Dried Rusk+

1 pint of warm milk.

2 eggs.

1/2 teacup of butter. Half a cup of yeast. 1 teaspoonful salt.

Set a sponge with these ingredients, leaving out the eggs, and stirring in flour until you have a thick batter. Early next morning add the well-beaten eggs, and flour enough to enable you to roll out the dough. Let this rise in the bread-bowl two hours. Roll into a sheet nearly an inch thick, cut into round cakes, and arrange in your baking-pan two deep, laying one upon the other carefully. Let these stand for another half-hour, and bake.

These are now very nice for eating, and you may, if you like, reserve a plateful for tea; but the rule for the many, handed down through, I am afraid to say how many generations, in the family where I first ate this novel and delightful biscuit, is to divide the twins, thus leaving one side of each cake soft, and piling them loosely in the pan, set them in the oven when the fire is declining for the night, and leave them in until morning. Then, still obeying the traditions of revered elders, put them in a clean muslin bag, and hang them up in the kitchen. They will be fit to eat upon the third day. Put as many as you need in a deep dish, and pour over them iced milk, or water, if you cannot easily procure the former. Let them soak until soft, take them out, drain them for a minute in a shallow plate, and eat with butter. Invalids and children crave them eagerly Indeed, I have seen few refuse them who had ever tasted them before. There is a pastoral flavor about the pleasant dish, eaten with the accompaniment of fresh berries, on a summer evening, that appeals to the better impulses of one's appetite.

Try my soaked rusk - not forgetting to ice the milk - and you will find out for yourself what I mean, but cannot quite express.

Dried rusk will keep for weeks, and grow better every day. The only risk is in their being eaten up before they attain maturity.

Butter Crackers

1 quart of flour.

3 tablespoonfuls butter.

1/2 teaspoonful soda, dissolved in hot water.

1 saltspoonful salt.

2 cups sweet milk.

Rub the butter into the flour, or, what is better, cut it up with a knife or chopper, as you do in pastry; add the salt, milk, and soda, mixing well. Work into a ball, lay upon a floured board, and beat with a rolling-pin half an hour, turning and shifting the mass often. Roll into an even sheet, a quarter of an inch thick, or less, prick deeply with a fork, and bake hard in a moderate oven. Hang them up in a muslin bag in the kitchen for two days to dry.

Wafers+

1 pound of flour.

2 tablespoonfuls butter. A little salt.

Mix with sweet milk into a stiff dough, roll out very thin, cut into round cakes, and again roll these as thin as they can be handled. Lift them carefully, lay in a pan, and bake very quickly.

These are extremely nice, especially for invalids. They should be hardly thicker than writing-paper. Flour the baking-pan instead of greasing.