The Fun of Cooking Part 2

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.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Christmas elves]

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 them full of receipts. When you made such delicious things for Christmas, I ordered these for you, so you could write down each rule that you used then, and add others as you learned other things. You see, there are little letters all down the edges of the book, and when you want to find gingerbread, for instance, all you have to do is to turn to G; and when you want--"

"Cake," interrupted Brownie, "you turn to K."

Everybody laughed then, but in a minute Jack said soberly: "If you don't mind, Mother, I think I'll use mine for school. You see, boys don't cook."

"It seems to me I've heard that before," said Father Blair, nodding at him. "But you just tuck that book away in your bureau drawer and keep it, because I've an idea you may want it yet for a cook-book."

Jack shook his head energetically, but as Norah just then brought in a fresh plate of popovers, he was too busy to say anything more.

That afternoon, the girls began their books by copying very neatly the receipts they had already used: Brownies, Christmas Cakes, Icing, Christmas Elves, Gingerbread Men, Oatmeal Macaroons, Pop-corn b.a.l.l.s, and Tartlets all went in, each under its own initial. Then they said they wanted some more receipts right away, because these looked so lonely.

"Very well," said their mother; "but first we will have a talk, because I have a bright idea."

Now it happened that one of the particularly nice things about the Blair family was that they owned a little bit of a house not many miles from town, right in the midst of a pine grove. A farmer lived quite close by, but the trees hid his house from sight; and the trolley-cars ran just around the corner, but they could not be seen either; so when the family went there for a day or two, or a week or two, it was just as though they were a long, long distance from everybody in the world. They called this little place the House in the Woods, and Brownie Blair often pretended it was the one in the fairy book, and that Goldilocks might come in at any moment to eat a bowl of porridge with the three Blairs, instead of the three bears.

"You see," Mother Blair went on, "the snow is still so fresh and lovely, and the sleighing so good, and the full moon is still coming up so very early, that I thought--"

"Oh, I know!" Jack shouted. "A sleighing party!"

"Yes," said his mother; "to the House in the Woods for supper. Won't that be fun? And you can cook the supper. Only, if you invite seven boys and girls to go with you, we must have plenty of things for them to eat; and of course you will want to cook them all yourselves."

"Of course," Mildred said decidedly. "What shall we have for the supper?"

"Oh, have cheese dreams!" Jack begged. "The fellows think they're great.

I'll make 'em myself, if you will. I learned how at the Dwights when I was there last week."

"You did!" teased his mother. "But I thought boys didn't cook!" Jack's face grew decidedly red.

"Of course boys cook with a chafing-dish," he explained; "so do men, too. In college, lots of them make Welsh-rabbit and oysters and things like that for spreads, you know. And you can make the same things in a frying-pan on the stove just as well. So I'll make the dreams up before we go, and cook 'em when we get there."

"Very well," said his mother; "but I bargain with you that you are to put the receipt in your own cook-book." And Jack had to promise.

Then Mildred and her mother planned the rest of the supper. They were to have oyster stew, because that was what everybody wanted at a sleighing party; and then the cheese dreams, and potatoes, and cocoa; and Mother Blair said they would have a dish of scrambled eggs for anybody who did not like cheese. And, last of all, they would have little hot brown biscuits and honey; Farmer Dunn always had beautiful honey.

"Now, let us plan things out," said Mildred. "You and Brownie and I, Mother, can go out to the House in the Woods by trolley, and get the fires going and the table all ready; and Father and Jack can drive out with the others just at supper-time, and then we can all go back together afterward." This seemed the very best way of managing; so early one Sat.u.r.day afternoon they reached the little house, and while Mildred and her mother went in and opened the windows and looked all around to see if everything was as they left it, Brownie ran off for Farmer Dunn, who soon brought wood and made up rousing fires in the rooms. By the time the baskets were unpacked on the kitchen table, he was ready to go back to his house and get milk and cream and eggs and b.u.t.ter and honey.

As the Blairs always left the house ready to open at a moment's notice, they had sugar and flour and salt and things like that in the pantry.

Mildred and Brownie laid the table, putting on plates and cups and gla.s.ses, and they rubbed the forks and spoons and made them as bright as the suns.h.i.+ne. When it was all done, they got a beautiful great bunch of feathery pine branches for a centerpiece, and then it looked exactly as though the table knew there was going to be a party.

"It is nearly five o'clock," their mother called to them as they finished. "It is time we began to get supper. Brownie, here is a receipt for you; do you think you can manage it all alone?"

"Of course," said Brownie, with great dignity. "Only you might just tell me how, first."

Mother Blair laughed, and read the receipt over to her, and told her what to do.

STUFFED BAKED POTATOES

Take six large potatoes, wash and scrub them well, and bake them for about forty minutes in a hot oven, or till they are done. Take one potato at a time, hold it in a towel, and cut it in two, lengthwise. Scoop out the inside with a spoon into a hot bowl.

When all six are ready, add 1/2 teaspoonful of salt and 1 teaspoonful of b.u.t.ter, beating and mas.h.i.+ng well till they are light; then fill the potato sh.e.l.ls, heaping them full; arrange in a shallow pan, and set it in the oven; bake about ten minutes, or till they are brown.

As soon as Brownie was busy with the potatoes, Mildred said she would make the cocoa, because that could stand and wait while other things cooked. Her mother told her to get the double boiler, put some hot water in the outside, and set it on the stove. Then she gave her this receipt:

COCOA

6 teaspoonfuls of cocoa.

1-1/2 cups of boiling water.

1-1/2 cups of boiling milk.

1 tablespoonful of powdered sugar.

1 small pinch of salt.

_Always measure spoonfuls just a little rounded._ Put the powdered cocoa into the double boiler and pour on it the boiling water, a little at first, stirring it until it melts; add the boiling milk, and cook two minutes, stirring all the time; add the sugar, stir a moment longer; add the salt and take from the fire. If not to be used at once, stand the double boiler on the back of the stove till wanted.

"But, Mother, we will need a great many more cups of cocoa than this,"

Mildred exclaimed, as she read the rule over. "Those boys will drink at least two apiece, and the girls may, too; they will all be just starving!"

"Of course," said Mother Blair. "But what do you go to school for, if not to learn multiplication? How many times over must you make the rule?"

Mildred thought two whole minutes, and then said she thought about five times would do; so she very carefully measured everything five times over. "I never thought arithmetic was any good before," she said soberly. "But now I see it is to cook by."

"Yes, I find it useful myself," her mother said, with a smile. "Now, Mildred, we might make the biscuits. I think those will not be hurt by standing any more than the cocoa will. But this rule I think you will have to multiply by three."

BAKING-POWDER BISCUITS

1 pint of sifted flour.

1/2 teaspoonful of salt.

4 teaspoonfuls of baking-powder.

3/4 cup of milk.