Use none but the best butter in pastry.

"Cooking butter is a good thing," said a grave epicure to me once, "an admirable thing - in its place, which is in the soap-fat kettle or upon wagon-wheels! "

It is certainly out of place in biscuits, cake, or in any substance destined for human palates and stomachs. It is never less in place than in pastry; never betrays its vile-ness more surely and odiously.

Butter intended for pastry should be washed carefully in several clear, cold waters, and kneaded while under water, to extract the salt. Then wipe it dry and lay it in a cold place until you are ready to work it in.

"Keep cool," is a cardinal motto for pastry-makers. A marble slab is a good thing to roll out paste upon. Next to this, the best article is a clean board of hard wood, which is never used for any other purpose. It is harder to make good pastry in warm weather than cold, 15 on account of the tendency of the butter to oil, and thus render the crust heavy and solid.

Few people know what really good pastry is. Fewer still can make it. It has no inevitable resemblance either to putty or leather. It is light, crisp, flaky, goodly to behold - goodlier to the taste.

"Pork fat and pies kill more people yearly in the United States than do liquor and tobacco," said a popular lecturer upon conservatism.

Perhaps so; but I incline to the belief that bad pastry is answerable for a vast majority of the murders. Not that I recommend pies of any description as healthful daily food - least of all for children. But since they are eaten freely all over our land, let us make them as wholesome and palatable as possible.

Family Pie-Crust (No. 1.)+

1 quart flour.

1/3 lb. lard, sweet and firm.

1/2 * butter.

1 small teacup ice-water.

Sift the flour into a deep wooden bowl. With a broad-bladed knife, or a small keen "chopper," cut up the lard into the flour until it is fine as dust. Wet with ice-water into a stiff dough, working it with a wooden spoon until obliged to make it into a roll or ball with your hands. Flour these, and knead the paste into shape with as few strokes as will effect your end. Lay the lump upon a floured kneading-board and roll it out into a thin sheet, always rolling from you with quick, light action. When thin enough, stick bits of butter in regular close rows all over the sheet, using a knife for this purpose rather than your hands. Roll up the paste into close folds as you would a sheet of music. Flatten it that your rolling-pin can take hold, and roll out again as thin as before. Baste, roll up and then out, until your butter is gone. It is a good plan to sprinkle the inside of each sheet with a little flour after buttering it, before making it into a roll. Finally, make out your crust; butter your pie-plates, lay the paste lightly within them, cut it off evenly about the edges after fitting it neatly ; gather up the scraps left from cutting, and make into another sheet. If the pies are to have a top crust, fill the plates with fruit or whatever you have ready, lay the paste on this, cut it to fit, and press down the edges to prevent the escape of the juice, with a spoon, knife, or jagging-iron, ornamenting it in a regular figure.

Bake in a moderate oven until a light brown. Be particularly careful to have your heat as great at the bottom as at the top, or the lower crust will be clammy and raw.

Pastry is always best when fresh.

It is well, when you can spare the time, to lay the roll, when all the butter is used up, in a very cold place for fifteen minutes or so before rolling it into crust. Indeed, some good housewives let it stand on the ice an hour in hot weather. They say it tends to make it flaky as well as firm.

Touch as little with your hands as may be practicable.