To Sweeten Tainted Meat.

We don’t need to give a lot of thought to the problem of dealing with tainted meat these days. By ‘tainted’ I mean ‘fresh’ meat which is no longer ‘fresh’. 

Think for a moment on what it must have been like in the not too distant past, before the days of refrigeration. Remember that a domestic refrigerator in every house did not happen until many decades after commercial refrigeration. When I grew up in a working-class family in post-war England, we did not have a fridge – nor did anyone else in the neighbourhood. At least the butchers did have refrigeration, so presumably the meat our mothers bought each day was fresh at the point of sale.

In the past, high-protein food was far too valuable to waste, but inevitably, especially in warm weather, meat would be past its best by the time the cooks got to it. What to do? Cookery books were full of advice on how to deal with tainted meat, and today I want to share a couple of methods with you –with the caveat of course that these would not be considered safe today.

Tainted meat may be restored by washing in cold water, afterwards in strong chamomile tea, after which it may be sprinkled with salt and used the following day, first washing it in cold water. Roughly pounded charcoal rubbed all over the meat also restores it when tainted. In Scotland meat is frequently kept a fortnight smothered in oatmeal, and carefully wiped every day; and if it should be a little tainted, it is soaked some hours before it is used, in oatmeal and water.

The cook's own book, and housekeeper's register, (1832) by Mrs. N. K. M. Lee, Eliza Lee

It has been successfully proved, by many experiments, that meat entirely fly-blown has been sufficiently purified to make good broth, and had not a disagreeable taste, by being previously put into a vessel containing a certain quantity of beer. The liquor will become tainted, and have a putrid smell.

The Kaleidoscope: or, Literary and scientific mirror (1824).

Cooked leftover meat could also not be wasted, and was commonly served at the next meal, perhaps doctored up a little. Here, from Mrs. Lee’s book, is one way of recycling leftover steak.

Beef, Cold Rump Steaks To Warm.

Lay them in a stew pan, with one large onion cut in quarters, six berries of allspice, the same of black pepper, cover the steaks with boiling water, let them stew gently one hour, thicken the liquor with flour and butter rubbed together on a plate; if a pint of gravy, about one ounce of flour, and the like weight of butter, will do; put it into the stewpan, shake it well over the fire for five minutes, and it is ready; lay the steaks and onions on a dish and pom- the gravy through a sieve over them.

Quotation for the Day.

Ever since Eve started it all by offering Adam the apple, woman's punishment has been to supply a man with food then suffer the consequences when it disagrees with him.
Helen Rowland

China Chilo.

I have a puzzle for you today. Maybe a food historian or linguist has already solved this, but if so, I don’t know about it. A popular dish of the nineteenth century in England was ‘China Chilo.’ In The Spirit of Cookery: A Popular Treatise on the History, Science, Practical, Ethical and Medical Import of Culinary Art, (1895) by J.L.W. Thudicum, this was described as “a ragout of green peas and mutton, stewed with some onions, lettuce, butter and spices, to be served with rice boiled in broth and moistened with butter. This is a most excellent dish, and is most conveniently eaten with a dessertspoon.’

It sounds quite delicious, doesn’t it? But whence the name?  Dishes with names suggesting an exotic foreign origin became increasingly popular as the British Empire extended, but there is nothing evocative of China about the dish, and ‘chilo’ is an even greater mystery.

I have found but one attempt at an explanation. The ‘chilo’ is an alternative (Italian) spelling of ‘chyle’, which is ‘The white milky fluid formed by the action of the pancreatic juice and the bile on the chyme, and contained in the lymphatics of the intestines, which are hence called lacteals. ‘The term has been used to designate the fluid in the intestines just before absorption.’ Thus, the suggested explanation that the dish was a similar colour. A cook naming a dish in recognition of it looking like vomitus? I don’t think so.

While the puzzle waits to be solved, here is the earliest recipe I have found so far:

China Chilo.

Mince a pint-basin of undressed neck of mutton, or leg, and some of the fat; put two onions, a lettuce, a pint of green peas, a tea-spoonful of salt, a tea-spoonful of pepper, four spoonsful of water, and two or three ounces of clarified butter, into a stew-pan closely covered; simmer two hours, and serve in the middle of a dish of boiled dry rice. If Cayenne is approved, add a little. This cannot be done too slowly.

A new system of domestic cookery, (1807) by Maria Eliza Ketelby Rundell

Quotation for the Day.

