136 
‘Ibt RURAL. NEW-YORKER 
January 2o, 1910 
It was one morning late in the Fall that 
our County Food Demonstration Agent 
came out for a day at our farm—for my 
part to help, for her part to experiment. 
And a busy day we did have. She came 
on the earliest train, and even before 
breakfast filled the oven with fine, clean 
ears of corn. This was to be roasted 
until very dry and then later was ground 
in our home mill into a delicious meal. 
Its fineness and nutty flavor is like the 
much-talked-of Virginia water-ground 
meal, and is fine for 
Spider Cake.—Mix together three- 
fourths cup of home-ground cornmeal, 
one-fourth cup of wheat flour, one table¬ 
spoon sugar, one-half teaspoon salt, one 
tablespoon baking powder, one-fourth tea¬ 
spoon soda, add one egg slightly beaten, 
one-half cup thick sour milk, one-half cup 
sweet milk and mix all together thor¬ 
oughly. Put two tablespoons of butter or 
cooking oil in a frying pan, “spider,” and 
heat. Into this hot pan pour the mixture, 
add another one-half cup of sweet milk 
and bake in a moderate oven 30 min¬ 
utes. 
Virginia Spoon Bread.'—Mix one-half¬ 
cup of cornmeal with one-half teaspoon 
salt and one cup of scalded milk. When 
cool add the yolk of one egg well beaten 
and one teaspoon of baking powder. 
Fold in the well-beaten white of one egg 
and pour the whole mixture into a hot, 
well-greased tin, and bake in a qu?ck 
oven until brown. Either one of these 
dishes makes a wholesome change from 
ordinary corn bread. 
While our corn was drying we had 
breakfast and cleared it away and were 
ready for our main day’s work—that of 
trying some recipes for a whole meal 
canned in one jar. It seemed too good to 
be true to have these complete dinners to 
put on my emergency shelf. On a wash¬ 
day, when unexpected guests should come 
in, wb"n I had been busy outside or with 
other housework, no matter how near the 
dinner hour, a little heating and they 
would be ready to serve. The idea caused 
enthusiasm enough to make up for the 
tvouble and work necessary to experiment 
with four recipes in one day. Here they 
are, just as w T e did them, and to assure 
you ahead of time that most of the jars 
have already been opened out of curiosity 
and the contents were even better than 
v T e had imagined them. 
A Chicken Dinner.—Prepare a chicken 
as for stewing. Cover with boiling water, 
add two sliced onions and one tablespoon 
of salt and simmer until the chicken is 
tender. Remove the bones and cut the 
chicken in pieces of a convenient size to 
serve. Now wash one cup of rice and 
blanch it for three minutes in boiling, 
salted water; drain, rinse in cold water 
and drain again very thoroughly. For 
the sauce, cook one small onion cut in 
fine pieces, in two tablespoons of butter 
or other fat until tender (be careful not 
to brown or burn) ; add two tablespoons 
of flour, blend w 7 ell; pour in one pint of 
chicken broth, add a dash of nutmeg, a 
blade of mace and salt as necessary. Stir 
ever the fire until slightly thickened, then 
add one-half cup of pimentos cut in small 
pieces. Take a well-sterilized jar, pock 
in the chicken and rice in layers until 
the jar is half full; then pour in some of 
the sauce, boiling hot; add more chicken, 
rice and sauce until the jar is full (the 
jar should be packed loosely to allow' the 
rice to swell as it continues cooking). 
Cut one-half a green pepper in strips and 
blanch in boiling w'ater three minutes, 
cold dip, and use, pushed down the sides 
of the jar, as a decoration. Adjust a ster¬ 
ilized rubber, partly seal and sterilize for 
three hours. Seal, test for leaks and 
store on your emergency shelf. This will 
fill two quart jars. 
Beef Stew Dinner.—Parboil one pound 
of lean stewing meat in a kettle, with 
thin gravy, for 30 minutes; w'eigh out 
four ounces of potatoes, four ounces of 
onions and two ounces of carrots, cut in 
small pieces; add two ounces of beans. 
Place the whole mixture in the kettle, 
add the gravy, season to taste, stir the 
A Busy Day on the Farm 
mixture and cook for 10 minutes. Pack 
while hot in a well-sterilized glass jar to 
one-half inch of the top and allow the 
beans room to sw 7 ell as they cook ; adjust 
a sterilized rubber, partly seal and steril¬ 
ize for three hours. Seal, test for leaks 
and also store on your emergency shelf. 
This fills one jar. 
Bacon and Hominy Dinner.—Cook one 
pound of hominy, one teaspoon of salt 
and two quarts of boiling water in a 
double boiler until the hominy is soft. 
In a saucepan cook one-half pound of 
bacon cut in slices, one-half pound of 
sweet green peppers cut fine, and one pint 
of strained tomatoes; then add one pound 
of mixed equal parts of carrots, onions. 
ing salted water to soften them. Drain 
and pack them wuth the meat in layers in 
a well-sterilized jar. Pour in enough boil¬ 
ing broth (the fat and clove removed) to 
fill the jar. Adjust the rubber, partly seal 
and sterilize for three houi'S. 
It was late in the day when we finished, 
but we felt proud of our results—seven 
whole dinners ready and waiting, put up 
during our spare time when the good 
things in the garden were available for 
our use. If I had ever had any doubts 
about the usefulness and helpfulness of 
our Demonstration Agent they would 
have been dispelled before that day was 
over. She is coming again in a week or 
so, for we have a beef to kill and we are 
A Corn-husking Party 
beans and potatoes, season with celery 
salt and cook this vegetable combination 
until done. Stir this mixture Avell into the 
hominy and pack in well-sterilized jars 
to one inch from the top. Put on a ster¬ 
ilized rubber, partly seal and sterilize for 
three hours. Seal, test for leaks. This 
makes three quart jars full. To serve, 
garnish with a few slices of crisp bacon 
and surround with home-canned green 
peas. 
