Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1889-07-13
How TO HANG THE KETTLE.

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How TO HANG THE KETTLE.
primary requisite when you get into camp
will be fire upon which to cook your food.
One person should get to work at building it
immediately, while the others are raising the
tent. ditching around it, cutting spruce or hem
lock branches for the bed, erecting a table and
cleaning out the spring. Here is the best way
to make fire for camp cooking: Have two
solid green logs feet long and IL or IA inches
in diameter, one side of each fiattened SO as to
support utensils. Lay these logs together at
one end and about foot apart at the other
making narrow -, with the fiattened sides
uppermost and the open end of the to wind
ward. Between these logs start your fire with
paper, splinters of dry wood and dry twigs and
by the way, have plentiful supply of matches
not the fancy ''parlor" variety, the heads
of which become soft in damp weather, but
stout old-fashioned birthstone ones, and
keep them in a strong glass jar or tin can with
water-tight screw cap. Only feed your fire
as fast as the fuel is consumed brightly, and
increase gradually the size of the sticks you
put on 1t, using dry hard wood if obtainable,
and in a little while you will have pile of
clear, glowing Goals. Not until then will your
fire be tit for cooking over. While it is reach
ing this point, you may profitably busy your
self with planting firmly in the ground, say
or feet apart, in a straight line with the lon
gitudinal center of your V, couple of strong
pole between them at such height that, when
your S-shaped iron hooks are placed upon it,
the potslhung on them will be almost down to the
logs. When your fire is good, each dish cooked
over the Goals may, when done, be set on one of
the logs to keep warm until all are completed.
The apex OF the Is good safe place to keep
the coffee pot hot. En- passant-don't culti-
vate the common but absurd notion that you
want an egg to ''clear" your coffee. Cold water
will do quite as we'll When your coffee has
tn n ash hal of xvat on
the surface and all the grounds" will be at
once precipitated to the bottom. In the army,
where We were bound to get out of the coffee
all the strength there was in it, we used to let
1T boil up three times, taking it off the fire
moment at the first and again at the second
and using the cold water at the third, and our
coffee was strong and clear as sherry.
OTHER FIRES.
You will want two other kinds of fires. The
one just described is for cooking things put
over it. But it is not we'll adapted for roasting
or cooking hoe-cakes. For that special service,
drive two stout stakes IN the ground four feet
apart and two or three feet high pile against
these two or three green logs five feet long and
high enough to reach the top of the stakes.
like a wall; and against these on the windward
side, build your fire. In front of it set your
bread or hoe-cake on edge against fiat stone,
or pan: or, if you want to roast, hang the joint,
bird or beast. by a bit of wire from pole sup
ported on crOtcneQ SUCKS, WIN gripping
pan under it. Never try roasting oUer a
fire, but always in front of it, unless you
are fond of scorched. smoky, burnt
grease-scented meat. Your third kind of
fire is for cooking game-scaled, furred,
feathered-"hunter fashion," for baking loaves
of bread and baking beans. Dig in the dry
ground a hole twelve inches deep and wide
enough to allow three or four inches space all
around your largest mess pans. In and over
this hole build good fire and keep it up until
the ground all about is thoroughly heated and
the hole is nearly filled with Goals. Then. with
hoe, if you have one, scoop out most Of the
Goals. Now your fire is ready for cooking, but
from this point your proceedings must vary
according to what you propose to cook.
COOKING FISH AND BIRDS.
Let US suppose that it is a fish or a bird. If
you are in the neighborhood of trout
stream you will be likely to find in
its bottom, somewhere near, a bed of
| creamy or blue clay. Dig this out with
your hunting-knife and work it with water into
| a stiff batter or soft dough. Having taken the
entrails out Of your fish or bird (unless it is a
woodcOck), roll it in that dough until it is COM
pletey encased in clay mould half an inch
thick. In this condition lay it down ON the
| Goals in the hole and draw in Goals and hot
ashes. and layer of earth over it so as to cover
| it deeply. Then if the thing to be cooked is
large, start a small fire over it and keep
burning steadily until the cooking is done.
Inc time requisite Tor that Is little
longer than would be required in a good
kitchen range, but is SO dependent upon
the quality Of wood used, the length of
| time the fire has been heating the ground,
| the dampness of the clay envelope, and the
| fire maintained above, that only a certain
measure of experience and good Judgment can
| inform you, with any exactitude. when the mo-
ment shall have arrived for you to rake out the
dinner. When you crack off the hard-b baked
clay it will take with it every feather scale or
| hair, and you will have game cooked in fash
| ion infinitely superior to any other known by
| man. Such tenderness, juiciness and perfec-
ton Of flavor are absolutely unattainable by any
other method. When you cannot possibly get
| clay you may wrap your game in wet brown
paper and bed it down in a mass of fresh grass
leaves, or sea-weed, if you happen to camp
near to saltwater. The sea-weed is only pre-
| ferable where fish, clans, oysters, Holsters or
| crabs are to be cooked.
| When you want to bake beans or bread in
| that hole put the material into one of your
| sheet-iron mess pans and place the other over
| it, mouth downward the ears keeping it in
| position. Otherwise proceed as If cooking
| game, only keep your fire over it considerably
| longer. You will find it good idea to line the
hole completely with round boulders, Of the
size of small cocoanuts, if you can get them
handily. They will prevent the annoyance Of
| the burned earth crumbling into the hole and
will retain strong heat longer than the earth