A Thousand Ways to Please a Husband With Bettina's Best Recipes (29 page)

Breaded Lamb Chops Baked Potatoes
Creamed Peas
Sliced Tomatoes Salad Dressing
Steamed Date Pudding Lemon Sauce
Coffee

BETTINA'S RECIPES

(All measurements are level)

Breaded Lamb Chops
(Four portions)

4 chops
1 egg-yolk
1 T-water
½ C-bread crumbs
½ t-salt
1 T-butter

Wash and look over the chops carefully to remove any particles of bone. Beat the egg yolk and water. Dip each chop into the egg mixture, and then roll in the crumbs, to which the salt has been added. Place in a buttered pan, dot well with butter, and bake twenty-five minutes in a hot oven.

Steamed Date Pudding

²
/
₃
C-soft, fresh bread crumbs
²
/
₃
C-flour
2 t-baking powder
²
/
₃
C-fine chopped suet
²
/
₃
C-sugar
1 egg
²
/
₃
C-dates, chopped fine
½ t-salt
1 t-vanilla
²
/
₃
C-milk

Mix all the ingredients in the order given. Stir well for two minutes, and place in a buttered mould. Steam two hours on the stove or in the fireless cooker. Serve hot with lemon sauce.

Lemon Sauce

½ C-sugar
1 T-flour
1 C-water
2 T-lemon juice
¹
/
₈
t-salt
1 t-butter

Mix well the flour, sugar and salt, add the water and cook for one minute. Add the lemon juice and butter. Beat vigorously, and serve with the date pudding.

"Come, on mystic Hallowe'en,
Let us seek the dreadful scene,
Where the witches, imps and devils,
Elves and ghosts will hold their revels!
1107 Carberry Avenue.
Seven o'clock."

T
HIS was the invitation received by Harry, Alice, Fred and even Bob, who had an inkling of what was about to happen, inasmuch as 1107 Carberry Avenue happened to be his own address. At seven o'clock that evening Bob was nowhere to be found. However, when four horribly disguised figures were ushered into the house, the witch who pointed the way up the stairs seemed satisfied. A few minutes later, the ghosts and demons having removed such garments as were needed only in the outer air, assembled in the weirdly lighted living-room. All of the electric lights were covered with yellow crêpe paper shades, with faces cut in them. Jack-o'-lanterns stood in every conceivable place, and a fire burned brightly in the open fireplace.

The two witches, who were evidently the hostesses, commenced a weird chant in a minor key. The male ghosts, three in number, immediately took up the music, if it could be so called, howling in loud and uncanny tones. Thereupon the witches beckoned the whole company with all speed to the dining-room.

The table was a mass of color and light. Potatoes, carrots and beets, with sticks for legs, held the lighted candles. At each place were individual favors, witches holding the place cards, and small Jack-o'-lanterns standing beside them. The
center of the table was a miniature field of pumpkins and cornstalks.

The place cards were read and the places were found. The guest of honor, he who sat at the right of her who was evidently "witch-in-charge," discovered the following on his card, and the others were equally descriptive and illuminating:

This place is laid for one who soon
Will marry!
O youth bewitched by maid and moon,
Be wary!
But if you can't, then make it soon,
Dear Harry!

The supper, decorative as well as delicious, was all upon the table. Little individual pumpkin pies on paper doilies stood beside each place. The salad caused much delight among the guests, who at the invitation of the witches, had now removed their masks. A large red apple with a face cut on the outside, had been hollowed out, and the salad was within. On the top of the apple was a round wafer with a marshmallow upon it to represent a hat. The hat was further decorated with a "stick-up" of stick candy on one side. The apple stood on a leaf of lettuce, with a yellow salad dressing necktie. The favor boxes, which were under the witches, were filled with candy corn, while the popcorn balls, placed on a platter, had features of chocolate fudge, and bonnets of frilled paper.

The supper menu was as follows:

Oyster Patties Bettina's Surprise Salad
Hallowe'en Sandwiches Pickles
Pumpkin Pie
Cider Doughnuts
Jumbles Popcorn Balls

"Have another jumble, Harry," urged Ruth. "See, this one has unusual eyes and a particularly soulful expression."

"I have already eaten so many that I fear my memory of this party will be a jumble of faces! I'll see them in my sleep—all with that soulful expression!"

"Another toasted marshmallow, Bettina?" asked Fred,
thrusting it toward her on the end of a hat-pin. "This candle is nearly burned out, so I'm afraid I can't offer you any more."

"It is really time to bob for apples," said Bettina. "Who ever heard of a Hallowe'en party without that! And we must each try to bite the swinging doughnut, and then we must blindfold each other and try to pin the tail on the unfortunate black cat. Bob, will you carry this tub into the living-room? And Ruth, will you remove the popcorn balls to the piano bench? Perhaps someone will grow hungry from the exertion of these games. And I know that later in the evening Alice, though a guest, will tell our fortunes."

