Potato

A dozen large mealy potatoes.

2 onions.

1 lb. salt pork.

3 qts. water.

1 tablespoonful butter. 1 cup milk or cream. 1 well-beaten egg. Chopped onion.

Boil the pork in the clear water for an hour and a half, then take it out. Have ready the potatoes, which, after being peeled and sliced, should lie in cold water for half an hour. Throw them into the pot, with the chopped onion. Cover and boil three-quarters of an hour, stirring often. Beat in butter, milk and egg. Add the latter ingredients carefully, a little at a time; stir while it heats to a final boil, and then serve.

This is a cheap wholesome dish, and more palatable than one would suppose from reading the receipt.

Graham Soup+

3 onions.

3 carrots.

4 turnips.

1 small cabbage.

1 bunch celery.

1 pt. stewed tomatoes.

Chop all the vegetables, except the tomatoes and cabbage, very finely, and set them over the fire with rather over three quarts of water. They should simmer gently for half an hour at the end of which time the cabbage must be added, having previously been parboiled and chopped up. In fifteen minutes more put in the tomatoes and a bunch of sweet herbs, and give all a lively boil of twenty minutes. Rub through a cullender, return the soup to the fire, stir in a good tablespoonful of butter, pepper, and salt, half a cup of cream if you have it, thickened with corn-starch; let it boil up, and it is ready for the table.

Ochra, Or Gumbo

Ochra, or okra, is a vegetable little known except in the far South, where it is cultivated in large quantities and is very popular. A favorite soup is prepared from it in the following manner: -

2 qts. of ochras, sliced thin.

1 qt. of tomatoes, also sliced. 4 tablespoonfuls of butter.

2 lbs. of beef, cut into small pieces.

1/2 lb. corned ham or pork, also cut up.

Put the meat and ochras together in a pot with a quart of cold water - -just enough to cover them - and let them stew for an hour. Then add the tomatoes and two quarts of boiling water - more, if the liquid in the pot has boiled away so as to expose the meat and vegetables. Boil three-quarters of an hour longer, skimming often with a silver spoon. When the contents of the vessel are boiled to pieces, put in the butter, with cayenne pepper and salt, if the ham has not seasoned it sufficiently. Strain and send up with squares of light, crisp toast floating upon it.

Corn+

1 large fowl, cut into eight pieces.

1 doz. ears green corn - cut from the cobs.

Boil the chicken with the cobs in a gallon of water until the fowl is tender - if tough, the boiling must be slow and long. Then, put the corn into the pot, and stew an hour longer - still gently. Remove the chicken with a cupful of the liquid, if you wish to make other use of the meat. Set this aside, take out the cobs, season the corn-soup with pepper, salt, and parsley; thicken with rice or wheat flour, boil up once, and serve without straining, if the corn be young and tender.

A tolerable fricassee may be made of the chicken, unless it has boiled to rags, by beating up an egg and a tablespoonful of butter, adding this to the cupful of reserved liquor from which the corn must be strained. Boil this for a moment, thicken with flour, throw in a little chopped parsley, pepper, and salt; pour, while scalding, over the chicken, which you have arranged in a dish; garnish with circular slices of hard-boiled eggs and curled parsley.