VEGETABLES
MASHED POTATOES
6 large potatoes.
½ cup hot milk.
Butter the size of a walnut.
3 teaspoonfuls salt.
3 shakes of pepper.
Peel and boil the potatoes till tender; then turn off the water and stand them on the back of the stove with a cover half over them, where they will keep hot while they get dry and floury, but do not let them burn; shake the saucepan every little while. Heat the milk with the butter, salt, and pepper in it; mash the potatoes well, either with the wooden potato-masher or with a wire one, and put in the milk little by little. When they are all free from lumps, pile them lightly in the vegetable-dish as they are. Do not smooth them over the top.
BEETS
Wash the beets but do not peel them. Boil them gently for three-quarters of an hour, or till they can be pierced easily with a straw. Then skin them and slice in a hot dish, dusting each layer with a little salt, pepper, and melted butter. Those which are left over may have a little vinegar poured over them, to make them into pickles for luncheon.
Once Margaret made something very nice by a recipe her Aunt put in her book. It was called—
STUFFED BEETS
1 tin French peas.
6 medium-sized beets.
Boil the beets as before and skin them, but leave them whole. Heat the peas after the juice has been turned off, and season them with salt and pepper. Cut off the stem end of each beet so that it will stand steadily, and scoop a round place in the other end; sprinkle each beet with salt and pepper, and put a tiny bit of butter down in this little well, and then fill it high with the peas it will hold.
PEAS
Shell them and drop them into a saucepan of boiling water, into which you have put a teaspoonful of salt and a pinch of soda. Boil them till they are tender, from fifteen minutes, if they are fresh from the garden, to half an hour or more, if they have stood in the grocer’s a day or two. When they are done they will have little dents in their sides, and you can easily mash two or three with a fork on a plate. Then drain off the water, put in three shakes of pepper, more salt if they do not taste just right, and a piece of butter the size of a walnut, and shake them till the butter melts; serve in a hot covered dish.
FRENCH BEANS
Pull off the strings and cut off the ends; hold three or four beans in your hand and cut them into long, very narrow strips, not into square pieces. Then cook them exactly as you did the peas.
STEWED TOMATOES
6 large tomatoes.
1 teaspoonful of salt.
1 teaspoonful of sugar.
3 shakes of pepper.
Butter as large as a walnut.
Peel and cut the tomatoes up small, saving the juice; put together in a saucepan with the seasoning. Simmer twenty minutes, stirring till it is smooth, and last put in half a cup of bread-crumbs. Serve in a hot, covered dish.
ASPARAGUS
Untie the bunch, scrape the stalks clean, and put it in cold water for half an hour. Tie the bunch again, and cut enough off the white ends to make all the pieces of the same length. Stand them in boiling water in a saucepan, and cook gently for about twenty minutes. Lay on a dish, on squares of buttered toast.
ONIONS
Peel off the outside skin and cook them in boiling, salted water till they are tender; drain them, put them in a baking-dish, and pour over them a tablespoonful of melted butter, three shakes of pepper, and a sprinkling of salt, and put in the oven and brown a very little. Or, cover them with a cup of white sauce instead of the melted butter, and sprinkle with salt and pepper, but do not put in the oven.
FRIED POTATOES
Wash and peel sufficient potatoes, then chop them fine, and put them into cold water. Put some bacon dripping into an iron frying-pan, and when very hot turn the potatoes into it (previously dried by pressing in a clean cloth). Add salt and pepper. Cook until soft; then draw the pan to a hotter part of the stove and brown. Serve very hot.
CARROT CROQUETTES
Wash and scrape a sufficient number of carrots; stew them until very soft, drain and mash and season with salt, pepper, and butter; then bind together with the yolk of an egg. When cool enough to handle, shape into balls, dredge with brown bread-crumbs, and fry in deep fat till brown. Serve up with parsley.
MACARONI
6 long pieces of macaroni.
1 cup of white sauce.
½ pound of cheese.
Pepper and salt.
Break up the macaroni into small pieces, and boil fifteen minutes in salted water, shaking the saucepan often. Pour off the water. Butter a dish, put in a layer of macaroni, a good sprinkle of salt, then a very little white sauce, and a layer of grated cheese, sprinkled over with a tiny dusting of pepper; only use a tiny bit. Then cover with a thin layer of white sauce, and so on till the dish is full, with the last layer of white sauce covered with an extra thick one of the cheese. Bake till brown.
Margaret’s mother got this recipe in Paris, and she thought it a very nice one.
After the soup, meat, and vegetables at dinner came the salad; for this Margaret almost always had lettuce, with French dressing, as mayonnaise seemed too heavy for dinner. Sometimes she had nice watercress; very occasionally she had celery with mayonnaise.