Part 6

Planked Steak, Parkerhouse Style Head Lettuce King's Pudding, with Apple Jelly Sauce Black Coffee

TUESDAY

Breakfast

Dates Gluten Grits, Cream Baked Potatoes Bacon Graham Toast, Butter Coffee

Luncheon

Salmon a la Creole Pulled Bread Sweet Potato Croquettes Pears in Syrup Milk or Tea

Dinner

Stuffed Leg of Pork Mashed Potatoes Apple Sauce Fig-and-Cranberry Pie Coffee

WEDNESDAY

Breakfast

Winter Pears Wheatena, Milk Pork-and-Potato Hash Raised Pancakes, Syrup Coffee

Luncheon

Oyster-and-Onion Puree Crusty Rolls Apple-and-Nut Salad Cocoa

Dinner

Skirt Steak with Raisin Sauce Dry Deviled Parsnips Baked Sweet Potatoes Cherry Pie Coffee

THURSDAY

Breakfast

Cream of Wheat, Cream Tomato Omelet Stirred Brown Bread Coffee

Luncheon

Potato-and-Peanut Sausages Cabbage-and-Celery Salad, with Cheese Strawberry Gelatine Jelly Tea

Dinner

Boiled Tongue Steamed Potatoes Creamed Carrots Brussels Sprouts Apple Pie a la Mode Coffee

FRIDAY

Breakfast

Grapefruit Cracked Wheat, Milk Creamed Finnan Haddie Hashed Brown Potatoes Popovers Coffee

Luncheon

Frumenty with Cream Escaloped Chipped Beef and Potatoes Chocolate Layer Cake Cafe au Lait

Dinner

Halibut Steaks Brother Jonathan Creamed Cabbage Chow-Chow Apricot Puffs with Custard Sauce Coffee

SATURDAY

Breakfast

Gravenstein Apples Quaker Oats, Milk Scrambled Eggs with Bacon Steamed Brown Bread Coffee

Luncheon

Puree of Baked Beans Castilian Salad (Pineapple, Nuts, Apples, Grapes, Celery) Swedish Pancakes with Aigre-Doux Sauce Chocolate

Dinner

Veal Stew Browned Sweet Potatoes Lima Beans in Tomato Sauce Leaf Lettuce with Fr. Dressing Brown Betty with Foamy Sauce Coffee

Menus for Thanksgiving Dinners

I

_Three-Course Dinner for Small Family in Servantless House_

Roast Chicken, stuffed with Chopped Celery and Oysters Baked Sweet Potatoes Boiled Onions

Salad (Fine chopped apples and nuts in red apple cups) Cream Dressing

Mince or Squash Pie a la mode Sweet Cider Coffee

II

_A Simple Company Dinner of Six Courses_

Celery Clam Bouillon, Saltines Ripe Olives

Roast, Chestnut-Stuffed Turkey, Giblet Sauce Buttered Asparagus Glazed Sweet Potatoes Moulded Cranberry Jelly

Chicken Salad in Salad Rolls

Thanksgiving Pudding Hard Sauce

Chocolate Ice Cream Strawberry Sauce

Assorted Fruit Coffee

III

_A Formal Company Dinner. Eight Courses_

Curled Celery Oyster Soup, Bread Sticks Radish Rosettes

Turbans of Flounder Hollandaise Sauce Potato Straws Olives Crusty Rolls Salted Nuts

Capon a la Creme (Stuffing of Potatoes, Mushrooms, Chestnuts, etc.) Mashed Potatoes Green Pea Timbales Cranberry Sauce

Sweet Cider Frappe

Venison Steaks Currant Jelly Sauce Baked Parsnips

Apple-and-Grape Salad

Macaroon Pudding Frozen Mince Pie Hot Chocolate Sauce

Glaceed Walnuts Fruit Black Coffee

IV

_Elaborate Formal Dinner. Ten Courses_

Fruit Cocktail Oysters on Half-shell Brown Bread-and-Butter Sandwiches Quartered Lemons

