This section is from the book "Common Sense In The Household. A Manual Of Practical Housewifery", by Marion Harland. Also available from Amazon: Common Sense in the Household.
1 quart flour.
1 tablespoonful lard, and same of butter.
1 teaspoonful soda, dissolved in hot water.
1 saltspoonful salt.
2 cups milk, or enough to make the flour into soft dough.
1 quart berries, chopped apples, sliced peaches, or other fruit; jam, preserves, canned fruit, or marmalade may be substituted for the berries.
Roll out the crust less than half an inch thick - indeed, a quarter of an inch will do - into an oblong sheet. Cover thickly with the fruit and sprinkle with sugar. Begin at one end and roll it up closely, the fruit inside. In putting this in, leave a narrow margin at the other end of the roll, which should be folded down closely like the flap of a pocket-book. Pinch the ends of the folded roll together, to prevent the escape of the fruit, and baste up in a bag, the same size and shape as the "valise." Flour the bag well before putting in the pudding, having previously dipped it - the cloth - into hot water, and wring it out.
Boil an hour and a half. Serve hot with sauce, and cut crosswise in slices half an inch thick.
Make a paste according to the above receipt; cut in squares, and put in the centre of each an apple, pared and cored. Bring the corners together; enclose each dumpling in a small square cloth, tied up bag-wise, leaving room to swell. Each cloth should be dipped in hot water, wrung out and floured on the inside before the apple is put in. . Boil one hour.
1 quart flour. 1/4 lb. suet. 1 teaspoonful salt.
1/2 teaspoonful soda dissolved in hot water. 1 • cream-tartar sifted in the flour.
Cold water enough to make into a tolerably stiff paste.
Boll out, cut into squares, put in the middle of each a fine, juicy apple, pared and cored. Fill the hole left by the core with marmalade, or with sugar wet with lemon-juice. Stick a clove in the sugar. Close the paste, tie up in the cloths, when you have wet them with hot water and floured them, and boil one hour.
A pleasing idea for dumpling cloths is to crochet them in a close stitch with stout tidy cotton. They are easily done, wash and wear well, and leave a very pretty pattern upon the paste when they are opened. Crochet them round, with a cord for drawing run into the outer edge.
Prepare a paste in accordance with either of the foregoing receipts, but roll into one sheet. Lay apples, peaches, or berries in the centre, paring and slicing the fruit; sprinkle with sugar, and close the paste over them as you would a dumpling. Dip a stout cloth in hot water, flour the inside, put in the pudding, tie tightly, and boil two hours and a half.
Eat hot with sauce.
1 lb. rice boiled without stirring, until soft, and at the top dry.
12 pippins, pared and cored.
Strawberry marmalade or crab-apple jelly.
Let the rice cool upon a sieve or coarse cloth, that it may dry at the same time. Dip your dumpling cloths in hot water; wring them out and flour well inside. Put a handful of the cold rice upon each, spreading it out into a smooth sheet. Lay in the centre an apple; fill the hole left by the core with marmalade or jelly ; draw up the cloth carefully to enclose the apple with a coating of rice; tie, and boil one hour.
Turn over with care; pour sweet sauce or rich sweetened cream over them, and send around more in a boat with them.
 
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