Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 32, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 August 1895 — Nice Gruel [ARTICLE]

Nice Gruel

A missionary’s wife, Mrs. Paton, had been very ill on a lonely island in the Pacific, and when she recovered sufficiently to write to her friends at home she thus described one of her experiences: When I was able to take an intelligent view of my surroundings, this Is what I first remember seeing: John (her husband) sitting by my bedside with an old straw hat on the back of his head and a huge tin basin between his knees half full of what tasted like very thin, sweet porridge, with which he was feeding me lovingly out of the cook’s long iron spoon! He assured me that it was water gruel; that he had got into the way of making it nicely now; but that he could not find a clean dish on the premises to put it in! He was so proud of his cooking that I asked for the recipe, and you have It here: Equal parts of meal, sugar and water—a cupful of each for one dose; boil all together till there is a smell of singeing, whereby you know it is sufficiently cooked!