Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 253, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 October 1914 — CHAFING DISH IDEAS [ARTICLE]

CHAFING DISH IDEAS

POINTERS FOR USERS OF POPULAR COOKING APPARATUS. Recognized as Most Valuable Friend of Surprised Hostess, There Are Things to Be Remembered as to Care and Operation. No wonder the chafing dish is popular. There’s magic in. it. When one has assisted at a chafing dish supper, formality is over forever. Besides allowing a woman to appear at her best and exhibit cooking as a fine art, the chafing dish will always serve as a friend in need to the surprised hostess. A word of caution is necessary, however. Keep the chafing dieh clean. Under no circumstances place it-on a fabric cover, but use marble, slate, wood or tile. Keep it away from curtains and protect filmy sleeves while working around the chafing dish. A piece of slate roofing is convenient to hold the lamp. Above all, when the alcohol has burned out, do not put in a fresh supply until the tray has thoroughly cooled off, otherwise you may encounter an explosion. Keep all chafing dish articles and utensils ready where they can be reached without trouble. Use an agate ware uteneil. It will heat in a third of the time required by tin or copper. Procure a small wire toaster, that fresh toast may be served with each chafing dish delicacy and a second alcohol lamp to keep one dish hot while another is in preparation. Do not forget the various wooden-handled spoons and mixing forks. ■" The most important article on the larder shelf -is prepared beef stock. A great number of chafing dish recipes have as their fundamental ingredient soup etock. This can be made excellently and at short notice by dissolving a dessertspoonful of concentrated fluid in half a pint of boiling water, adding pepper, salt, two or three drops of extract of celery and a tiny teaspoonful of onion juice. Besides stock the chafing dish expert has in her commissary department some fine East Indian curry powder, caviare, tomato catchup, anchovy paste, canned mushrooms, salmon, chicken, sardines, cheese and all the ordinary season-' ings, including paprika.

Bread and butler sandwiches, iced tea, coffee or chocolate, fruit cake, pickles and wafers form a foundation for a lunch to which the addition of the hot dish prepared in the chafing dish is the finishing touch. Chafing dish cookery is really very simple and anyone may soon learn to stir up delicious things with little preparation, provided one knows something definite to begin with. It would be well to purchase a book of recipes and begin at the beginning. To make chicken croquettes a neverfailing and universally liked dish, take the following for six or eight people: Three cupfuls of chicken chopped fine, one cupful of bread crumbs and two eggs well beaten. Roll the chicken and bread crumbs into small, pear-shaped balls, dip into beaten eggs and bread crumbs and fry In butter in the chafing dish. Oysters are always acceptable and appetizing. The easiest way to cook Is to pan them. Heat a tablespoonful of butter and when it melts add the juice of half a. lemon and a teaspoonful of chopped parsley and stir in the drained oysters. Cook only until their edges curl and lift out quickly on strips of buttered toast. Oyster stew is also easy to prepare in a chafing dish.