The Democratic press. [volume] (Ravenna, O. [Ohio]) 1868-1901, 1892-11-09

How Cooking Was Done In the Early
Days-Home Experiences.
Every Saturday, long years ago, my
mother used to bake in brick oven,
says writer in the Troy Times. We
had a stove in the kitchen, but it's
oven was imperfect, SO she clung to
the brick one. The boys brought in
the long oven wood. 1t was heated to
perfection. When the wood was re-
duced to Goals and the Goals were
mostly taken out, the temperature
was tried. not with a thermometer, for
these instruments were then scarcely
known, but with the hand. If the
hand could be held therein while its
owner counted thirty, the oven was
just right for the proper baking of
pies. If the hand was scorched the
oven was left open for few minutes
to cool off. After the pies and cake
came the bread, and then Cfor we were
Connecticut Yankees) the pot of beans
and the loaf of rye and indian bread
were put in the bake for the Saturday
nights supper and the Sunday dinner.
Many beans have l eaten elsewhere in
many parts of our land, but never did
beans have the same flavor, never did
pork have the same crispness, or brown
bread the same richness as used to be
produced in the old family brick oven.
On extraordinary occasions, such as
quilting parties, training days, we'd
dings and funerals, old Nance was
! called in to bake for us. She was the
neighborhood caterer; an African of
the Africans. How the oven glowed
as the fire shown on her yellow turban
and was reflected from her honest
black facei What wonderful wedding
cake she would make! What palata-
BILE funeral meats she would bake! Her
midmorning dram was always set up
on the mantelpiece, and how timber
her tongue would become after she
had tossed it off.
Bake kettles were used to supple
ment the brick ovens. To this day
they are used on southern plantations.
These were kettles, or ovens, placed
upon the Goals in huge freplaces,. on
| the covers of which were put Goals so
that both top and bottom would bake
alike.
Johnnycake and shortcake were
often baked upon board tilted in
front of the fire upon the hearth. The
turning of these cakes required a
sleight-of-hand trick incomprehensible
to my youth, but my mother always
did it deftly enough. Small tin
| bakers, closed on three sides, were
afterward substituted for the johnny
| cake board.
The second stove in my fathers
| kitchen was a rotary, and we had a
large circular tin baker, narrowed to-
ward the top so as to admit of small
cover. This baker was set over the
lids of the stove in which all things
could be baked. My mother always
clung, however, to the brick oven.
The oven wood had to be brought in
from the shed on Friday. My young
est brother, 10 years of age, one Fri
day afternoon of a slippery winters
day, engaged my sister Lib, two years
his junior, to aid him in carrying it in.
She slipped upon the ice, silver from
the wood caught in her eyelid and
tore open the skim l was much
younger than she, but can well remem-
Der how we all screamed and ran into
the room where my mother had a
quilting party. She was woman OF
nerve and of quick perceptions, and as
she saw the blood and heard the
screams she broke her thread from the
quilt and in a second sewed up the
torn eyelid. My frightened brother
ran for the surgeon. When he came
he said, "Woman, you have saved that
child's eye"
The modern stove, with it's improved
oven, found its way into our house
and the brick oven gradually fell into
disuse.
Cookery in these latter days has be.
come a science. Cook-books leave nc
room for guesswork. We no longer
mix our ingredients as the woman
said she made her brown bread: "First
/ put in what meal l think will need
| then what rye the meal will bear; next
good-sized pinch of salt; next little
-four, trife of molasses, and as much
water or milk as | think it wants, anc
then bake it till | see it is DONE"
Some women have such an aptitude
for cooking that dishes will turn ou
well even though put together like
stray pieces of silk in a crazy patch
work. But the most of us want al
exact rule. We want to be sure VIZ
can count the thirty before we place
our pies in the oven. Hence the value
of cooking schools and of excellent
cook-books, though pupils at cooking
schools are apt to be like Miss Jennie
who last year wished to learn the mys
teries of the art. She took a course
but when asked how long she bakeC
her bread, she replied: 81 do no
know. for Susan baked it." Wher
questioned about the quantity of but
ter in her cake, she answered: "Susar
got the butter for me-" So it wa
Susan's bread and cake after all.