Squashes Or Cymlings

See that the squashes are not turning old, and hardening. Wash them, and cut them into four pieces each; but do not split them. Put them on in boiling water, with a little salt. Boil them steadily till quite tender throughout. Then take them, up, and mash or drain them through a cullender, pressing them with a broad short-handled wooden ladle. All the water (of which there will be a profusion,) must be entirely squeezed out. Serve them up very dry, and smoothly and evenly mashed, having first mixed with them a very little butter; and season them with very little pepper. Much butter gives them a disagreeable taste and consistence, and the butter should be fresh and good. It is better to mash squashes, turnips, pumpkins, etc, without any butter, than to use that which is salt and bad. The flat white ones are the best summer squashes; the striped green are more watery; the cashaw, or yellow winter squash, is best of all, and grows well in the New England states, from whence, as it keeps well all winter, it is often brought in barrels. Every family should get a barrel of winter squashes from Boston. They do not thrive in the middle States. In New Jersey and Pennsylvania, they cannot be raised even from the best yankee seed, turning pumpkinish the next year, and afterwards becoming quite pumpkins, and very bad ones too. But when raised in their native soil and climate nothing of the squash kind is equal to them. They are very dry and sweet, and of a rich yellow color. Take them out of the barrel, and keep them far apart on the shelves or floor of a dry pantry.

Stewed Pumpkin

No pumpkin is too large to be good, but they may be too old. Cut a good deep-colored pumpkin in half, and empty out all the seeds, etc. Then cut it into pieces, and pare them. Put the pieces of pumpkin into a pot with barely sufficient water to keep them from burning. When they are thoroughly done or soft all through, take them up; drain, mash, and press them through a cullender. They must be very dry. Put the stewed pumpkin into a dish, and mix it with a small portion of butter. Season it with black pepper, and eat it with boiled corned beef, or corned pork, or bacon.

Stewed pumpkin is chiefly used for pies and puddings.

Yankee Pumpkin Pudding

Take a pint of stewed pumpkin. Mix together a pint of West India molasses and a pint of milk, adding two large table-spoonfuls of brown sugar, and two table-spoonfuls of ground ginger. Beat three eggs very light, and stir them, gradually, into the milk and molasses. Then, by degrees, stir in the stewed pumpkin. Put it into a deep dish, and bake it without a crust. This is a good farm-house pudding, and equally good for any healthy children.

For a large family, double the quantities of ingredients-that is, take a quart of milk, a quart of molasses, four spoonfuls of brown sugar, four spoonfuls of ginger, six eggs, and a quart of stewed pumpkin.

You had best have at hand more than a quart of pumpkin, lest when mixed it should not hold out. This pudding is excellent made of winter squash.