Page:The English housekeeper, 6th.djvu/376

348  grated, cloves or mace, in a ¼ pint of water; add a pint of Port, and sugar to taste, boil it up, and serve it hot.

Blanch, pound, then boil in a little water, ½ lb. sweet, and a very few bitter almonds, strain, and put the liquid into a quart of heated white wine, with sugar to sweeten; beat well, and serve hot.

, of all the departments of country house-keeping, is the one which most quickly suffers from neglect; and of all the appendages to a country dwelling, there is nothing which so successfully rivals the flower garden, in exciting admiration, as a nice dairy. From the show-dairy, with its painted glass windows, marble fountains and china bowls, to that of the common farm house, with its red brick floor, deal shelves, and brown milk-pans, the dairy is always an object of interest, and is associated with every idea of real comfort, as well as of imaginary enjoyment, attendant upon a country life.

The management of this important department in a country establishment, from the milking of the cows, to the making of the butter and the cheese, must necessarily be almost wholly intrusted to a dairy maid, who ought to be experienced in the various duties of her office, or she cannot be skilful in the performance of them. Those persons who have excelled in dairy work, have generally learnt their business when quite young, as a knowledge of it is not to be hastily acquired. The great art of butter and cheese-making, consists in extreme care and scrupulous cleanliness; and an experienced dairy maid knows, that when her butter has a bad taste, some of the dairy utensils, the churn, the pail, or the pans, have been neglected in the scalding, or, the butter