grown, but not the least hard, and putting them in their pods into a keg. Throw some salt into the bottom of the keg, and cover it with a layer of bean pods, then add more salt, and then another layer of beans in their pods, till the keg is full. Press them down with a heavy weight, cover the keg closely, and keep it in a cool, dry place. Before you use them, soak the pods all night in cold water, the next day shell them, and soak the beans till you are ready to boil them.

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POTATOES.

Leeks to the Welsh, to Dutchmen butter’s dear; Of Irish swains, potatoes is the cheer. Gay.

Gay.

Wash them, but do not pare or cut them, unless they are very large. Fill a saucepan half full of potatoes of equal size (or make them so by dividing the larger ones), put to them as much cold water as will cover them about an inch; they are sooner boiled, and more savory than when drowned in water. Most boiled things are spoiled by having too little water; but potatoes are often spoiled by having too much; they must be merely covered, and a little allowed for waste in boiling, so that[77] they may be just covered at the finish. Set them on a moderate fire till they boil; then take them off, and put them by the side of the fire to simmer slowly till they are soft enough to admit a fork. Place no dependence on the usual test of their skins cracking, which, if they are boiled fast, will happen to some potatoes when they are not half done, and the insides quite hard. Then pour the water off—(if you let the potatoes remain in the water a moment after they are done enough, they will become waxy and watery),—uncover the saucepan, and set it at such a distance from the fire as will secure it from burning; their superfluous moisture will evaporate, and the potatoes will be perfectly dry and mealy.

[77]

You may afterwards place a napkin, folded up to the size of the saucepan’s diameter, over the potatoes, to keep them hot and mealy till wanted.

This method of managing potatoes is in every respect equal to steaming them, and they are dressed in half the time.

There is such an infinite variety of sorts and sizes of potatoes, it is impossible to say how long they will take doing: the best way is to try them with a fork. Moderate sized potatoes will generally be done enough in fifteen or twenty minutes.

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