The qualities of an exceptional cook are akin to those of a successful tightrope walker: an abiding passion for the task, courage to go out on a limb and an impeccable sense of balance.

Bryan Miller.

Butter Factoids.

Butter has been around for a very long time, and the language of the ‘fatty substance obtained from cream by churning’ proves it. The Oxford English Dictionary has an enormous list of compound butter-words.

While you are buying your butter from the butter-dairy or the butter-shop, you might chat with the butter-maker, butter-dealer, butter-monger, butter-merchant, butter-man, butter-wife, or butter-woman. Your butter might have already had a trip in a butter-cart to get to the point of purchase, and then you take it home, perhaps wrapped in butter-muslin. Your purchase might have spent some time in a butter-churn, butter-tub, butter-barrel, butter-cask, or butter-firkin before you take it home and put it your butter-dish, butter-crock or butter cooler – or melt it and put it in your butter-boat. You might use a butter knife, butter scoop, or butter tongs to manage your butter while you decide whether to simply spread it on your bread or make butter-cream, butter-sauce, butter-biscuits, or butter-cake.

That isn’t all of the butter-words, but I didn’t want to labour the point too hard. One compound usage that was particularly enlightening is ‘butter salt’, which is ‘fine common salt in small crystals obtained by rapid evaporation of brine, used in salting butter.’ Another is ‘butter-weight’ – which used to be 18 oz to the pound. In the future I must do a post on how and when a pound or an ounce or a hundred was not always the same for every product.

I now have an excuse to give you “Butter Biscuits” – several varieties in fact.

First, the ‘healthy option’, from Allinson’s Vegetarian Cookery Book (1915) – a rather bleak, sugarless, saltless, hardtack-style cracker, which would qualify for inclusion in a ‘Three Ingredients Cook Book.’

Butter Biscuits.

½ lb. butter, 2 lbs. wholemeal flour, ½ pint milk. Dissolve the butter in the milk, which should be warmed, then stir in the meal and make to a stiff, smooth paste. Roll out very thin, stamp it into biscuits, prick them out with a fork, and bake on tins in a quick oven.

Secondly, a similar concept, this time the dough being beaten into submission before baking,  from Eliza Leslie's Seventy-Five Receipts, for Pastry, Cakes, and Sweetmeats (1828) [with thanks to blog commenter Carolina for her correction of my wrong attribution.]

Butter Biscuits.

Half a pound of butter.

Two pounds of flour, sifted.

Half a pint of milk, or cold water.

A salt-spoonful of salt.

Cut up the butter in the flour, and put the salt to it. Wet it to a stiff dough with the milk or water. Mix it well with a knife. Throw some flour on the paste-board, take the dough out of the pan, and knead it very well. Roll it out into a large thick sheet, and beat it very hard on both sides with the rolling-pin. Beat it a long time. Cut it out with a tin, or cup, into small round thick cakes. Beat each cake on both sides, with the rolling-pin. Prick them with a fork. Put them in buttered pans, and bake them of a light brown in a slow oven.

Thirdly, a yeast-leavened soft roll, from Cookery and domestic economy, by Mary Somerville (Glasgow, 1862)

Butter Biscuits.

Weigh two pounds of flour, rub into it four ounces of butter, and two ounces of raw sugar; mix one cupful of good fresh yeast in a cupful of warm water, stir it in, cover up, and let stand by the fire all night. Next morning, work in a quarter of an ounce of powdered ammonia; knead together, and make up in small biscuits. Prickle them, and bake in a quick oven.

Quotation for the Day.

If toast always lands butter-side down, and cats always land on their feet, what happens if you strap toast on the back of a cat and drop it?

Stephen Wright.

Black Butter.

There are two distinct types of Black Butter in the repertoire of the Compleat Chef. One is a thick, quite dark, conserve of fruit of the type enjoyed by Jane Austen, and which featured in a blog post some time ago. The word ‘butter’ in this context intends to convey its spreadable nature, as it does in lemon butter, orange butter, peanut butter, and so on.

Before we move on to the second type, I give you a variation of the first, made with fruit other than the traditional apples.

Black Butter.

Three pounds of fruit, (viz. currants, gooseberries, raspberries, and cherries) to one pound of sixpenny sugar boiled till it is quite thick: it must waste half the quantity. It is a very pleasant sweetmeat, and keeps well.

