Split in two some square sponge-cakes, which can be bought at the baker's for two cents each. Put a little butter in the chafing-dish. When it is hot put in the slices of cake, and brown them a little on both sides. Lay the slices on a plate, and spread each one with a layer of canned chopped pineapple. Turn the juice from the can into the chafing-dish. Moisten a teaspoonful of arrowroot with cold water, stir it slowly into the hot juice, and continue to stir until it becomes thickened and clear. Pour the sauce over the slices of spread cake. If more than a cupful of juice is used, add more arrowroot in proportion. Any kind of fruit, and slices of sponge cake or of brioche, can be used instead of the square individual cakes. Strawberries, raspberries, or peaches make good sweet canapés.
Fill the cups to be used about one third full of condensed milk; add a heaping teaspoonful of instantaneous chocolate, which is chocolate ground to a fine powder. Mix them well together; then fill the cup with boiling water, and stir until the chocolate and milk are dissolved. No sugar is needed, as the milk is sweetened to preserve it.
Yeast is a minute plant, and like other plants must have the right conditions of heat, moisture, and nourishment in order to live or to nourish. It will be killed if scalded, or if frozen, as any other plant would be; therefore, as we depend upon the growth of this little plant for raising our bread, we must give its requirements as much care as we do our geraniums or our roses. The yeast plant takes its nourishment from sugar. This is found in flour. It converts this sugar into carbonic acid gas and alcohol, and the pressure of this gas causes the mixture in which it is generated to become inflated, or to "rise."
[Illustration: FORMS OF GROWTH OF THE YEAST PLANT.]
In mixing bread, we put the yeast into warm (not hot) water; this we mix with flour, thus supplying the moisture and nourishment required. We put this mixture in a warm place to force the growth of the plant. When the dough has become sufficiently inflated we put it into the oven and raise the heat to a degree which kills the plant and fixes the air cells, and our bread is done.
In cities, where fresh compressed yeast can be obtained, it is not worth while to prepare one's own. Where this cannot be had, the dry yeast-cakes often give satisfactory results, but are not as reliable as a liquid yeast, which in the country it is often necessary as well as desirable to make.