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Show MB II mm K BOON TO WEAK STOMACHS. By Martha McCulloch Williams. When the Risleys were invited to a paper-bagged dinner, they came prepared pre-pared to scoff and openly. Charming people both, but a bit difficult. Especially Espe-cially the husband. The root of his difficulties I had long since set down as a stomach maladroit, in doing its whole duty. The stomach's o"ner took on fat too readily, but did not gain strength proportionately to his thriving. Therefore 1 permitted them to be In at the death the death of several paper bags, the resurrection of their contents. When the broiler came forth bearing a biggish bag, black-brown black-brown at the corners, and ready to crack at a touch, they stood smiling, but critical, waiting to see what I would do with it. Catching the bag either side the cut, I lifted it gently it came apart along all the seams, revealing re-vealing a chicken, roasted to the most delicate brown all over. But when the carving knife went in there came out the finest flaous juice, and in. such quantity it was possible to add "dish-gravy" to the plates as well as that in the boat. "I never tasted real chicken before," be-fore," young Risley said, as he took a second helping. His wife gave him an anxious look. "Be careful, dear," she urged. "You know, you've been on the verge of a bad spell all week." His answer was to take another sweet potato, and help himself to succo- I tash both had been cooked in bags. Salad he disdained upon hearing that there was in wait a damson roly poly by help of which he rounded out a noble meal. His wife also ate heartily to my great joy. But I saw apprehension in her eye, until the very last. Early next morning she called me. "Jack slept like a baby and says he has ot felt so well in ages," she said. "Where can I get some paper bags?" M. Soyer states positively that paper pa-per bag cookery is fine for contrary stomachs. My experience backs him up in this statement. The succotash which I made for my friends, the Risleys, was prepared in this manner. Succotash. Boil one pint shelled lima beans in slightly salted water half an hour, drain and put while hot into a well buttered bag. Add green corn cut from the cob four to six ears according to size, butter the size of an egg, half a tumbler of rich milk, a very little salt, a dust of pepper, and a teaspoonful of sugar. Seal bag, lay on broiler, and cook fifteen minutes. min-utes. The beans are parboiled thus to avoid overcooking the corn, which requires much less time. Plum Roly Poly. DamsonL are my favorites for this, but any ripe, sound plums will do. Wash and stew them, pick out the seed, and if very juicy, drain away more than half the juice. Sweeten lightly no spicing Is needed. Make puff paste, roll it out in long strips a quarter inch thick, sprinkle sugar on the upper side, then spread thinly with the stewed frait, roll up and pinch the ends tight. Roll in a little lump of extra butter. Cook thirty minutes in a hot oven forty if the roly is quite big. Serve hot with a sauce made from the extra juice, along with butter and BUgar, cooked together over boiling water. CONVERTING THE COOK. "But would It be easy to get the cook to take up Soyer's method of paper bag cooking?" That question was put to me the other day by one of my friends who has been captivated with the paper-bag paper-bag cooked luncheons and dinners I have invited her to eat with me. In reply to her query 1 told how I had converted one cook to M. Soyer's method with one "demonstration." This particular queen of the kitchen was a Creile cook who has followed her "Madam" up North away from the delights of her native New Orleans. Or-leans. She feels that she knows pretty well all that is to be known about cooking, especially in the finer parts, and not without reason. Because her "madam" is my friend, and had eaten things out of paper bags, the cook was sent to see the new method for herself. Less than respectful she cannot possibly be especially toward one whose cookery she had deigned to approve, yet 1 was conscious of a certain bewildered amusement in her; her eyes were hawk-keen as she watched me grease bags and slip into the bigges: of them well seasoned fillets of bh.e fish, along with a thinly sliced onion, tomatoes, p.eled and sliced, a good Ijmp of but ter, and a generous squeeze of lemon juice. 1 then bagged some very firm, almost al-most green, unpeeled bananas, putting put-ting in with them a little water, and finding the trivet' that would best fit the remaining shelf-space. 1 saw my critic smile a faint fleeting ghostly smile, and look affectionately at the scrubbing brush. I was sure she saw herself mentally undoing the tragic results of my doing, by scrubbing scrub-bing out the stove floor when bursting burst-ing bags had made it messy. I was getting a hurry luncheon partly because there was need of haste, partly to show my pupil how quickly things could be done. A lemon pie and fresh biscuit werekeep-ing werekeep-ing hot in the troiler-space beneath the oven, shielded from burning by the inverted broiler pan. Adele, the cook, had not seen them, I meant them for the finishing stroke. After five minutes a look-in showed bag-corners brown, so I turned off one gas jet and busied myself getting dishes hot. At tin end of tei minutes I took t" em out. Adele was staring at the bag. It was brown, almost crisp at the corners, cor-ners, but only lightly tinged cm top, and underneath as sound and tough as when it went in. Yet she had seen bananas come out of it and her judgment judg-ment assured her that they were thoroughly, and beautifully cool-.ed. But she was still doubtful. "Maybe hit is good for things dat don't take long," she said. "But I'd be 'feard ter trus' hit wid all my dinner." din-ner." By time the tananas were out of hand, the fish was ready six fair-siztid fair-siztid fillets made a brave showing in the platter, with the tomatoes splashed over them, the onion showing show-ing pearl rings in their red. Supplemented Supple-mented with the potatoes, which came out thoroughly cooked and a delicate brown, and the bananas, they made a satisfying meal. "Miss Molly says you tole her you kin bake fish, and meat and roas' chickens in dese things?" Adele said interrogatively as she stood surveying survey-ing the uncluttered sink, where never a pot or pan waited her skilled touch. "You can cook almost anything you like," I answered. "But first you must take the trouble to learn how." Adele nodded thoughtfully. "Yes-sum," "Yes-sum," she said, "I ain't as young as I used ter be but I sho'ly is goin' ter learn how, and den I won't has any pots and kittles to scrub." (Copyright, 1911, by the Associated Literary Press.) |