To Preserve Potatoes.-The preservation of potatoes by dipping them in boiling water is a valuable and useful discovery. Large quantities may be cured at once, by putting them into a basket as large as the vessel containing the boiling water will admit, and then just dipping them a minute or two at the utmost. The germ, which is so near the skin, is thus destroyed without injury to the potato. In this way several tons might be cured in a few hours. They should be then dried in a warm oven, and laid up in sacks, secure from the frost, in a dry place. Choice of Meats-Names and Situation of the Joints.

The baron of beef is formed of the pieces marked A, B, united on both sides.

The calf is divided into joints by the butcher, upon a system which unites the methods employed for cutting up both beef and mutton.

The sparerib is under the shoulder, which, when removed in a porker, leaves part of the neck without a skin upon it, forming the sparerib. The head is much liked by many, and appears at table dressed in vari

Relative Economy of the Joints.-The round is, in large families, one of the most profitable parts. It is usually boiled, and, like most of the boiling parts of beef, is generally sold less than roasting joints.

The brisket is also a penny a pound less in price than the roasting parts. It is not so economical a part as the round, having more bone to be weighed with it, and more fat. Where there are children, very fat joints are not desirable, being often disagreeable to them, and sometimes prejudicial, especially if they have a dislike to it. This joint also requires more cooking than many others; that is to say, it requires a double allowance of time to be given for boiling it; it will, when served, be hard and scarcely digestible if no more time be allowed to boil it than that which is sufficient for other joints and meats. When stewed it is excellent; and when cooked fresh (i. e. unsalted), an excellent stock for soup may be extracted from it, and yet the meat will serve as well for dinner.

The edgebone, or aitchbone, is not considered to be a very economical joint, the bone being large in proportion to the meat; but the greater

part of it at least is as good as that of any prime part. It sells at a penny a pound less than roasting joints.

The rump is the part of which the butcher makes great profit, by selling it in the form of steaks. In the country, as there is not an equal demand for steaks, the whole of it may be purchased as a joint, and at the price of other prime parts. It may be turned to good account in producing many excellent dishes. If salted, it is simply boiled; if used unsalted, it is usually stewed.

The veiny piece is sold at a low price per pound; but if hung for a day or two it is very good and very profitable. Where there are a number of servants and children to have an early dinner, this part of beef will be found desirable.

From the leg and shin excellent stock for soup may be drawn; and, if not reduced too much, the meat taken from the bones may be served as a stew with vegetables; or it may be seasoned pounded with butter, and potted; or chopped very fine, and seasoned with herbs, and bound together by egg and bread-crumbs; it may be fried in balls, or in the form of large eggs, and served with a gravy made with a few spoonfuls of the soup.

Of half an ox-cheek excellent soup may be made; the meat, when taken from the bones, may be served as a stew.

Roasting parts of beef are the sirloin and the ribs, and these bear in all places the highest price. The most profitable of these two joints at a family table is the ribs. The bones, if removed from the beef before it is roasted, will assist in forming the basis of a soup. When boned, the meat of the ribs is often rolled up, tied with strings, and roasted; and this is the best way of using it, as it enables the carver to distribute equally the upper part of the meat with the more skinny and fatter parts at the lower end of the bones.

To Preserve Fresh Meats.-Meat may be kept several days in the height of summer, sweet and good, by lightly covering it with bran and hanging it in some high or windy room, or in a passage where there is a current of air.

MODES OF COOKING.

THE different modes of cooking, as boiling, baking, frying, and broiling will now be considered.

BOILING. This most simple of all culinary processes is not often performed in perfection. It does not require quite so much care and attention as roasting; to keep your pot really boiling, and to skim it to know how long is required for cooking the joint, etc., and to take it up at the right time, though apparently a simple process, yet to do it in the best manner requires more care than is generally believed. When the pot is coming to a boil there will always, from the cleanest meat and clearest water, rise a scum to the top of it, proceeding partly from the foulness of the meat, and partly from the water; this must be carefully taken off as soon as it rises. On this depends the good appearance of all