The Lady’s Assistant for Regulating her Table, Charlotte Mason, 1777

The second type of black butter is the ‘French’ style, called in its native tongue and in classic cookery texts, ‘beurre noire’, and traditionally used as a sauce for fish, eggs, and other dishes. An important concept is that the butter is not, in fact, black in colour. It is made by carefully and slowly cooking butter over a low heat until it is a deep mellow brown. If the melted butter becomes black it is overdone and ruined. I have never understood why it is not called ‘beurre brunes’. Some inscrutable French reason, I suppose. To complete the dish, the flavour of the melted brown butter is then sharpened with lemon juice, vinegar, or capers before use.

Black Butter

Shake a quarter of a pound of butter in a frying-pan till it becomes a deep brown; let it settle; skim and pour it clear off; wipe the pan, and return the butter into it; add two spoonfuls of tarragon vinegar, salt, and mix it.

Domestic Economy and Cookery, for rich and poor, by a Lady, 1827

There is an entirely different English melted butter sauce – some ill-read folk even believe it is the only English sauce – and you can read a few opinions and recipes for it in a previous post.

Quotation for the Day

Butter is the great staple article for breakfast & tea among all classes. The idea of restraining children from a liberal use of good fresh butter is exploded, & they almost live upon bread & butter in this city.
John Pintard (1759-1844) writing from New York to his daughter in New Orleans.

Vegetable Puddings.

Historically, the word ‘puddings’ was just as likely – at times, more likely – to refer to a ‘savoury’ dish rather than a sweet, ‘dessert’ dish (and the distinction between sweet and savoury dishes was blurred, if you go back to medieval times.) We have discussed the general subject of puddings, and the troublesome etymology of the word in a previous post (here), but the topic is far from exhausted.

I want to talk today about vegetable puddings. Again, this is not a new topic here – I considered the idea of vegetable puddings in a previous post, as a way of helping you to get your ‘five a day’ by adding them to your dessert menu. My favourite idea was the ‘Pudding in a Turnep Root’, but there have been many others.

The concept behind these recipes was not, of course, that of increasing vegetable consumption. At the time, a far greater priority for the mass of the population was to get more protein. The starchy vegetables (which could be home-grown, or were cheap) which feature in many of these sweet puddings acted to reduce the amount of flour or other grain, and to fill the belly, so the lack of a nice steak or chicken breast did not bite so much.

The vegetable puddings which have so far featured in this blog have been puddings in the dessert style – like this one, from the Los Angeles Times Cookbook: 1,000 Recipes of Famous Pioneer Settlers ... (1905)

Vegetable Pudding.

Mrs. Nellie B. Stewart, 1417 East Twenty-first street, Los Angeles.

One cup carrots, one cup potato, one cup sour apples, one cup currants, one cup raisins, one cup bread crumbs, one cup flour, one cup suet, two cups white sugar, one teaspoon soda, one cup walnuts coarsely chopped. Steam three hours. The vegetables and apples can be cut with a cutter.

Let us not forget that a vegetable pudding can function very well, without the sugar and spices, as a vegetable dish. Either of the following would make a fine main course for a vegetarian dinner.

Vegetable Pudding.

Take spinage, peas, and broad beans, boiled each separately, and rubbed through a sieve.

Mix with the whites of two eggs, a little pepper, and salt; fill a basin, and boil.

Maigre Cookery (1884)

A Vegetable Pudding.

Boil a savoy cabbage, and squeeze it as dry as possible in a clean rubber; then chop it very fine, and put it into a stew-pan, and about an ounce of butter, and a little pepper and salt; set it over the fire; keep stirring it until quite hot; then put it on a plate to cool:—boil two carrots, but do not scrape them; when boiled, cut them in quarters, and shape them round with a knife:—mash some potatoes very fine, make them very good, and put them to cool:—boil some spinach, and squeeze it very dry ; chop it very fine; put it into a stew-pan, about an ounce of butter, a little cream, pepper and salt; stir it about until quite hot, and dry; then put it on a plate to cool:—then mash some turnips ; the turnips should be squeezed very dry; the best way is to put them in a clean cloth, and squeeze the water out; then put them into a sauce-pan, with about two ounces of butter, a little white pepper, and salt; put them over a slow fire ; keep stirring them while on the fire; then put them to cool:—boil four heads of nice greens; then squeeze the water well from them, and leave them their full length:—butter an oval, or round mould (called a crocant mould); at each end put carrots, then potatoes, next greens, then turnips, next carrots, then cabbage, then spinach, and then potatoes ; they should all be laid longways down the mould; make a star in the bottom of the mold, with carrots, cut in the shape of leaves; fill the middle up with mashed potatoes; put it in the oven (or a stew-pan, with water to come up about three parts of the mould) about half an hour before it is wanted; (the oven is best, as the vegetables bind together better) be very particular about buttering the mould; make as much butter stick to it as you can. To make it easier understood, I have given the following plan of the method of putting the vegetables into the mould.

