ТОП просматриваемых книг сайта:
The Fun of Cooking: A Story for Girls and Boys. Caroline French Benton
Читать онлайн.Название The Fun of Cooking: A Story for Girls and Boys
Год выпуска 0
isbn http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/33213
Автор произведения Caroline French Benton
Жанр Зарубежная классика
Издательство Public Domain
After the cakes were iced, the leaves were laid in a wreath around the edges, with the tiny red berries among them; and they were the prettiest things for Christmas anybody ever saw.
When, at last, they were put away, Norah told them she had some bits of pie-crust left over from her mince-pies that they could have, if they wanted it. Brownie dashed into the hall, shouting, "Mother, Mother! What can we make with pie-crust? Norah says we can have some."
"Tartlets," called Mother Blair from upstairs. And when Brownie ran up for it she gave her this receipt:
Flour the pastry board; roll out some pie-crust very thin, and press it into little scalloped tins; prick holes in the bottom to let the air in. Cut off the edges smoothly, and bake till light brown. Just before you need them fill the shells with jelly.
The very moment when the tarts disappeared in the pantry, Jack came up with his pans of pop-corn.
"Real cooking is just for girls," he said, with his mouth full of a stolen macaroon. "It's all right for boys to make pop-corn balls, though. Only how do you do it?" His mother told him to wash his hands well, and then gave him this rule:
1 cup of molasses.
½ cup of sugar.
2 teaspoonfuls of vinegar.
½ teaspoonful of soda.
2 teaspoonfuls of butter.
Boil fifteen minutes, stirring all the time. Pour a little over a pan of corn, and take up in your hands all that sticks together, and roll it into a ball. Keep the candy hot on the back of the stove, and pour on more till it is all done.
This made a great dishful of lovely balls, and they set them away in a cold place; and then Norah told them they must run out of the kitchen, because she wanted to get luncheon ready.
After lunch, Jack had to go and shovel out paths again, because those he had made had all disappeared. Mildred and Brownie dressed a tiny doll for a cousin they were afraid might not have quite as many as she would want, and when that was done, they said they wanted to cook some more.
Their mother told them she had one very, very nice receipt meant especially for holidays, which, strangely enough, had Brownie's name. "Because you are so very, very nice yourself," she said with a hug, "perhaps you can make these all by yourself, too."
3 squares of chocolate.
2 eggs, beaten together.
½ cup of flour.
2 cups of sugar.
¼ cup of butter.
1 cup of chopped English walnuts.
Cream the butter and sugar together, and add the eggs, well beaten without separating; then add the flour. Melt the chocolate by cutting it up into small bits and putting it in a little dish over the steam of the tea-kettle. Put this in next, and, last, the nuts. Lay a greased paper on the bottom of a shallow pan, and pour the cake in, in a thin layer. Bake twenty-five minutes; mark off into squares while warm, and cut before removing from the pan. These should be as thick as cookies when done.
"Don't you want me to help you make them, Brownie?" Mildred asked, as she read the receipt over. "You see, I could beat the eggs for you, and you know how hard it is for you not to tip the bowl over when you beat them!"
"Well," Brownie said slowly, "I might let you do just that one thing, Mildred, but Mother said I was to make these cakes all alone."
"But let me help just a tiny little bit," Mildred coaxed; "they do sound so interesting!"
So in the end the two made the cakes together, all delicious, and just the thing for company.
While they were still fresh from the oven, in came a pretty grown-up neighbor, whom all the Blairs, big and little, loved very much, because she always was ready for a good time with them.
"Fee-fy-fo-fum!" she exclaimed, wrinkling up her little nose. "I smell something good to eat!"
"Oh, dear Miss Betty," Brownie cried, "it is Christmas cooking! Come and see it."
So Miss Betty saw all the lovely little holly cakes, and the tartlets, and the macaroons, and the Brownies, and ate little crumbs off wherever she could find one. Then she said, "I want to cook too! May I, Norah?"
"Sure you may," said Norah, who thought Miss Betty was the nicest young lady in the world.
Then Miss Betty wrote out this receipt, and pinned it up, and everybody helped her make:
2 cups of molasses.
1 cup of equal parts of butter and lard, mixed.
1 level tablespoonful of ginger.
1 teaspoonful of soda.
Flour to mix very stiff.
Melt the butter, add the molasses and ginger, then the soda, dissolved in a teaspoonful of boiling water; stir in flour till the dough is so stiff you cannot stir it with a spoon; take it out on the floured board, and roll a little at a time, and with a knife cut out a man; press currants in for eyes and for buttons on his coat. Bake in a floured pan.
"These are going to be Santa Clauses," said Miss Betty. "Jack, if you will cut me some tiny cedar twigs, we will stick them in the right hands – one in each." So Jack whittled down the ends of some little twigs till they were very sharp, and while the men were warm and soft, they put a twig in the right hand of each, and they were as funny as could be.
"Now, Jack, I've something lovely for you to make!" said Miss Betty. "I came over on purpose to tell you about it."
"Boys don't cook!" said Jack, loftily.
"Boys would be perfectly wild to make these," laughed Miss Betty, "if only they knew how; but of course if you don't care to – "
"What are they?"
"Christmas elves, and the cunningest things you ever saw." She opened a box and showed them a dear, droll little figure, brown and fat. It made the children laugh to look at him.
"We will make one for each person at the Christmas dinner, and stand them at the plates with cards in the hands, to show where everybody is to sit. Now, Jack, do you want to try?"
Jack instantly was hard at work.
Take a square of thin wood and drive two long, slender nails through it; these are the legs of the elf. Turn it upside down and push two large raisins on each nail, and then a fig on both – these are the legs and the body. Take a wire about four inches long, and put two raisins on each end, twisting up the ends to hold them. Lay this across the fig body and press it down to hold it firm. Put a marshmallow on a wooden toothpick, and put that on top for a head, and half of a fig for a cap. Draw eyes, nose, and mouth on the face with pen and ink, and, if you choose, brush a little melted chocolate on the sides of his head, for hair. Put a sprig of Christmas green in his cap.
Just as the elves were put in a row on the table. Miss Betty exclaimed, "Children, it's stopped snowing! It will be all clear to-morrow, and everybody will get here in time, after all!"
They rushed to the window to look, for sure enough, the storm was over, and everybody was going to have A Merry Christmas!
CHAPTER II
SUPPER AT THE HOUSE IN THE WOODS
When the Junior Blairs came down to breakfast on New Year's morning, there were three good-sized red-covered books lying on the table, one by each plate, and on the cover of each, in gold letters, was the name of Mildred, or Jack, or Brownie. But when they opened them there was nothing inside – only just white paper leaves.
"What are they for?" asked Mildred, puzzled. "For school, for examples and compositions?"
"Not a bit of it!" laughed her mother. "They are cook-books, or they will be when you have filled