boiled things, an essential matter. When you have scummed well, put in some cold water, which will throw up the rest of the scum. The oftener it is scummed, and the cleaner the top of the water is kept, the cleaner will be the meat. If let alone it soon boils down and sticks to the meat, which, instead of looking delicately white and nice, will have that coarse and filthy appearance we have too often to complain of, and the butcher and poulterer be blamed for the carelessness of the cook in not scumming her pot with due diligence. Many put in milk, to make what they boil look white, but this does more harm than good; others wrap it up in a cloth, but these are needless precautions; if the scum be attentively removed, meat will have a much more delicate color and finer flavor than it has when muffled up. This may give rather more trouble, but those who wish to excel in their art must only consider how the processes of it can be most perfectly performed: a cook who has a proper pride and pleasure in her business will make this her maxim and rule on all occasions. Put your meat into cold water, in the proportion of about a quart of water to a pound of meat; it should be covered with water during the whole of the process of boiling, but not drowned in it; the less water, provided the meat be covered with it, the more savory will be the meat, and the better will be the broth in every respect. The water should be heated gradually, according to the thickness, etc., of the article boiled; for instance, a leg of mutton of ten pounds' weight should be placed over a moderate fire, which will gradually make the water hot, without causing it to boil, for about forty minutes; if the water boils much sooner, the meat will be hardened and shrink up as if it had been scorched; by keeping the water a certain time heating without boiling its fibers are dilated, and it yields a quantity of scum, which must be taken off as soon as it rises, for the reasons already mentioned. "If a vessel containing water be placed over a steady fire, the water will grow continually hotter till it reaches the limit of boiling, after which, the regular accessions of heat are wholly spent in converting it into steam; the water remains at the same pitch of temperature however fiercely it boils. The only difference is, that with a strong fire it sooner comes to boil, and more quickly boils away and is converted into steam."

Time for Boiling and Roasting.-Ten pounds of beef require from two hours to two hours and a half roasting, eighteen inches from a good clear fire.

Six pounds require one hour and a quarter to one hour and a half, fourteen inches from a good clear fire.

Three ribs of beef, boned and rolled, tied round with paper, will require two hours and a half, eighteen inches from the fire; baste once only.

The first three ribs, of fifteen or twenty pounds, will take three hours or three and a half.

Reckon the time for its first coming to boil. The old rule of fifteen minutes to a pound of meat we think rather too little; the slower it boils the tenderer, the plumper, and whiter it will be. For those who choose their food thoroughly cooked (which all will who have any regard for their stomachs), twenty minutes to a pound will not be found

too much for gentle simmering by the side of the fire, allowing more or less time according to the thickness of the joint and the coldness of the weather, always remembering, the slower it boils the better. Without some practice it is difficult to teach any art; and cooks seem to suppose they must be right if they put meat into a pot and set it over the fire for a certain time, making no allowance whether it simmers without a bubble or boils at a gallop.

Fresh killed meat will take much longer time boiling than that which has been kept till it is what the butchers call ripe, and longer in cold than in warm weather; if it be frozen, it must be thawed before boiling as before roasting; if it be fresh killed, it will be tough and hard if you stew it ever so long and ever so gently. In cold weather, the night before you dress it bring it into a place of which the temperature is not less than forty-five degrees of Fahrenheit's thermometer. The size of the boiling-pots should be adapted to what they are to containthe larger the saucepan the more room it takes upon the fire, and a larger quantity of water requires a proportionate increase of fire to boil it. In small families we recommend block-tin saucepans etc., as lightest and safest; if proper care is taken of them, and they are well dried after they are cleansed, they are by far the cheapest-the purchase of a new tin saucepan being little more than the expense of tinning a copper one. Take care that the covers of your boiling-pots fit close, not only to prevent unnecessary evaporation of the water, but that the smoke may not insinuate itself under the edge of the lid and give the meat a bad taste.

If you let meat or poultry remain in the water after it is done enough it will become sodden and lose its flavor.

Beef and mutton a little underdone (especially very large joints, which will make the better hash or broil) is not a great fault-by some people it is preferred; but lamb, pork, and veal are uneatable if not thoroughly boiled-but do not overdo them. A trivet, or fish-drainer, put on the bottom of the boiling-pot, raising the contents about an inch and a half from the bottom, will prevent that side of the meat which comes next the bottom from being done too much, and the lower part of the meat will be as delicately done as the other part; and this will enable you to take out the contents of the pot without sticking a fork, etc., into it. If you have not a trivet, use four skewers, or a soup-plate laid the wrong side upward.

Take care of the liquor you have boiled poultry or meat in; in five minutes you may make it into soup.

The good housewife never boils a joint without converting the broth into some sort of soup.

If the liquor be too salt, only use half the quantity, and the rest water; wash salted meat well with cold water before you put it into the boiler. ROASTING-Time required. The noble sirloin of about fifteen pounds. (if much thicker the outside will be done too much before the inside is enough), will require to be before the fire about three and a half or four hours. Take care to spit it evenly, that it may not be heavier on one side than the other; put a little clean dripping into the drippingpan (tie a sheet of paper over it to preserve the fat); baste it well, as