Clear Bouillon, Oysterettes Radishes Celery

Boiled Halibut Potato Balls in Parsley Sauce Sweet Pickles

Cauliflower au Gratin

Braised Turkey or Capon Bread Stuffing Giblet Gravy Duchesse Potatoes Spinach

Crystallized Ginger Salted Pecans Pineapple Fritters, Lemon Sauce

Granite of Cider and Apples

Cutlets of Duck, with Chopped Celery

Orange Salad

Pumpkin Pie Raisin and Cranberry Tarts Chocolate Parfait Almond Cakes

Nuts Raisins Bonbons Candied Orange Peel Black Coffee

Concerning Breakfasts

By Alice E. Whitaker

A certain Englishman who breakfasted with the Washington family in 1794 wrote of the occasion: "Mrs. Washington, herself, made tea and coffee for us. On the table were two small plates of sliced tongue and dry toast, bread and butter, but no broiled fish, as is the general custom." However sparing the mistress of Mt. Vernon might have been, it was the usual custom in old times to eat a hearty breakfast of meat or fish and potato, hot biscuits, doughnuts, griddle cakes and sometimes even pie was added. A section of hot mince pie was always considered a fitting ending to the winter morning meal in New England, at least.

When Charles Dickens was in the United States, in 1842, he stopped at the old Tremont house in Boston. In his "American Notes," which followed his visit to this country, he wrote critically of the American breakfast, as follows: "And breakfast would have been no breakfast unless the principal dish were a deformed beefsteak with a great flat bone in the center, swimming in hot butter and sprinkled with the very blackest of pepper."

For a time my household included a colored cook, who, according to local custom, went to her own home every night. Invariably before leaving she came to me with the short and abrupt question, "What's for?" This experience taught me the difficulty of planning breakfasts off hand. More than one beginner in housekeeping wonders whether a light breakfast of little but a roll and coffee is more healthful than one of several courses. It is an old American idea that luncheon or supper may be light, dinner varied and heavier, but breakfast must be wholesome and nourishing. This is based on the belief that it is natural for man and beast to wake up in the morning with a desire for food and unnatural to try to do the hardest work of the day with but a pretence at eating.

About twenty years ago there was much talk of the alleged healthfulness of going without breakfast entirely. For a time this plan was the object of much discussion and experiment by medical and scientific men and workers in general. The late Edward Everett Hale was a strong opponent to abstinence from breakfast by brain workers, while those who labored with hand and muscle looked with little favor on the morning fast. Finally the no-breakfast idea went the way of most fads in food.

As a compromise between the extremes of going without any breakfast, and the old-time, over-hearty meal of several courses, there came into fashion the simple meal of fruit, cereal and eggs. This is to be commended, if the egg, or its substitute in food value, is not omitted. Too often a sloppy cereal is washed down rapidly with a cup of coffee and called sufficient. Sometimes the ready-to-eat cereal and the milk bottle left at the kitchen door include the entire preparation for the morning meal.

The adaptability of this quick breakfast, and its ease of preparation, keep it in favor, but filling the stomach with a cereal, from which some of its best elements have been taken, means, for women folks at home, placing the coffee pot on the range to warm up the cup that will stop that "gone" feeling so common after a near-breakfast. The man at work might once have found solace in a glass of beer; now, perhaps, he smokes an extra cigarette. It is well understood that children grow listless and dull before noon, when an insufficient breakfast is eaten. One who has breakfast leisurely at nine o'clock may be satisfied with a roll and a cup of hot drink, but a commuter with a trip ahead to office or shop, and the farmer who must make an early start in the day, cannot rely on light, quickly digested food in the morning. Their energy and working capacity will slow down long before noon.

Objection is sometimes made to a good, sustaining breakfast because of a distaste for food in the morning. In such a case, look to the quality or quantity of the night meal; it may be too heavy or indigestible.

Between a breakfast with warmed-over meats, and one without meat, especially if eggs are substituted, the choice should be given to the latter. Twice-cooked meats, however pleasing they may be to the palate, are not easy to digest. They serve merely as a way to use left-overs, which good management will keep to the minimum.

When selecting fruits for breakfast, the fact must not be overlooked that the starch of cereals and acid fruits, like a sour orange, often disagree. When apples are plentiful nothing is better than this fruit when baked, but in cities the banana frequently costs less and it stands at the head of all fruits in food value. When perfectly ripe it has about 12 per cent of sugar, but as it is picked green, the fruit sold in the markets is often but partially ripe and is more easily assimilated, if baked like the apple; it then becomes a valuable breakfast food.