N. B. The vegetables should be rolled in the shape of a sausage, put quite close to each other; when done, turn it out; it is a handsome dish for the middle, or two of them for flanks.

A complete system of cookery on a plan entirely new (1816) by John Simpson.

Quotation for the Day.

“'Make a remark,' said the Red Queen; 'it's ridiculous to leave all the conversation to the pudding!'”

Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland.

Ale, Beer, and Porter.

Nowadays most beer-lovers don’t agonise over the difference between ale and beer, and most would only order a porter if they wanted their baggage delivered. Historically the differences are important, however, so as the words came up in yesterday’s post, I thought I should clarify their meanings. I can do no better than the author of A dictionary, practical, theoretical, and historical, of commerce ..., Volume 1, (1840), who precedes his explanation of ale and beer with a short historical overview:

ALE and BEER, well-known and extensively used fermented liquors, the principle of which is extracted from several sorts of grain, but most commonly from barley, after it has undergone the process termed malting.

I. Historical Notice of Ale and Beer.—The manufacture of ale or beer is of very high antiquity. Herodotus tells us, that owing to the want of wine, the Egyptians drank a liquor fermented from barley (lib. ii. cap. 77.) The use of it was also very anciently introduced into Greece and Italy, though it does not appear to have ever been very extensively used in these countries. Mead, or metheglin,was probably the earliest intoxicating liquor known in the North of Europe. Ale or beer was, however, in common use in Germany in the time of Tacitus (Morib. Germ. cap. 23.). "All the nations," says Pliny, "who inhabit the West of Europe have a liquor with which they intoxicate themselves, made of com and water (fruge madida). The manner of making this liquor is somewhat different in Gaul, Spain, and other countries, and it is called by many various names; but its nature and properties are everywhere the same. The people of Spain, in particular, brew this liquor to well that it will keep good for a long time. So exquisite is the ingenuity of mankind in gratifying their vicious appetites, that they have thus invented a method to make water itself intoxicate."— (Hist. Nat. lib. xiv. cap. 22.) The Saxons and Danes were passionately fond of beer; and the drinking of it was supposed to form one of the principal enjoyment! of the heroes admitted to the hall of Odin.—(Mallet's Northern Antiquities, cap. 6, &c.) The manufacture of ale was early introduced into England. It is mentioned in the laws of Ina, King of Wessex; and is particularly specified among the liquors provided for a royal banquet in the reign of Edward the Confessor. It was customary in the reigns of the Norman princes to regulate the price of ale; and it was enacted, by a statute passed in 1272, that a brewer should be allowed to sell two gallons of ale for a penny in cities, and three or four gallons for the same price in the country.

The use of hops in the manufacture of ale and beer seems to have been a German invention. They were used in the breweries of the Netherlands, in the beginning of the fourteenth century; but they do not seem to have been introduced into England till 200 years afterwards, or till the beginning of the sixteenth century. In 1530, Henry VIII. enjoined brewers not to put hops into their ale. It would, however, appear that but little attention was paid to this order; for in 1552 hop plantations had begun to be formed. — (Beckmann's Hist. Invent, vol. iv. pp. 336—341. Eng. ed.) The addition of hops renders ale more palatable, by giving it an agreeable bitter taste, while, at the same time, it fits it for being kept much longer without injury. Generally speaking, the English brewers employ a much larger quantity of hops than the Scotch. The latter are in the habit of using, in brewing the fine Edinburgh ale, from a pound to a pound and a half of hops for every bushel of malt.

