The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, Adapted to the Use of Private Families

well washed and kneaded with the hands under the water, and the water to be renewed till it ceases to become white by the operation. If the flour be sound, the paste which remains will be glutinous and elastic, and brittle after it has been baked.--Adulterated meal and flour are generally whiter and heavier than the good, and may be detected in a way similar to that already mentioned, under the article ADULTERATIONS. Or pour boiling water on some slices of bread, and drop on it some spirits of vitriol. Put them in the flour; and if it contain any quantity of whiting, chalk, or lime, a fermentation will ensue. Vitriol alone, dropped on adulterated bread or flour, will produce a similar effect.--American flour requires nearly twice as much water to make it into bread as is used for English flour, and therefore it is more profitable. Fourteen pounds of American flour will make twenty-one pounds and a half of bread, while the best sort of English flour produces only eighteen pounds and a half. FLOUR CAUDLE. Into five large spoonfuls of pure water, rub smooth one dessert-spoonful of fine flour. Set over the fire five spoonfuls of new milk, and put into it two pieces of sugar. The moment it boils, pour into it the flour and water, and stir it over a slow fire twenty minutes. It is a nourishing and gently astringent food, and excellent for children who have weak bowels. FLOWER GARDEN. The pleasures of the garden are ever various, ever new; and in every month of the year some attention is demanded, either in rearing the tender plant, in preparing the soil for its reception, or protecting the parent root from the severity of the winter's blast. Ranunculuses, anemones, tulips, and other bulbous roots, if not taken up, will be in great danger from the frost, and their shoots in the spring will either be impaired, or totally destroyed.----JANUARY. Cover the flower beds with wheat straw, to protect them from the cold; but where the shoots begin to appear, place behind them a reed edge,