It is a common mistake in a meatless breakfast to use too large a proportion of cereal. While the standard cereal foods, when dry, are from two-thirds to three-quarters starch, with the balance made up of a little protein, fat, water, fibre and a trace of mineral matter, it should not be forgotten that while cooking they absorb several times their bulk of water, which reduces the food value of the product. Oatmeal and corn meal are best adapted for winter use because they contain a little more fat than wheat or rice, which are suitable for summer diet.

Eggs are the most available substitute for meat at breakfast and it is doubtful economy to omit them, except in times of extreme high prices. They are not essential in all desserts and saving in their use should begin at that point. Eggs may be cooked in many ways so that they need never become a monotonous fare. All kinds of fish are an excellent substitute for meat, and, as prepared for the table, nearly equal beef and mutton, in the amount of protein, which is the element missed in a non-meat diet, unless it be carefully planned.

Breakfasts without Meat

The following are adapted to different seasons and the beverage may be selected to suit the taste.

1. Strawberries, eggs baked in ramekins, oatmeal muffins.

2. Fruit, cheese omelet, rice griddle cakes.

3. Oranges, codfish balls, wheat muffins.

4. Oatmeal, baked bananas, scrambled eggs, rice muffins.

5. Cereal, hashed browned potatoes, date gems.

6. Oranges, soft boiled eggs, lyonnaise potatoes, dry toast.

7. Cereal with dates, whole wheat muffins, orange marmalade.

8. Stewed prunes, French omelet, creamed potatoes, dry toast.

9. Grapefruit, broiled salt codfish, baked potatoes, corn muffins.

10. Fresh pineapple, broiled fresh mackerel, creamed potatoes, French bread.

11. Sliced bananas, omelet with peas, rusked bread.

Breakfasts with Meat

1. Fresh apple sauce, pork chops, stewed potatoes, graham muffins.

2. Dried peaches, stewed, broiled honeycomb tripe, escalloped potatoes, reheated rolls.

3. Fruits, minced mutton, potato puffs, rice griddle cakes, lemon syrup.

4. Baked apples, baked sausages, hashed potatoes, corn cakes.

5. Baked rhubarb and raisins, ham omelet, bread-crumb griddle cakes, caramel syrup.

6. Melon or berries, broiled ham, shirred eggs, creamed potatoes.

7. Oranges, broiled beef cakes, French fried potatoes, toast.

8. Steamed rice, sliced tomatoes, bacon and eggs, rye muffins.

9. Berries, broiled chicken with cream sauce, fried potato cakes, muffins.

10. Cereal with syrup, scalded tomatoes with melted butter, baked hash, dry toast.

11. Melon, veal cutlet, cream sauce, baked potatoes, corn bread.

Some Recipes for Preparing Poultry

By Kurt Heppe

Fowls should be divided into four classes, according to their uses. The uses are controlled by the age of the fowl.

What is suitable for one dish is not suitable for others. In fowls the age of the bird controls the use to which it can be put. This is something the caterer and the housewife must remember.

A young bird can be distinguished from an old one by the pliability of the tip of the breastbone. When this tip bends under pressure, then the bird is young. If it is hard and unyielding, then it is old.

Very old birds are used for soup and for fricassee.

Medium-aged birds are used for roasts.

Spring chickens are used for broilers and for sauteed dishes.

Very young chicks are used for frying in deep fat; for this purpose they are dipped in a thin batter, or else in flour, and in eggs mixed with milk and afterward in breadcrumbs. These chicks, and also spring chickens, are used for casserole dishes and for cocottes (covered earthen ware containers, in which the fowls are roasted in the oven).

The liver of fowls is used in different ways; it makes an excellent dish. It is best when sauteed with black butter. Some of the fine French ragouts consist mostly of chicken livers.

With omelettes they make an incomparable garnish.

In very high-class establishments the wings and breast are often separated from the carcass of the fowl and served in manifold ways. Sometimes the entire fowl is freed of bones, without destroying the appearance of the bird. These latter dishes are best adapted for casserole service and for cold jellied offerings.

Capons are castrated male fowls. They fatten readily and their flesh remains juicy and tender, owing to the indolence of the birds. The meat of animals is tenderest when the animal is kept inactive. For this reason stall-feeding is often resorted to. When the animal has no opportunity to exercise its muscles the latter degenerate, and nourishment, instead of being converted into energy, is turned into fat. Range birds and animals are naturally tough; this is especially true of the muscles.