2. Distinction between Ale and Beer, or Porter.—This distinction has been ably elucidated by Dr.Thomas Thomson, in his valuable article on Brewing, in the Supplement to the Encyclopaedia Britannica: —" Both ale and beer are in Great Britain obtained by fermentation from the malt of barley; but they differ from each other in several particulars. Ale is light-coloured, brisk, and sweetish, or at least free from bitter; while beer is dark-coloured, bitter, and much less brisk. What is called porter in England is a species of beer; and the term "porter" at present signifies what was formerly called strong beer. The original difference between ale and beer was owing to the malt from which they were prepared. Ale malt was dried at a very low heat, and consequently was of a pale colour; while beer or porter malt was dried at a higher temperature, and had of consequence acquired a brown colour. This incipient charring had developed a peculiar and agreeable bitter taste, which was communicated to the beer along with the dark colour. This bitter taste rendered beer more agreeable to the palate, and less injurious to the constitution than ale. It was consequently manufactured in greater quantities, and soon became the common drink of the lower ranks in England. When malt became high priced, in consequence of the heavy taxes laid upon it, and the great increase in the price of barley which took place during the war of the French revolution, the brewers found out that a greater quantity of wort of a given strength could be prepared from pale malt than from brown malt. The consequence was that pale malt was substituted for brown malt in the brewing of porter and beer. We do not mean that the whole malt employed was pale, but a considerable proportion of it. The wort, of course, was much paler than before; and it wanted that agreeable bitter flavour which characterized porter, and made it so much relished by most palates. The porter brewers endeavoured to remedy these defects by several artificial additions. At the same time various substitutes were tried to supply the place of the agreeable bitter communicated to porter by the use of brown malt. Quassia, cocculus indicus, and we believe even opium, were employed in succession: but none of them was found to answer the purpose sufficiently. Whether the use of these substances be still persevered in we do not know; but we rather believe that they are not, at least by the London porter brewers."

The author does not explain how ‘strong beer’ became known as ‘porter’, so I must  fill in the gap with the help of the Oxford English Dictionary. ‘Porter’ is short for ‘porter’s ale’ or ‘porter’s beer’. It is ‘a dark-brown or black bitter beer, brewed from malt partly charred or browned by drying at a high temperature’ and was designed as an especially strong beer for the especially strong men who worked as porters in the markets of London, and without whom the city would have ground to a halt.

Recipe for the Day.

Some time ago I gave you a beer-themed menu, and included a recipe for a Chocolate Beer Cake. Several beer-based recipes followed in another post (here.) Today I give you a beer bread recipe from the San Antonio Light of November 12, 1937.

Pearl Beer Bread.

One cup syrup, 1 teaspoon salt, 2 pounds rye flour, 6 cakes yeast, 8 orange peels, 4 cups Pearl beer, 2

pounds white flour.

Heat beer and syrup together until lukewarm; mix yeast and salt and stir in some beer mixture. Cut small pieces of orange peel separately into the rye and white flour. Make a smooth dough by mixing all ingredients; let stand for 3-4 hour. Knead dough into long loaves; rub with flour; and cover dough until it raises. Bake an hour over slow fire; and brush loaves with hot water, rolling them in cloth until used.

Makes 3 loaves. Excellent for sandwiches.

Quotation for the Day.

The roots and herbes beaten and put into new ale or beer and daily drunk, cleareth, strengtheneth and quickeneth the sight of the eyes.
Nicholas Culpeper

Drinkable Liquorice.

One last post (for the time being) on liquorice. We have had medicinal liquorice, and liquorice in cakes, today we have it in a beverage or two.

A child’s favourite, from my own childhood: put a stick of ‘Spanish’ in a bottle, add water, and shake until the liquorice is dissolved, or the child becomes bored, whichever comes first (usually the latter). Drink. Or not, because the fun was in the making, and it is not as good to drink as lemonade, to a child’s taste.

And a slightly more sophisticated version, from a useful book called Household management for the labouring classes, (1882) by H.L. Hamilton:

Liquorice water.

Break an ounce of liquorice stick and half an ounce of gum arabic into a jug; add a quart of boiling water; cover the mouth of the jug, and let it stand till cold.

Finally, for those of you who love dark beer, or liquorice, or both, I give you the instructions for making your own. They are taken from a book by William Cobbett, published in 1824, with the full and informative title of:

Cottage economy: containing information relative to the brewing of beer, making of bread, keeping of cows, pigs, bees, ewes, goats, poultry and rabbits, and relative to other matters deemed useful in the conducting of the affairs of a labourer's family: to which are added, instructions relative to the selecting, the cutting and the bleaching of the plants of English grass and grain, for the purpose of making hats and bonnets.

