I cleared away the breakfast, while Cecilly ran up to air the bedrooms and beddings. Then together we washed up, and afterwards made the beds and tidied the bedrooms. Our house is a bright sunny one in West Hampstead, and the kitchen arrangements are all on the same floor as the living-rooms, which saved us many steps. One of Aunt Jane’s orders was, “Always have something hot for the boys’ dinner,” and she gave me a list of dishes I could prepare in the morning, and leave them to “cook for themselves.” The list was as follows. _Stewed Steak._—Put into your stew-pan a piece of dripping, two or three onions cut up, two or three carrots (according to size), lay your steak on the top of these, till all is a nice brown. Take all from the stew-pan and place in a brown jar (previously heated), add a few peppercorns, a pinch of spice, ginger, and three cloves, add sufficient hot water or stock to cover the meat, cover tightly, and leave in a cool oven for two or three hours. Before serving, strain off the gravy, thicken it with flour, heat to boiling in a saucepan. Put steak on dish and pour the gravy over. In preparing this dish our mistakes were—once we allowed it to cook too quickly, so that it was too hard; another time we cooked it too slowly, so that it was not done enough. We learnt that with all stews they must come to _nearly_ boiling point, then put back just far enough to keep them from boiling. _Haricot Mutton._—Cook as above. _Steak Pudding, Steak Pie._—Beef steak answers perfectly for all these. _Canadian Steak Puddings._—Cut up two pounds of steak into a pie-dish; pepper and salt freely. Pour on water just to cover steak. Take two ounces of suet, shred very fine; the crumb of a small loaf rubbed through a sieve. Mix together, moisten with milk, add two eggs well beaten, pour over the steak, and bake for two or three hours. This was a great favourite. _Curries._—Aitch-bone of beef stewed in the same manner as the steak, but not removed from the pan it is first put into. This requires stewing from four to five hours. When possible use weak stock instead of water, as it makes nicer soup for the following day.