Connecticut western news., 1879-12-17
THE HOUSEHOLD.
FEW HINTS ABOUT MAKING PIES AND
 PUDDINGS,

cloth be perfectly clean. Dip it in hot water and dredgo it we'll with flour. If bread pudding, tie it loose if batter pudding, tie it nearly close; apple and gooseberry pudding, etc., should be tied quite close. When you make bat ter pudding, first mix the four we'll with milk, and stir in the other ingredients by degrees you will then have it smooth without Jumps. The best way, how ever, for plain batter pudding is to strain it througk a coarse hair sieve, that it may have neither Jumps nor the treadings of the eggs and for all other buildings strain the eggs when they are beaten up. Be sure the water boils when you put your pudding in, and that it keeps boiling all the time, and that you keep it always covered with water. You should always move it about two or three times at first or it may stick to the pot; dip the pudding into cold water immediately you take it out, which pre- vents it sticking. If you boil your pud- ding in dish or basin, butter the inside before putting the pudding in the same should be done to the dish for baked pudding or pie.
 The quality of pie crust depends much on the baking. If the oven be too hot, the paste, besides being burned, will fall if too slack, it will be soddened, and consequently heavy.
 Paste should bemade on cold smooth substance such as marble, with light, cool hand. It should be made quickly :; much handling makes it heavy. Great nicety is required in wettiDg the paste, too little moisture rendering it dry and crumbly, while too much makes it tough and heavy and in either case, the paste cannot be easily worked. Practice alone can produce perfection in this art.
 Before commencing to make paste for pies or buildings, it is necessary to place near at hand everything likely to be wanted, to inspect all the utensils, to prepare all the ingredients, and though last, not least, to wash the hands and nails perfectly clean for the hands are the best tools to make paste with.
 Always use good, sweet butter, drip ping, or lard, for pie or pudding crust. Some persons entertain the mistaken notion that butter which cannot be eaten on bread will do very we'll for paste, on the contrary, the baking or boiling of rancid fat increases the bad flavor. It is @ good plan to wash the butter in clean spring water before using it. Make two or three holes with fork in the cover of your pies, that the steam may escape.
 To MAKE DRIPPING CRUST. Take half pound of fresh, clean dripping, and work it we'll up into pound and a half of flour rub it we'll in, and make it into paste with water with the chill taken off. If worked well, it makes an excellent crust some, however, prefer butter, quarter of pound of which will be enough for pound and quar- | ter of four.
 RAISED CRUST FOR MEAT PIES OR Fcw1s, ETo.-Boil water with little fine lard, an equal quantity of dripping, or of butter, but not much of either. | While hot, mix this with as much flour as you will want, making the paste as stiff as you can to be smooth, which you will make it by good kneading and beat ing it with the rolling-pin. When quite smooth, put a lump into cloth or under pan to soak till near cold. Those who have not good hand at raising crust may do thus Roll the paste of a proper thickness, and cut out the top and bot tom of the pie, then long piece for the sides. Cement the bottom to the sides with egg, bringing the former rather farther out, and pinching both together; put egg between the edges of the paste to make it adhere at the sides. Fill your pie and put on the cover, and pinch it and the crust together. The same mode of uniting the paste is to be ob- served if the sides are pressed into tin form, in which the paste must be baked, after it shall be filled and covered but in the latter case, the tin should be but tered and carefully taken eff when done enough ; and as the form usually makes the sides of lighter color than is proper, the paste should be put into the oven again for quarter of an hour. With 8 feather, put egg over St first.
 M1NcE P1Es.-Take equal weights oi tender roast beef, suet, entrants, raisins, and apples which have been previously pared and cored, with half their weight of soft sugar, one ounce of powdered cinnamon, an equal quantity of candied orange and lemon peel, and citron, s little salt, and twelve sour almon ds blanched and grated. Chop the meat and the suet separataly wash and picA the entrants, stone the raisins and choI them with the peel and having minced all the ingredients very fine, mix then together, adding nutmeg.
 APPLE PIE.-Pare and take out tn. cores of the apples, cutting each apple into four or eight pieces, according te their size. Lay them neatly in baking dish seasoning with brown sugar, ant any spice, such as pounded cloves ant cinnamon, or grated lemon peel. A littl quince marmalade gives fine flavor tt the pie. Add little water, and cove with puff paste, as above directed. Bak fer an hour.
 Cruelty to Prisoners.
 1the xvorsE storias told of Ehe Mi1wau kee House of Correction seems to b.