Read Ebook: Holiday Stories for Young People by Sangster Margaret Elizabeth Munson Editor

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Ebook has 2571 lines and 435964 words, and 52 pages

The next morning grandmamma was better, and I had my hands full.

COMPANY TO TEA, AND SOME RECEIPTS.

You remember that grandmamma in the very middle of her headache gave orders about boiling the ham and the tongue.

We made a rule after that, and Veva, who was secretary, wrote it in the club's book: "Always begin getting ready for company the day before."

I had not noticed it then, but it is mother's way, and it saves a great deal of confusion. If everything is left for the day on which the company is expected, the girl who is hostess will be much too tired to enjoy her friends. She ought to have nothing on her mind which can worry her or keep her from entering into their pleasure. A hurried, worried hostess makes her guests feel somehow in a false position.

Our house was, fortunately, in excellent order, so I had nothing to do except, in the morning, to set the table prettily, to dust the parlors, to put fresh flowers in the vases, and give a dainty finishing touch here and there to the rooms. There were plenty of pleasant things to do. I meant to have tea over early, and then some of the club's brothers would be sure to come in, and we could play tennis on our ground, and perhaps have a game of croquet. Then, when it was too dark for that sort of amusement, we could gather on the veranda or in the library, and have games there--Dumb Crambo and Proverbs, until the time came for the girls to go home.

First, however, the eating part of the entertainment had to be thought of.

Aunt Hetty was in a wonderful good humor, and helped with all her might, so that my preparations went on very successfully. Grandmamma felt so much better that I asked her advice, and this was the bill of fare which she proposed:

Ham Sandwiches. Cold Sliced Tongue. Quick Biscuits. Apple-Sauce. Strawberries and Cream. Tapioca Blanc-Mange. Cup-Cake. Cookies. Cocoa.

The ham, having been boiled till tender the afternoon before, was chopped very fine, a tiny dash of mustard added to it, and then it was spread smoothly between two pieces of the thinnest possible bread-and-butter. Around each of the sandwiches, when finished, I tied a very narrow blue ribbon. The effect was pretty.

The tongue was sliced evenly, and arranged on a plate with tender leaves of lettuce around its edge.

The biscuits I made myself. Mother taught me how. First I took a quart of flour, and dropped into it two teaspoonfuls of our favorite baking-powder. This I sifted twice, so that the powder and flour were thoroughly blended. Mother says that cakes and biscuits and all kinds of pastry are nicer and lighter if the flour is sifted twice, or even three times. I added now a tablespoonful of lard and a half teaspoonful of salt, and mixed the biscuit with milk. The rule is to handle as little as possible, and have the dough very soft. Roll into a mass an inch thick, and cut the little cakes apart with a tin biscuit-cutter. They must be baked in a very hot oven.

No little housekeeper need expect to have perfect biscuits the first time she makes them. It is very much like playing the piano. One needs practice. But after she has followed this receipt a half dozen times, she will know exactly how much milk she will require for her dough, and she will have no difficulty in handling the soft mass. A dust of flour over the hands will prevent it from sticking to them.

Mother always insists that a good cook should get all her materials together before she begins her work.

The way is to think in the first place of every ingredient and utensil needed, then to set the sugar, flour, spice, salt, lard, butter, milk, eggs, cream, molasses, flavoring, sieves, spoons, egg-beaters, cups, strainers, rolling-pins, and pans, in a convenient spot, so that you do not have to stop at some important step in the process, while you go to hunt for a necessary thing which has disappeared or been forgotten.

Mother has often told me of a funny time she had when she was quite a young housekeeper, afflicted with a borrowing neighbor. This lady seldom had anything of her own at hand when it was wanted, so she depended upon the obliging disposition of her friends.

One day my mother put on her large housekeeping apron and stepped across the yard to her outdoor kitchen. The kitchens in Kentucky were never a part of the house, but always at a little distance from it, in a separate building.

"Aunt Phyllis," said my mother to the cook, who was browning coffee grains in a skillet over the fire, "I thought I told you that I was coming here to make pound cake and cream pies this morning. Why is nothing ready?"

"La, me, Miss Emmeline!" replied Aunt Phyllis. "Miss 'Tilda Jenkins done carried off every pie pan and rolling-pin and pastry-board, and borrowed all de eggs and cream fo' herself. Her bakin' isn't mo'n begun."

This was a high-handed proceeding, but nothing could be done in the case. It was Mrs. Jenkins' habit, and mother had always been so amiable about it that the servants, who were easygoing, never troubled themselves to ask the mistress, but lent the inconvenient borrower whatever she desired.

Sometimes just as we were going to church, I was too little at the time to remember, mother said that a small black boy with very white teeth and a very woolly head, would pop up at her chamber door, exclaiming,

"Howdy, Miss Emmeline. Miss 'Tilda done sent me to borrow yo' Prayer-book. She goin' to church to-day herself."

Or, of a summer evening, her maid would appear with a modest request for Miss Emmeline's lace shawl and red satin fan; Miss 'Tilda wanted to make a call and had nothing to wear.

"Never borrow," said my mother. "Buy, or give away, or do without, but be beholden to nobody for a loan."

