baek and cut through 
the ribs close to the back-bone, so as to 
meet the cut made from the other side. 
Cut off the head, and your pig will be in 
halves; cut, the leaf lard from the ribs; cut 
off the shoulder and ham: cut out all the 
lean meat from the side; then cut the side 
in strips about three inches wide, cutting 
across from back to belly. When you have 
your Rides all out in this way, take your 
barrel and cover the bottom three-fourths 
of an inch deep with salt; then take your 
pieces of pork and set them on edge, the 
skin next to the barrel, and bind them round 
in the barrel, making the circle smaller and 
smaller, until you have a perfect layer, and 
as close together as you can well press each 
piece with the hand; then till all open spaces 
with salt. Then, witli a square-ended stick 
or maul pound the pork down until it is 
smooth on the top. Then cover witli salt 
about live-eighths of an inch deep. Then 
proceed with another layer, as before, and 
so on t ill the barrel is filled to within three 
or four inches of the top. Then make a 
brine as strong as can be made with salt 
and boiling soft water; skim the brine und 
let it cool. When cold, pour it on the meat 
until the barrel is tilled to within two inches 
of t he top. Put. a board, cut to fit the in¬ 
side of the barrel, on top of the pork, and 
lay upon it a "uigger-head” rock weighing 
about forty pounds. Keep the barrel in a 
cool place if you have one; if not, keep it 
almost anywhere out of the sun, and you 
will have good pickled pork as long as you 
keep it completely covered u ith brine, I 
have never lost any pork put up in this way, 
and 1 have kept it in cellars, on the first 
floor, and in the garret. 
Lysander W. Babbitt. 
Council Bluffs, Iowa. 
A Good Clement.—The following has 
been tested for cementing w ood, iron, leath¬ 
er, glass, paper and almost all kinds of 
household materials: Best isinglass, half an 
ounce; rub It between the hands until it 
breaks down into a powder, put in a bottle, 
and put as much common acetic acid to it 
as will just wet the mass through, stand 
the bott le in some boiling .water, and the 
paste will dissolve and be lit to use at once; 
it will be solid when oold, hut is easily 
warmed up the same as before. Leave the 
cork out when warming, or there is danger 
of bursting the bottle. 
|! ontological. 
PIG-PEN PAPERS. 
A Swine Herd-Book—Is kept by Mr. 
W. Smith, one of the most extensive breed¬ 
ers of swine in Michigan, in which a regu¬ 
lar record is kept of every boar or swine se¬ 
lected for breeding. How many breeders 
of swine do the same thing. How many 
exercise the same care in selection and in¬ 
telligence in breeding that breeders of 
Short-Horn, Jersey, Ayrshire, and Devon 
cattle, and of thoroughbred horses And it 
profitable to do? We should like our swine- 
breeders who are systematic and have such 
records to tell our readers about them. 
Incjuiides for Swineherds—W. P. S. 
asks if any one has given in our columns 
the history of the Jersey Reds. No. 
POMOLOGICAL GOSSIP. 
Pioneer Peach.—A correspondent of 
the Kansas Farmer at Fort Scott, Kansas, 
speaks of a seedling peach which he has 
propagated by budding, and to which he 
has given the abovo name as surpassing 
“everything in the line so far.” lie adds: 
It ripens tho last, of July; a free-stone, 
three times as largo as Hale’s Early, beauti¬ 
ful and excellent; color, where exposed to 
the sun, white, with a shade of yellow and 
very deep blush oti cheek; in the shade tho 
coloring 19 in stripes, that ruu together, 
making it rather mottled with pink and 
white; flesh white, or a very little inclined 
to bo golden; deep red about the stone, 
which is of medium size. 1 have four trees. 
They aro four years old from setting, and 
bore, perhaps a little more than a peck of 
peaches each, this season. The tree grows 
well, has fine, large deep green leaves, the 
fruit disturbed but little with curculio. 
This peach is certainly twice the size of any 
other of its season, and of very superior 
quality. Tt is said to be the best by all who 
have seen and tried it.” 
The Triomphe de Jodoigne Pear.— 
The Horticulturist says:—Dr. Swazy, of 
Louisiana, says that as a market fruit it 
lacks color, as a dessert fruit, quality, but 
accords to it great value for hardiness, pro¬ 
ductiveness, and large size. In a specimen 
orchard of a hundred varieties of pears on 
quince, set out in 18.71, there were but two 
trees that outgrew the Triomphe do Jo- 
doigne, and not a dozen that excelled it in 
productiveness—most of them were as good 
and nearly all of them better. This was in 
our garden. Out in the big orchard, where 
we had over five hundred varieties of tho 
pear in hearing, tile Triomphe do Jodoigne 
did not equal either in beauty or quality 
one fifth of them. Few excelled it in sound¬ 
ness, productiveness or vigor or luxuriance 
of growth. Our experience has been on a 
strong clay loam—a light sandy soil may 
produce a different result. 
Peter Wylie No. 1 Grape.—The Gar¬ 
dener’s Monthly says:—We have from Dr. 
Wylie, July 31, a bunch of this new grape, 
which reached us in excellent condition. 
It weighed half a pound. It is a white grape, 
or as some of our modern critics would say, a 
green grape. The berries are about the size 
of the Royal Muscatine, and the flavor so 
delicious, that if we could always depend 
on its doing as well as this in tho open air, 
we might shut up our cold graperies at once. 
Though the skin is as thin, and the appear¬ 
ance much as a foreign grape,it still retains 
somewhat the firm flesh of the American 
parent; and It. also has, but in a less degree, 
the peculiarity of dropping some of its ber¬ 
ries easily from the stems, after a long voy¬ 
age.” 
The Best Blackberry,—In answer to 
an inquiry, Maj. FiiEAgof the Germantown 
Telegraph saysWe have tried them all, 
we believe. Our last Jove is with the “ Mis¬ 
souri Cluster,” we think it is called, sent to 
us by our friend Sam. Miller. It was cer 
tuinly larger, and we thought more luscious. 
We doubt, however, if there is any really 
better, all things considered, than the New 
Rochelle or Lawton.” 
New Peach.es.—The Rural World says: 
—We have fruited Busky Hill, Moore’s Fa¬ 
vorite and Harker’s Seedling peaches ,this 
season for the first time. We cannot con¬ 
ceive of anything that took us as much by 
surprise as these fruits. Busky Hill is oue 
of the most delicious peaches we have ever 
tasted. Their only fault is coming during 
the hight of the season. 
Figs in Ohio.— Gen. Jas. T. Worthing¬ 
ton is successful as a grower of figs on the 
high cliffs on the banks of the Scioto, near 
Chillicothe, O. His fruit is very fine this 
season. He says high lands should be chosen 
for fig planting. 
Ford’s Hooaac Thornless Blackberry 
is highly spoken of by a Western paper: 
“ For prolific production, and sweetness of 
taste, it rivals all varieties of which we 
have knowledge.” 
Legal Fruit Weights in Iowa.—The 
Iowa Legislature is reported to have passed 
a law fixing the legal weight of a bushel of 
undried apples, pears, peaches or prunes, 
at forty-eight pounds, 
