Bande-Cai (bhindi) Toast is so well known that I need scarcely do more than mention it, out of respect as it were, for, homely as it is, there are few toasts more palatable. Cream, when it can be spared is, of course, a vast improvement, and the following variation will be found nice for a change :- Boil the bande-cais, and, when cold, scrape out the seeds and pulp from each pod into a small basin, using a silver spoon for the operation. Give the pulp a dusting of white pepper, and salt to taste, with a few drops of anchovy sauce. Fry rounds, or slices of bread, according to the number you want, in butter, and set them to keep crisp, and hot in the oven. Now, take a small sauce-pan, place it in the bain-marie, or over a very moderate fire, melt a dessert-spoonful of butter in it, stir into it the bande-cai pulp, and two good table-spoonfuls of cream with the yolk of one egg. Continue stirring one way until the contents of your sauce-pan look nice and thick, and steaming hot; then pour the mixture over the toasts, and serve. A dust of grated Parmesan cheese should be shaken over the surface of the toasts as an embellishment, and Nepaul pepper should be handed round.

Very young Brinjals (binegun) may be treated exactly in the same manner as the foregoing, as also the pods of the moringa ("drum-stick") tree. Be sure that you select tender pods for toast-making, or the result will disappoint you.

A very superior dish of this kind can be concocted if you happen to be able to obtain the flower-pod of a cocoa-nut palm. Treat the buds of the embryo flower which the pod contains as laid down for bande-cai; that is to say, boil the flower, after you have cut it out of the pod, in salt and water till tender, then cut off the buds, and heat them up in a sauce-pan in thickened cream, or in milk thickened with the yolks of two eggs, pour them over hot fried toasts, which should be sent up immediately.

The white stalks of the flower, if quite young, can be served exactly like asparagus, i. e.:- boiled, laid in a very hot dish, with plenty of butter melting over them, or maitre d'hotel butter if at hand, and assisted by "Dutch sauce." No toast is needed in this case. The cocoanut flower-pods can be obtained now and then at Madras, for the toddy-drawers cut them off when tapping the palms for sap. I can strongly recommend my readers to try both the dishes I have mentioned.

Sardine toast, herring toast, cod's-roe toast, pilchard toast, salmon toast, etc., etc., are all nice, and very easily made. Trim the fish free from oil, skin, fins, bones, etc., and chop it up on a plate, give it a dust of Nepaul pepper, with a very little salt, and knead it up with a little butter. Put a pat of butter at the bottom of a sauce-pan, proceed as if to make a sauce blanche with a little milk, incorporate therewith the minced fish, add the yolk of an egg, and when thick enough and thoroughly hot, pour it upon slices of fried toast hot from the pan, and dish up quickly. The cold remains of all fish may be thus satisfactorily disposed of. "Buttered eggs" go wonderfully well with fish toasts, either laid as a top-dressing over the fish mince, or mingled with it; and hard-boiled eggs may be cut up, and tossed with the fish in the saucepan just before serving.

Cheese is another valuable ingredient in the hands of the toast-maker. Welsh rarebit, or "Ramakin toast" as it is called by Ramasamy, is universally familiar to native cooks, and is a dish upon which they generally fall back in an emergency, or when "Missis din't give arders" for any anything else. For a really good Welsh rarebit, you should have a sound fresh cheese, not over-strong, and proceed thus :- Grate two ounces of the cheese, mix with it an ounce of butter, a dessert-spoonful of made-mustard, a little salt, a pinch of Nepaul pepper, and the yolks of two eggs. Mix well together in a basin, and work the mixture thoroughly smooth. Toast a couple of neat slices of bread very carefully, butter them on both sides, place them on a dish that will stand the oven, spread the cheese mixture over them pretty thickly, and bake for ten minutes. If you want a smooth yellow surface, neither too brown nor dry, place your toasts in a buttered pie-dish, and spread a sheet of common white paper over them : after ten minutes baking in a really hot oven, they will be ready, so remove the paper and serve forthwith.

A good plain Cheese toast, made as follows, is not is be despised :- Cut a few very thin slices of a nice fresh cheese, or grate two ounces of a hard dry one: put the cheese upon a small well buttered baking tin, and place it in the oven; watch it carefully, and when it begins to dissolve, stir some butter into it, give it a dust of Nepaul pepper, and serve it upon crisply fried toasts quickly.

To make a very toothsome cheese toast in the dining room I have found the following method successful. Take two table-spoonfuls of grated cheese, and mingle with it a dessert-spoonful of mustard powder, a pinch of salt and dust of Nepaul pepper. Light a spirit lamp, and, in a little frying-pan placed over it, melt a dessert-spoonful of butter (tinned butter docs capitally); when melted, shake evenly over the butter the powdered cheese, and stir well. As soon as the cheese looks creamy, stop, and pour it over some hot buttered toast brought in on the instant from the verandah.

mock crab toast. - This variety of Welsh rarebit is generally popular. Pound two ounces of cheese with a dessert-spoonful of anchovy sauce, a dessert-spoonful of made-mustard, and one of vinegar, a pinch of Nepaul pepper, and a little salt, the yolks of two eggs, and a table-spoonful of butter. Mix thoroughly in a basin, and proceed as directed for Welsh rarebit.

A toast that might correctly bear the name of "Rame-quin" is to be composed as follows :- Make the mixture exactly as laid down for "Ramequins en caisses" Chapter 24, and put it upon very carefully fried toasts, which should be arranged upon a silver dish, and baked for ten minutes, or until the cheese dressings on the toasts rise in the manner of fondues. If served at the nick of time, these little toasts will be found very good.

Never use a rich ripe cheese, or one that is beginning to show the lovely tins of honorable age, in cookery. A little mildew from damp in your bottle of grated Parmesan, remember, will ruin any dish in which it may be used afterwards. Choose a good, fresh, hard, dry cheese, of a mild family, for toasts, etc.: between ourselves, indeed, I know of no more useful domestic sort than the round Butch. It is a cheap cheese, and inclined to be saltish in taste, but that is of no consequence in cookery; all you have to do is to omit the item of salt mentioned in the recipe you may have selected. 'Dutch cheese' grates easily, and is rarely inclined to mouldiness. Next to Parmesan, I would sooner use it than any of the other commonly imported kinds.

I may have omitted a few good toasts in this chapter, I hope, however, that I have given several that will prove acceptable.