Hand-Book of Practical Cookery, for Ladies and Professional Cooks: Containing the Whole Science and Art of Preparing Human Food

must be free from bones. _Fruit-Pies._--Pies are made with paste and fruit or vegetables. The under-paste may be made of trimmings of puff-paste, or of the paste hereafter described, but the top is always made of puff-paste. The paste on the top may cover the fruit entirely, or it may be only strips running across, according to taste and fancy. The fruit is used raw or cooked previously, according to kind; if it requires longer cooking than the paste, or if it requires to be mixed or mashed, it must be cooked previously. _Under-Paste._--Put one pound of flour on the paste-board with six ounces of butter in the middle of it; also two ounces of sugar, two eggs, and cold water enough to make an ordinary paste, neither too stiff nor too soft. Roll the paste down to a thickness of one-eighth of an inch, spread it on a tin dish or bakepan, buttered slightly, raise the borders a little or place a strip of puff-paste all around it; put the fruit in the middle, then cover with a thin piece of puff-paste or place strips of it only over the fruit, and bake in a rather quick oven, about 390 degrees Fahr. The strips of paste are cut with a paste-cutter (caster-like) and placed across; one strip may also be placed all around. When trimmings of puff-paste are used for the under-paste, when placed on the tin or bake-pan, prick it in about a dozen places with a fork to prevent it from rising. To place a border around the paste, you have only to cut a strip of it about half an inch wide, wet the paste with water by means of a brush, that is, the edge or place where you are going to put it; then take hold of the strip, place one end of it on the paste and run it all around till you meet the end, cut it off and stick the two ends together by wetting them also. When the border is placed, then put the fruit in the middle; if the