Another rule for little housekeepers is to wash their hands and faces and have their hair in the nicest order before they begin to cook. The nails should be cleaned and the toilet attended to as carefully as if the girl were going to a party, before she begins any work in the kitchen.

I suppose you think my bill of fare for a company tea very plain, but I hadn't time for anything elaborate. Besides, if what you have is very good, and set on the table prettily, most people will be satisfied even if the fare is simple.

"Apple-sauce," said Amy one day, "is a dish I never touch. We used to have it so often at school that I grew tired at the sight of it."

But Amy did eat apple-sauce at our house. Aunt Hetty taught me how to make it, and I think it very good. We always cook it in an earthenware crock over a very quick fire. This is our receipt: Pare and slice the apples, eight large ones are sufficient for a generous dish, and put them on with a very little water. As soon as they are soft and pulpy stir in enough granulated sugar to make them as sweet as your father and brothers like them. Take them off and strain them through a fine sieve into a glass dish. Cook the apple-sauce about two hours before it is wanted on the table. Put beside it a bowl of whipped cream, and when you help to the sauce add a heaping spoonful of the cream to every dish.

Everything on the table was enjoyed, and we girls had a very merry time. After tea and before the brothers came, we arranged a plan for learning to make bread. I forgot to speak of the strawberries, but good strawberries and rich cream need no directions. A pretty way of serving them for breakfast, or for people who prefer them without cream, is simply to arrange the beautiful fruit unhulled on a cut glass dish, and dip each berry by its dainty stem into a little sparkling mound of powdered sugar.

As for our games, our talk, our royally good time, girls will understand this without my describing it. As Veva said, you can't put the soul of a good time down on the club's record book, and I find I can't put it down here in black and white. But when we said good-night, each girl felt perfectly satisfied with the day, and the brothers pleaded for many more such evenings.

A FAIR WHITE LOAF.

"It's very well," said Miss Clem Downing, Marjorie's sister, "for you little housekeepers to make cakes and creams; anybody can do that; but you'll never be housekeepers in earnest, little or big, my dears, till you can make good eatable bread."

"Bread," said Mr. Pierce to Amy, "is the crowning test of housewifery. A lady is a loaf-giver, don't you know?"

"When Jeanie shall present me with a perfect loaf of bread, I'll present her with a five-dollar gold piece," said Jeanie's father.

"I don't want Veva meddling in the kitchen," observed Mrs. Fay, with emphasis. "The maids are vexatious enough, and the cook cross enough as it is. If ever Veva learns breadmaking, it must be outside of this house."

"Don't bother me, daughter," said Mrs. Partridge, looking up from the cup she was painting. "It will be time for you to learn breadmaking when the bakers shut their shops."

As for the writer of this story, her mother's way had been to teach her breadmaking when she was just tall enough to have a tiny moulding-board on a chair, but Milly did not feel qualified to take hold of a regular cooking class. It was the same with Linda Curtis. Grandmamma suggested our having a teacher, and paying her for her trouble.

"Miss Muffet?" said Veva.

"Miss Muffet," we all exclaimed.

"And then," said Jeanie, "our money will enable her to buy the winter cloak she is so much in need of, and she will not feel as if she were accepting charity, because she will earn the money if she teaches us."

"Indeed, she will," exclaimed Veva. "I know beforehand that she will have one fearfully stupid pupil, and that is Veva Fay."

Breakfast was no sooner over next morning, and grandmamma dressed and settled in comfort, than away we flew to our friend. "We," means Linda and myself. She is my nearest neighbor, and we often act for the club.

Miss Muffet lived by herself in a bit of a house, her only companions being a very deaf sister and a very noisy parrot.

"Passel o' girls! Passel o' girls!" screamed the parrot, as we lifted the latch and walked up the little bricked pathway, bordered with lady-slippers and prince's feather, to the porch, which was half hidden by clematis.

Miss Muffet was known to every man, woman and child in Bloomdale. She was sent for on every extra occasion, and at weddings, christenings and funerals, when there was more work than usual to be done, the little brisk woman, so quiet and so capable, was always on hand. She could do a little of everything, from seating Tommy's trousers to setting patches in Ellen's sleeves; from making lambrequins and table scarfs to laundrying lace curtains and upholstering furniture. As for cooking, preserving and canning, she was celebrated for miles around and beyond our township.

"Would Miss Muffet undertake to show a few girls how to make bread and rolls and biscuit and sally-lunn, and have patience with them till they were perfect little housekeepers, so far as bread was concerned."

It was some little time before we could make Miss Muffet understand our plan, and persuade her to let us pay for our lessons; but when she did understand, she entered into the plan with enthusiasm.

"La me! What a clever notion to be sure! Sister Jane, poor dear, would approve of it highly, if she weren't so deaf. Begin to-day? Well, well! You don't want the grass to grow under your feet, do you? All right! I'll be at your house, Milly, at six o'clock this evening to give the first lesson. Have the girls there, if you can. It's as easy to teach a dozen as one."

"Milly," said Linda, "the club ought to have a uniform and badges. I don't think a club is complete that hasn't a badge."

"We all have white aprons," I said.

"Yes; ordinary aprons, but not great kitchen aprons to cover us up from head to foot."

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