Thursday, April 02, 2009

The Housewives' Monthly Calendar 1936: Table Decorations For The Month Of April

1. Flat green clouded glass bowl, planted with primula malacoides, with the soil carpeted with moss.

2. A rustic basket spilling over bunches of lightly tied polyanthus, of different shades but all to tone.

3. Japanese garden planted with a sprig of fresh cherry-blossom to impart a fresh touch.

4. Bowl massed with wallflower, arranged so that each different shade forms a ring.

5. Flat silver or iridiscent glass fruit-dish lined with damp moss and planted closely with either pale pink or mauve tulip heads, with sprigs of forget-me-nots spraying up between.

6. China shoe, or "bachel" filled with water and a little shot. Arrange in it sprays of varying lengths of flowering currant, fruit-blossom, etc.

7. Low oblong earthenware jardinière, overflowing with a green growing carpet of "Mrs. Gossip," planted with any garden flowers that tone with your colour scheme.

(The Housewives' Monthly Calendar by Elizabeth Craig, 1936 Chapman & Hall, London)

The Housewives' Monthly Calendar 1936: Tea Breads For The Month Of April

Pastries: Eccles cakes; apricot cheese cakes; cream puffs.

Biscuits: Oatmeal; almond shortbread; jam fingers.

Buns: Oatmeal; coco-nut; ginger.

Layer cakes: Marble, with apricot jam filling; Victoria sandwich with rum butter; spiced chocolate cake with vanilla custard filling.

Large cakes: Slab raisin gingerbread; Genoa; walnut; ribbon.

Sandwiches: Kipper cream; sieved cooked chicken; veal or pork, moistened with butter and seasoned to taste, then used with brown bread and mustard and cress; shredded lettuce, moistened with mayonnaise, strongly flavoured with Gorgonzola cheese, and mixed with a little minced walnut, used with brown bread; split toast, thinly buttered and filled with tuna fish mayonnaise and a little minced cucumber.

Note: Any of the fillings suggested for sandwiches can be used for filling oblongs of cooked pastry, or bridge rolls.

(The Housewives' Monthly Calendar 1936, Chapman & Hall, London)

Wednesday, April 01, 2009

The Housewives Monthly Calendar 1936: The Cook's Guide: April

1. Give rhubarb fool - equal quantity of stewed sieved rhubarb and cream or custard - for dinner.

2. Buttered boiled spring greens, turnip-tops or hearting and sprouting broccoli, go well with grilled or fried steak or chops.

3. Why not a prawn and new potato mayonnaise for lunch or supper?

4. Start breakfast with orange juice or tinned figs.

5. Soak salt fish in cold water, and boil rice, ready to make kedjeree, for to-morrow's breakfast.

6. A South African granadilla or two added to your fruit salad is a great improvement.

7. If you want a bird for dinner, why not a casserole of pigeons, well browned before placing in casserole? But don't forget to add some tinned or bottled peas just before serving.

8. Pickle some herring for to-morrow's lunch or supper, and either make or buy potato salad to go with them.

9. Stuffed roast shoulder of English or Canterbury lamb sounds good to me for dinner, but put mint in the stuffing instead of making it into sauce.

10. Make a salmon loaf with egg sauce the principal course at lunch, and give it mashed potatoes for company.

11. Fried rabbit, browned in bacon fat, then cooked with a little stock, in a covered pan, might appeal to you for dinner. Serve with a green vegetable.

12. If you do not like tripe and onions, try Tripe a la Nicoise—cooked in equal quantity of stock and white wine with plenty of sliced carrots and onions and well seasoned.

13. How would you like a slice of fried or grilled gammon and a slice of fried pineapple (tinned) for breakfast?

14. If you serve a shrimp omelet for lunch, give it an endive salad for company.

15. I think it's time we had a mixed grill, with mushroom sauce or grilled tomatoes, and latticed potatoes.

16. Try a crown roast of pork for dinner, with apple and onion sauce flavoured with sherry.

17. Turn the remainder of pork into a mayonnaise for lunch, but give it a little minced pimento for seasoning, if you can.

18. Let's start dinner with a grapefruit cocktail.

19. Make cream cheese, moistened with cream, seasoned and mixed with a little chopped pimento and walnuts, the filling for brown bread sandwiches for tea.

20. If you are calling on the poulterer, take a look at the guinea-fowls. Cooked on a bed of sliced onion and bacon, after flouring and seasoning, in a casserole, with or without mushrooms and chipolata sausages, they are delicious. But give them half a glass of stock and wine before serving.

21. I want grilled herrings and mustard sauce for lunch.

22. What about curried prawns and boiled rice for breakfast?

23. You must have a roast of beef (I insist on Scotch!) with horseradish sauce, and a green pea pudding in place of Yorkshire.

24. If tired of biscuits and cheese, have a Welsh rarebit or cheese soufflé for dinner.

25. Make some lemon and orange marmalade, as long as lemons and oranges are cheap.

26. Devilled eggs and lettuce salad make a good luncheon dish, if followed by a substantial sweet.

27. Should you want a small bird for two, try a hazel-hen and roast and serve like a partridge.

28. A fish pie, made of sea bream, which is so inexpensive, may appeal for lunch.

29. I would like ham and cress rolls and an orange layer cake for tea, but you can also
have hot tea-cakes or cinnamon toast if you want.

30. Say "Good-bye" to April with chicken pie made from boiled fowl, neatly cut up, and moistened white sauce, and flaky pastry, followed by gooseberry fool. You can start with smoked salmon or Scotch broth, if you please.

(The Housewives' Monthly Calendar by Elizabeth Craig, 1936 Chapman & Hall, London)

The Housewives' Monthly Calendar 1936: April's Table of Work

If Easter happens to fall in late March, and you manage to finish your spring cleaning before it, April should be an easy month in the home. But if, when Easter happens to be early, you have to leave some of your spring cleaning until after the holiday, then finish it at once, or as soon as you can.

1. Hang up clean or new curtains.

2. Clean or wash winter curtains and other soft furnishings, and store them away in a moth-proof bag or cedar-lined chest.

3. Plan your spring wardrobe if you did not re­furbish it for Easter.

4. Look over your bottling equipment, and renew anything required.

5. Prepare for egg pickling and early jam making, and if short of preserves, make lemon cheese and orange and pineapple butter.

6. If you did not make grapefruit marmalade when you made Seville orange, make it now.

(The Housewives' Monthly Calendar by Elizabeth Craig, 1936 Chapman & Hall, London)