Toad In The Hole

Make a batter with some milk, flour, and one or two eggs, as thick as double cream. (See Batter.) Put two pounds of beefsteak, cut into pieces about three inches long and one and a half wide, and an inch thick, into a hot buttered baking-dish; season the pieces of meat with a little salt and pepper sprinked over them. Pour the batter into the hot dish, and bake it in the oven for one hour and a half.

The remains of cold meat can be cooked this way. Unless the cold meat is underdone, and contains red juicy gravy in it, it will be very insipid.

Eggs are not absolutely essential to the batter, but are of course a very great improvement.

Toast And Water

Take a good-sized piece of stale crust of bread. Toast it a dark brown, as dark as possible without burning it black. Pour a quart of boiling water over, let it get quite cold, then strain it into a jug through a piece of muslin.

Hot Buttered Toast

Hot buttered toast is a somewhat expensive luxury when made properly. Rather stale bread is best. The bread should be cut into slices about one-third of an inch thick. It should be toasted quickly in front of a clear fire a nice golden brown on both sides. It should be quickly buttered on both sides, and placed in a hot dish. Another piece should then be toasted and buttered, and placed on the top. When four or five slices have been piled up, cut through the heap, and cut the toast into strips. The toast should be perfectly saturated with pure country butter, and served so hot that it almost burns the mouth.

Tomato Salad

Ripe, round, red tomatoes make a delicious salad. The best tomatoes are the small, round, smooth ones perfectly red all over. Cut these in slices. Take out the core and pips. Place them in a salad bowl rubbed with a bead of garlic, and dress them in the ordinary way with oil and vinegar. (See Salad.) Potatoes cut in slices, and a little chopped parsley, can be mixed with them.

Treacle Pudding

Make some ordinary suet crust (see Paste, Suet, for Puddings), roll out the paste about a quarter of an inch thick, butter an ordinary pudding-basin, and line it with the paste as if you were going to make an ordinary fruit pudding. Put a little treacle at the bottom, and then a layer of paste, then another layer of treacle, and so on till you fill the basin. Cover over with a top of paste, pinch the edges together in the ordinary way (see Pudding, Meat), and' boil in a cloth for about three hours.

Trout

Trout are best grilled whole. (See No. 5.) Serve cut lemon with them, or a little oiled butter. They can also be fried (see No. 6) after being floured, but it is best not to eggs-and-bread-crumb them.

Small trout are very nice cooked whole, wrapped up with plenty of butter and pepper, and a little chopped parsley and a pinch Of mixed sweet herbs (see Herbs), in some well-oiled paper. Bake in the oven according to the size of the fish, and serve in the paper. Time for a half-pound trout, about twenty minutes.

Trout, when large, can be boiled like a salmon, and served with Dutch sauce. (See No. 1, and Dutch Sauce).

Trout can also be cut in slices, and served in the water in which it is boiled "Souchet." A few sprigs of parsley should be thrown in. The trout should be cut up directly it is caught, and the pieces thrown into cold spring water. Serve thin brown bread and butter with trout "Souchet".