Savory Hash

Equal quantities mashed lentils and boiled rice or chopped potato, seasoned with sage or onion. Add water or cream and salt. A few soaked and chopped dried olives may be added to the hash.

“The pea and the lentil are roasted in the Mediterranean countries and form there a regular article of food. In India peas are parched in hot sand. The chick-pea, as found by experiment, can be parched over coals in a few moments and thus be made edible. The taste reminds one of pop corn and roasted chestnuts. A slight bitterness is present, due, probably, to the skin which does not slip off in roasting as does the skin of the peanut. When this skin is removed before roasting, as it may be by a half hour’s soaking, the product is improved.

“Our common split pea is also palatable when parched. Parched peas are too hard for any but the strongest teeth, and, as used in India, they are ground and cooked after parching. The roasted chick-pea is also used as a substitute for coffee.”--_Mary Hinman Abel, Farmers’ Bulletin No. 121, U. S. Dept. of Agriculture._

“Milk and eggs should not be classed with flesh meat. In some cases the use of eggs is beneficial.”

“While their use will become more and more unsafe as disease in animals increases, they should not be discarded entirely, when other foods to supply the needed elements cannot be obtained. Great care, however, should be taken to obtain milk from healthy cows and eggs from healthy fowls that are well fed and well cared for.”

Though eggs are, to some extent, stimulating, they do not contain the poisonous, excrementitious matter found in the flesh of dead animals; and no animal life is destroyed by their use.

As eggs, at present, form so important a part of the Vegetarian dietary, care should be taken to prepare them attractively and palatably.

Suggestions

Only strictly fresh eggs should be used for any purpose. There is danger in stale eggs.

The beaten raw egg is usually considered the most digestible, but there are some with whom lightly cooked eggs, as “Eggs in the Shell” agree best, and still others upon whom the soft yolk acts almost like poison, who can take omelets or scrambled eggs better, where the whites and yolks are thoroughly mingled (when cooked in not too large a quantity of oil).

Occasionally we find a person with whom the white of the egg disagrees; but very seldom.

Try taking the beaten white of an egg when you have a sour stomach. It is very soothing, also, to an irritated, sensitive stomach.

The white of an egg relieves the pain and prevents inflammation when applied quickly to a burn or scald.

A few sliced Brazil nuts or filberts or broken pieces of other nuts added to omelets or scrambled eggs aid mastication.

Salt should not be put into the water for poaching eggs; it renders them less digestible.

The cooked yolk of the egg is most digestible when cooked long enough to be dry and mealy, and the white when just jellied.

Never use milk in scrambled eggs or omelets. The casein of the milk hardens with cooking and renders the eggs tough; besides, the flavor of the eggs is much finer with water, and omelets are lighter. Cream spoils the flavor though it does not toughen the egg as does milk.

Always bake soufflés, puff omelets, cakes, all things to be made light with egg, slowly, and well from the bottom, so that they will stay up, after rising. Serve soufflés and puff omelets as soon as done.

For custards or any thickening, beat eggs just sufficiently to mingle, not to a foam.

Drop yolks of eggs in cold water to keep them from drying up when whites only are desired, and lift carefully from the water with a teaspoon when ready to use.

Add a trifle of salt to whites of eggs before beating; they will be lighter.

Stand yolks of eggs in half the shell on a wrinkled towel while waiting to prepare the whites for egg creams and other dishes.

When eggs are used freely in breads, cakes or puddings, other proteid foods will not be required, so they need not add to the expense of the meal.