The following instructions for the making of porter will clearly show what sort of stuff is sold at public houses in London; and we may pretty fairly suppose, that the public house beer in the country is not superior to it in quality. "A quarter of malt, with these ingredients, will make five barrels of good porter. Take one quarter of high coloured malt, eight pounds of hops, nine pounds of treacle, eight pounds of colour, eight pounds of sliced liquorice root, two drams of salt of tartar, two ounces of Spanish liquorice, and half an ounce of capsicum." The author says, that he merely gives the ingredients, as used by many persons.

Quotation for the Day.

Buy a man a beer, and he wastes an hour.  Teach a man to brew, and he wastes a lifetime.

Charles Papazian

Liquorice Cake?

I was not intentionally continuing the theme of medicinal cakes when I settled on the recipe for this day. Liquorice has a long history of medicinal use, it is true, but what caught my eye about this particular cake is that it is a ‘real’ cake – a real seventeenth century cake that is, leavened with eggs. It is not named ‘liquorice cake’ but the root does feature as one of the significant flavourings. The usual ‘liquorice cake’ found in historical cookery books is what we would now think of as a lozenge or candy intended for medicinal use.

Liquorice did have a culinary use in the past, in addition to its medical applications. It was used to flavour gingerbread for example, but I have not found any other examples of it in baked goods, until this discovery. I will continue my search and keep you informed. 

Here it is, from Sir Theodore Mayerne’s book Archimagirus Anglo-Gallicus, published in 1658.

To make fine Cakes in the form of rings.

Take a quart of fine flower, an ounce of Colliander-seed, one ounce of Anniseeds, a good piece of liquorish, half a pound of sugar, two new laid egs, new milke to wet it withal, being warmed, and so make boughts* in the form of rings.

* ‘boughts’ puzzled me initially. The OED tells me that a ‘bought’ is ‘The bend or loop of a rope, string, or chain; the part between the ends or points of attachment; the fold of a cloth, etc.; a turn or involution.’

Quotation for the Day

Nouvelle Cuisine, roughly translated, means: I can't believe I paid ninety-six dollars and I'm still hungry.

Mike Kalin.

Medicated Cakes, Part 2.

My story last week on ‘Medicated Gingerbread’ seems to have interested quite a number of you, and my own interest is far from sated. Naturally, I have been in search of similar dishes.

There are many recipes from ancient times in which a specific spice or herb is added for its perceived medicinal effect, and there are many recipes from the Victorian era for ‘invalid foods’ such as broths and bland puddings suitable for the weakly or indisposed - but what I have been in search of are the less obviously therapeutic dishes.

A single book has solved my dilemma. Meals medicinal: with "herbal simples" (of edible parts) Curative foods from the cook in place of drugs from the chemist (1905), by William Thomas Fernie contains many, many recipes with alleged therapeutic benefits, which you could place on the table at your next dinner party, and your guests have no inkling of the good you were doing them. Many recipes are completely delicious and indulgent, and it is a marvellous fantasy to hope that one day, dietitians might declare the following to be ‘health foods’!

For making Brandy Snaps of Ginger, which are carminative*, and gently relaxing to the bowels, take one pound of flour, half a pound of coarse brown sugar, a quarter of a pound of butter, one dessertspoonful of allspice, two dessertspoonfuls of ground ginger, the grated peel of half a lemon, and the juice of a whole, lemon; mix all together, adding half a pound of dark brown treacle (not golden syrup), and beat well. Butter some sheet tins, and spread the paste thinly over them, and bake in a rather slow oven. When done, cut it into squares, and roll each square round the finger as it is raised from the tin. Keep the Snaps in a dry, closely-covered tin, out of any damp, so that they shall

remain crisp.

* Having the quality of expelling flatulence.

And if your stomach is qualmish, or you simply want an excuse to indulge in macaroons for breakfast, here it is:

As an eligible piece of confectionery which is light, sustaining, and somewhat sedative to an irritable, or qualmish stomach, the macaroon (" maccare," to reduce to pulp) is admirable, either at breakfast (instead of the customary egg, including the yolk), or by way of an improvised luncheon, or as an occasional snack, about the easy digestion of which no fear need be entertained. The albuminous white of egg, the demulcent, reinvigorating sweet almond, the comforting sugar, and the tranquillising

modicum of bitter almond, with its infinitesimal quantity of prussic acid as a sedative to the gastric nerves, make altogether a most happy combination for the objects now particularized.

Quotation for the Day.

We are indeed much more than what we eat, but what we eat can nevertheless help us to be much more than what we are.

Adelle Davis.