Pot Roast with Noodles.—Place two 
tablespoons of minced suet in a deep 
saucepan to try it out. Cut two pounds 
of lean beef in. three-inch pieces and 
brown the pieces in the fat. Remove the 
meat and pour one quart of boiling water 
into the saucepan, thus making a nice, 
well-colored gravy. Put the meat back 
with one bay leaf, one clove and one tea¬ 
spoon of peppercorns and simmer for 
about two hours. Add one tablespoon 
salt and cook until tender. Blanch one 
package of medium-sized noodles in boil¬ 
going to preserve and can meat in ear¬ 
nest. MRS. F. W. STILLMAN- 
The Winter Thoughts of a Plain 
Farm-woman 
The Northern Season. —The months 
of January and February are not exactly 
prime favorites with the majority of coun¬ 
try housekeepers. Every time one is 
obliged to go out doors to feed the liens 
or calves or pigs or rabbits—or maybe all 
of them—the weather seems to delight in 
defying you, and apparently sets about to 
see just how cold and generally disagree¬ 
able and unsociable it can be. And then 
some of us have been known to knuckle 
under weakly and to declare in no uncer¬ 
tain terms that w 7 e wished we lived in 
Florida or California—for the Winter. 
But you never heard the cold-weatlier 
haters wishing they could migrate to these 
expensive climes when March suddenly 
ceases his naughty cavortings and over 
night assumes the meek and hopeful ways 
of the Spring lamb. Oh, my, no! The 
long, cold Northern Winter is instantly 
forgiven, somehow, and we quickly clean 
our mental house, as it were, and cheer¬ 
fully get into a new and chirked-up state 
of mind. For there are few natives of the 
rough hillsides and thrifty valleys of New 
York, Ohio, New England and the rest 
w T ho would really seriously dream of wish¬ 
ing themselves in foreign parts when the 
hardy maples begin to run sap, the great 
drifts add themselves to the mad Spring 
freshets— and, oh, joy! that bravest har¬ 
binger of blue skies to come shyly puts in 
his appearance—our own staunch Robin 
Redbreast. A Northern Spring is good 
enough for any of us, and if we weren’t 
on the spot to welcome it in, how genu¬ 
inely homesick everyone of us would be! 
Woman-saving Conveniences. — But 
I hear someone wondering to herself as 
she reads these lines if I would camouflage 
the terrors of Winter so fluently if per¬ 
chance the well was several rods from the 
house; the sink frozen up from Fall till 
Spring, and such a thing as an inside con¬ 
venience unknown. To such a woman Win¬ 
ter in truth has a meaning all its own— 
the greatest of which is plain despair. In 
those cases, I certainly believe that noth¬ 
ing on earth could stop me from having 
conditions changed before another season 
—if I stayed there, too! Of course I 
imply that there could be money found 
somehow to fix the sink, to drive a well 
at the house and move other inconveni¬ 
ences to their proper places. Personally 
it has often seemed to me that we country 
women could have things so much better 
in many cases if we thought about them 
enough to get them. I do believe that 
where there is a will there is a .way—and 
if that way weighs enough we eveutually 
get the new stove, or have new clapboards 
on the cold kitchen, or the old smoky 
chimneys altered, or whatever particular 
problem needs solving the most to keep 
things half way comfortable and woman- 
saving on the farm in Winter. 
Busy Times. —As for these mid-Win¬ 
ter months with me, I am paying no at¬ 
tention whatever to their bad dispositions, 
and am proceeding with the business of 
home-making just as if we were now enter¬ 
taining balmy June or sweet September. 
For I have no idea of allowing the weath¬ 
er to steal a march on me and upset the 
cheery business of making ready for 
Spring. The winds can snarl and quar¬ 
rel to their heart’s content outside—in¬ 
deed, and I should worry, for their tem¬ 
pers make no difference at all when you 
are busied in knitting pretty bedroom 
rugs, painting and varnishing shabby old 
furniture to look like new, and sewing up 
gay curtains, cushions and coverings for 
brightening the whole house this Sum¬ 
mer! So for several years, the first de¬ 
pressing months of the Ne\v Year have been 
reserved to do pleasant and busy things 
in. We do our Summer sewing then and 
enjoy working with the gay ginghams and 
light lawns when the thermometer threat¬ 
ens to make history. I refuse to dwell 
on the thought of frozen pipes and kin¬ 
dred annoyances and while literally wal¬ 
lowing back and forth from the barns 
with buckets of warm mash, I fancy that 
the weather can ferret out no trace of 
hate or even interest in my spirits! This 
Winter many happy homes in America will 
be eagerly listening to tales of unbe¬ 
lievable adventure which nevertheless ac¬ 
tually took place a few months back on 
the fields and farms of France—and our 
own sons, nephew's, neighbors and friends 
will be the narrators—and the unccn- 
fessed heroes. 
The Lonely Home. —But it makes my 
breath catch with wrenching pity when I 
think of other farm homes where the one 
w 7 ho w r ent away will never come back to 
tell how they fought the good fight and 
won it. Can v r e appreciate the sacrifice 
in such lonely farmhouses, and can v r e 
remember to let them know we remember 
even when the drifts in places are 10 feet 
high and it is 20 degrees below? In such 
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