Large supply houses now regularly basket their fowls for about two weeks before putting them on the market. During this time they are fed on grain soaked in milk. This produces a white, juicy flesh.

When a bird is to be roasted it should be trussed. This is done by forcing the legs back against the body (after placing the bird on its back); a string is then tied across the bird's body, holding the legs down. The wings are best set firmly against the breast by sticking a wooden skewer through the joint and into the bony part of the carcass, where the skewer will hold against the bones.

In preparing birds for the oven their breasts should be protected by slices of bacon. Otherwise they will shrivel and dry before the birds are cooked.

For broiling, the birds are cut through in the back, in such a manner that they quasi-hinge in the breast; they are then flattened so they will lie evenly in a double broiling iron; for this purpose the heavy backbone is removed.

Stuffed Poularde

After trussing the bird rub it with lemon so it will keep of good color; now cover the breast with thin slices of bacon (these can be tied on). The poularde is put into a deep, thick saucepan and cooked with butter and aromatics in the oven. When it is nearly done it is moistened with poultry stock. If this stock reduces too fast, then it must be renewed. It is finally added to the sauce.

These fowls may be stuffed with a pilaff of rice. This is prepared as follows: Half an onion is chopped and fried in two ounces of butter. Before it acquires color half a pound of Carolina rice is added. This is stirred over the fire until the rice has partly taken up the butter; then it is moistened with consomme (one quart); and covered and cooked in a moderate oven for fifteen minutes. It is now combined with a little cream, a quarter a pound of dice of goose liver and some dice of truffles.

The rice should not be entirely cooked by the time it is stuffed into the bird; the cooking is completed inside the bird. The cream is added to provide moisture for the rice to take up.

Instead of cream one may use consomme, and the truffles and fat liver may be left out, if too expensive.

The bird is served with a suitable sauce.

The best sauce for this purpose is Sauce Supreme, and is prepared as follows: Put two pints of clear poultry stock and some mushroom-liquor into a saute-pan. Reduce two-thirds.

While this is going on prepare some poultry veloute by bringing some butter in a pan to bubble, and adding some flour. This is brought to a boil while stirring constantly. The flour must not be allowed to color. Now, gradually, add some poultry-stock, stirring all the while with a whisk. Salt, pepper and nutmeg are added. This is simmered on the side of the fire, and then strained.

Now add one pint of this veloute to the supreme sauce; reduce the whole on an open fire, while constantly stirring. Gradually add half a pint of good cream and finish with a little butter.

Sauteed Chicken

Young chickens should be used for this purpose. Feel the breast bone; if it bends beneath pressure the bird is right.

Empty, singe and clean, and disjoint the bird. This is done by cutting the skin at the joints and loosening the bones with a knife.

The wings are cut off in such manner that each holds half of the breast; the pinions are entirely cut off; the different pieces are seasoned with salt and pepper; now heat some clarified butter in a saute-pan; when it is very hot insert the pieces of chicken and let them color quickly; turn them over, from time to time, so as to get a uniform color; cover the utensil and put it in a fairly hot oven. The legs are cooked for about ten minutes more than the breast and wings. The latter are kept hot separately.

When all pieces are done, they are dished on a platter and kept hot in the oven; the pan is now moistened with mushroom-liquor, or chicken stock, and again put on the fire; only a very little moistening is put in the pan. As soon as it boils swing it around the pan and then add to it, gradually, the sauce that is to be served. This swinging in the pan dissolves the flavor, which solidifies in the bottom of the pan; it greatly improves the sauce.

A simple sauce for sauteed chicken is nut butter, that is, butter browned in the pan. This may be varied by flavoring it with a crushed garlic-clove. An addition of fine herbs will further improve it. A dark tomato sauce may also be served.

A good garnish for sauteed chicken is large dice of boletus mushrooms, sauteed in garlic butter; also dice of raw potatoes sauteed in clarified butter, and again fresh tomatoes cut up and sauteed in butter. Egg-plants are also excellent for a garnish.

Sauteed chicken may be baked and served in the cocotte.

Poulet en Casserole Bourgeoise

The chicken is trussed; the breast is covered with strips of bacon and put into a deep, thick saucepan. It is colored in the oven, and when nearly done is transferred to a casserole. It is now moistened with some chicken-stock and a little white wine. This moistening is used in the basting, and after being freed of fat, added to the sauce.