"Alice can tell my fortune by looking at her own hand," said Harry. "Because she holds my happiness there."

"What a sentimental sentence, Harry!" said Fred, looking amazed. "See, you've embarrassed us all!"

"Well, I'm always being called cold and reserved, and I've decided to turn over a new leaf."

"Oh, Harry, don't be so foolish!" said Alice, who had grown as red as the apples on the table. "It's time for games!"

BETTINA'S RECIPES

(All measurements are level)

Oyster Patties
(Six portions)

3 T-butter
4 T-flour
1 C-milk
½ t-salt
¹
/
₈
t-paprika
½ pint of oysters

Clean the oysters by removing any shells, and drain off the liquor. Melt the butter, add the flour and salt, and mix thoroughly. Gradually add the milk, stirring constantly. Cook until very thick. Place the oysters in a pan and heat one minute. This "plumps" them. Do not cook too long. Add the oysters to the white sauce, and serve immediately in patty shells which have been freshened in a hot oven.

Bettina's Surprise Salad
(Six portions)

6 apples
1 green pepper, chopped fine
½ C-diced celery
½ C-seeded white grapes
½ C-sliced diced pineapple
2 T-chopped nut meats
1 C-salad dressing
½ t-salt
½ C-diced marshmallows

Remove the insides of the apples, add the green pepper, celery, grapes, marshmallows, pineapple, nut-meats and salt, mixed thoroughly with the salad dressing. Serve very cold.

To Make the Hallowe'en Sandwiches

When the bread is a day old, cut in slices one-third inch thick. Match in pairs. Cream the butter and spread one side. Place the other side on top. Press firmly. With a thimble cut out circles on one piece of the bread, cut nose and mouth with a knife. The butter showing through gives the resemblance to features.

Pumpkin Pie
(Eight pies)

Crusts

1 C-flour
5 T-lard
3 T-water
½ t-salt

Cut the lard into the flour and salt. Add sufficient water to make a stiff dough on a floured board. Roll into shape one-fourth inch thick. Place in tin muffin pans making individual pies, filling with the following mixture and baking 30 minutes in a moderate oven.

Pumpkin Filling

1½ C-canned pumpkin
²
/
₃
C-brown sugar
1 t-cinnamon
½ t-ginger
½ t-salt
2 eggs
2 C-milk

Mix the ingredients in the order given, and fill the pie-crusts two-thirds full.

Jumbles
(Twenty-four jumbles)

½ C-butter
1 C-sugar
1 egg
½ t-soda
½ C-sour milk
¼ t-salt
About 2 C-flour
Grape jelly.

Cream the butter, add the sugar, and gradually add the egg, the soda mixed with the sour milk, the salt, and the flour to make a soft dough. (One which will roll easily.) Cut into shape with a round cooky cutter. On the centers of one-half the pieces, place a spoonful of grape jelly. Make features on the rest, using a thimble to cut out the eyes. Press the two together, and bake 12 minutes in a moderate oven.

NOVEMBER.

Cosy fire a-burning bright,——
Cosy tables robed in white,——
Dainty dishes smoking hot,——
Home! And cold and snow forgot!

"S
AY, but it's cold today!" called Bob at the door. "Frost tonight all right! I was glad I took my overcoat this morning. Have you had a fire all day?"

"Yes, indeed," said Bettina, "and I've spent most of the afternoon cleaning my furs with corn meal, and fixing those new comforters for the sleeping porch, and putting away some of the summer clothing."

"I believe we will need those new comforters tonight. How were you fixing them?"

"I was basting a white cheese-cloth edge, about twelve inches wide, along the width that goes at the head of the bed, you know. It's so easy to rip off and wash, and I like to have all the comforters fixed that way. I was cleaning my old furs, too, to cut them up. I'm planning to have a fur edge on my suit this winter. I don't believe you'll know the furs, the suit, or Bettina when you see the combination we will make together! Fur is the thing this year, you know."

"Couldn't you spare me a little to transform my overcoat? I'd like to look different, too!"

"Silly! Come along to the kitchen! There's beefsteak tonight (won't it taste good?) and I want you to cook it, while I'm getting the other things on the table. I didn't expect you quite so soon."

That night for dinner they had:

Beefsteak Creamed Potatoes
Devilled Tomatoes
Rolls Butter
Plum Sauce
Bettina's Drop Cookies

BETTINA'S RECIPES

(All measurements are level)

Creamed Potatoes
(Two portions)

1 C-diced cooked potatoes
1 T-green pepper, chopped fine
1 T-butter
1 T-flour
½ C-milk
¼ t-salt

Melt the butter, add the flour and salt, mix well, and add the milk slowly. Cook until creamy, and add the potatoes and the chopped green pepper. Serve very hot.