A few minutes before the fowl is done bouquets of fresh vegetables are added to the chicken, in individual heaps, and the chicken is then served, either with a sauce, or else with an addition of butter. It should be carved in sight of the guests.

Chicken Pie

A fowl is cooked (boiled) with flavoring vegetables until done, and is then cut up as for fricassee; the pieces are seasoned with salt and pepper and sprinkled with chopped onions, a few mushroom-buttons and some chopped parsley. The pieces are now put into a pie-dish, legs undermost, some thinly-sliced bacon is added and some potatoes Parisienne (spooned with the special potato spoon). The pie-dish is now filled two-thirds with chicken veloute (chicken-stock thickened with flour and egg-yolks), and a pie crust is laid over all, pressed to the edges of the dish and trimmed off. The crust is slit open (so the steam can escape), it should be painted with egg-yolk, and be baked for one and a half hours in a moderate oven.

Supreme de Volaille Jeanette

Of a poached cold fowl the supremes (boneless wing and breast in one piece) are loosened and trimmed to oval shape. They are covered with white chaudfroid sauce, by putting the pieces on a wire tray and pouring the sauce over while still liquid. They are decorated with tarragon leaves.

In a square, flat pan a half-inch layer of aspic is laid. On this slices of goose liver are superimposed (after having been trimmed to the shape of the supremes); the supremes are now put on top of the fat liver, and then covered with half-melted chicken jelly.

When thoroughly cooled and ready to serve, a square piece is cut out of the now solid jelly around the supremes. The supreme is thus served incrusted in a square block of thick jelly; the dish is decorated with greens.

Polly's Thanksgiving Party

By Ella Shannon Bowles

The idea for the party came to Polly one night as she was washing the dinner dishes, and that very evening she waved away the boys' objection that Thanksgiving was a family affair pure and simple.

"I'm not planning to have any one in for dinner," she said, "though there's nothing that would suit me better, if the apartment boasted a larger dining room. But there are three girls in my Sunday School class that can't possibly go home this year, and I've no doubt you boys could find somebody that won't be invited anywhere. Thanksgiving is such a cheerless place in a boarding house! If we ask a few young people in for a party in the evening, it will liven things up a bit for them, and I think it will be pretty good fun for us, don't you?"

In the end Polly had her way, and just a week before Thanksgiving, she sent invitations to three girls and to two boys whom Rupert and Harry suggested.

Polly searched the shops for a card of two-eyed white buttons of the size of ten cent pieces. She carefully sewed a button on the upper part of a correspondence card, added eyebrows, nose and mouth with India ink, copied a body and cap from Palmer Cox's "Brownie Book," painted the drawing brown, and behold, a saucy brownie grinned at her from the invitation. Underneath the picture, she carefully printed a jingle.

"This Thanksgiving Brownie brings a message so gay, To visit our house on Thanksgiving Day, To help celebrate with all kinds of good cheer The 'feast of the harvest' at the end of the year."

The boys took a walk into the country on Thanksgiving morning and came laden with sprays of high-bush cranberries. These, with the bunches of chrysanthemums which they bought, and Polly's fern and palm, gave the small living room a festive appearance.

Assisted by her brothers, Polly served the dinner early. After clearing the dining room table, she placed a pumpkin jack-o-lantern in the center, and arranged around it piles of apples, grapes, and oranges.

After the guests had been introduced to each other, Polly passed each one a paper plate containing a picture, cut and jumbled into small pieces, and a tiny paper of paste and a toothpick. Each girl and boy was asked to put the "pi" together and paste it on the inside of the plate. When arranged, the pictures were found to be of Thanksgiving flavor. "Priscilla at the Wheel," "The Pilgrims Going to Church," "The First Thanksgiving," and others of the same type. To the person making his "pi" first a small and delicious mince pie was awarded.

Pencils and paper were then passed. On one slip was written, "What I have to be thankful for," on the other, "Why I am thankful for it." The slips were collected, mixed up, and distributed again. Each guest was asked to read the first slip handed him with the answer. The result caused much laughter.

This was followed by a modification of the famous "donkey game." Polly had painted a huge picture of a bronze turkey, but minus the tail, and this was pinned to the wall. Real turkey feathers with pins carefully thrust through the quills were handed about, and each guest was blindfolded and turned about in turn. To the one who successfully pinned a feather in the tail was given a turkey-shaped box of candy, and the consolation prize was a copy of "Chicken-licken."