King's Holiday Fun Recipes --- stressing fun

The Little Red Hen

The Little Red Hen lived in a large barnyard. She spent almost all of her time
walking about the barnyard in her pecketty-pecketty fashion,
scratching everywhere for worms and little treats.
 

She really loved fat, delicious worms and felt they were absolutely
necessary to the health of her children. As often as she found a worm
she would call "Chuck-chuck-chuck!" to her chickies.

When the chicks were gathered about her, she would distribute choice morsels
of her tid-bit. A busy little body was she!

A cat usually napped lazily in the barn door, not even bothering
herself to scare the rat who ran here and there as he pleased. The cat preferred to dream without doing any real work. And as for the pig who lived in the sty --- he did not care what happened so
long as he could eat and grow fat and have plenty of mud in which to relax.

One day the Little Red Hen found a beautiful brown Seed. It was a Wheat Seed, but the
Little Red Hen was so accustomed to bugs and worms that she supposed
this to be some new and perhaps very delicious kind of meat. She bit
it gently and found that it resembled a worm in no way whatsoever as
to taste although because it was long and slender, a Little Red Hen
might easily be fooled by its appearance.

She carried it about showing it to all who would look, she made many inquiries as to what it might be. She soon found it was a Wheat Seed and that, if planted, it would grow up and
when ripe it could be made into flour and then into a fine loaf of delicious bread.

When she discovered that it had to grow, she knew it ought to be planted. She was so
busy hunting food for herself and her family that, naturally, she thought she ought not to take time to plant it.

So she thought of the Pig -- upon whom time must hang heavily and of the
Cat who had nothing to do, and of the great fat Rat with his idle
hours, and she called loudly:

"Who will plant the Seed?"

But the Pig said, "Not I," and the Cat said, "Not I," and the Rat
said, "Not I," and both a horse and a cow standing nearby said, "Not 1."

"Well, then," said the Little Red Hen, "I will."

And she did.

Then she went on with all of her daily work through the long summer days,
scratching for worms and feeding her chicks, whilst the Pig grew fat,
and the Cat grew fat, and the Rat grew fat, and the Wheat grew tall
and ready for harvest.

So one day the Little Red Hen chanced to notice how very grown and large the Wheat
was and that the grain was ripe and plentiful, so she ran about calling briskly:
"Who will cut the Wheat?"

The Pig said, "Not I," the Cat said, "Not I," and the Rat said, "Not
I." The cow and the horse had no interest either.

"Well, then," said the Little Red Hen, "I will."

And she did.

She got the sickle, which is for cutting things like wheat,  from among the farmer's tools in the barn and proceeded to cut off all of the big plant of Wheat.

On the ground lay the nicely cut Wheat, ready to be gathered and
threshed, but the newest and yellowest and downiest of Mrs. Hen's
chicks set up a "peep-peep-peeping" in a loud fashion,
proclaiming to all, but most particularly to their
mother, that she was neglecting them and that they wanted to eat.

Poor Little Red Hen! She felt quite bewildered and hardly knew where
to turn.

Her attention was sorely divided between her duty to her children and
her duty to take care of harvesting the Wheat, for which she felt responsible.

So, again, in a very hopeful tone, she called out, "Who will thresh
the Wheat?"

But the Pig, with a grunt, said, "Not I,"
and the Cat, with a meow, said, "Not I," and
the Rat, with a squeak, said, "Not I."
The horse and the cow did not even glance at her.

So the Little Red Hen, looking, it must be admitted, rather
discouraged, said, "Well, I will, then."

And she did.

Of course, she had to feed her baby chicks first, though, and when she had
gotten them all to sleep for their afternoon nap, she went out and
threshed the Wheat. Then she called out: "Who will carry the Wheat to
the mill to be ground?"

Turning their backs with snippy glee,
that Pig said, "Not I,"

and that Cat said, "Not I," and that Rat said, "Not I."

The horse and the cow napped on, not interested at all.

So the good Little Red Hen could do nothing but say, "I will then."
And she did.

Carrying her  sack of Wheat for which she had worked very hard, she trudged off to the distant mill. There she requested that the Miller grind  the Wheat ground into beautiful white flour. When the Miller brought her the flour she walked slowly back all the way to her own barnyard in her own pecketty-pecketty fashion.

She even managed, in spite of her load, to catch a nice juicy worm now
and then and had one left for the babies when she reached them. Those
fun little yellow fluff-balls were very glad to see their mother and, for the
first time, they really appreciated her and all that she did for them.

After this really tiring  day, tiring because she had worked very hard,  Mrs. Hen retired to her slumbers earlier than usual --- indeed, before the evening colors came into the sky to
herald the sun set time, her usual bedtime hour.

She would have liked to sleep late in the morning, but her chicks,
joining in the morning chorus of the hen yard, drove away all hopes of
such a luxury.

Even as she sleepily half opened one eye, the thought came to her that
to-day that Wheat must, somehow, be made into bread.

She was not in the habit of making bread, although, of course, anyone
can make it if he or she follows the recipe with care, and she knew
perfectly well that she could do it if necessary.

So after her children were fed and made sweet and fresh for the day,
she hunted up the Pig, the Cat and the Rat.

Still confident that they would surely help her some day she sang out,
"Who will make the bread?"

Alas for the Little Red Hen! Once more her hopes were dashed! For the
Pig said, "Not I,"

the Cat said, "Not I," and the Rat said, "Not I."

So the Little Red Hen said once more, "I will then," and she did, saying, "I'll do it myself!"

Feeling that she might have known all the time that she would have to
do it all herself, she went and put on a fresh apron and spotless
cook's cap. First of all she set the dough, as was proper, and the yeast gave it a wonderful aroma. When it was time she brought out the moulding board and the baking tins, moulded
the bread, divided it into loaves, and put them into the toasty oven to bake.
All the while the Cat sat lazily by, giggling and chuckling.

And close at hand the vain Rat powdered his nose and admired himself
in a mirror.

In the distance could be heard the long-drawn snores of the dozing
Pig.

And, for no reason, the horse and the cow came to stand near the oven where the smell of the baking bread was very rich indeed.

At last the great moment arrived. A delicious odor was wafted upon the
autumn breeze. Everywhere the barnyard citizens sniffed the air with
delight.

The Red Hen ambled in her pecketty-pecketty way toward the source of
all this excitement.

Although she appeared to be perfectly calm, in reality she could only
with difficulty restrain an impulse to dance and sing, for had she not
done all the work on this wonderful bread?

Small wonder that she was the most excited person in the barnyard!

She did not know whether the bread would be fit to eat, but --- joy of
joys! --- when the lovely brown loaves came out of the oven, they were
done to perfection.

Then, probably because she had acquired the habit, the Red Hen called:
"Who will eat the Bread?"

All the animals in the barnyard were watching hungrily and smacking
their lips in anticipation, and the Pig said, "I will," the Cat said,
"I will," the Rat said, "I will." And, of course, the horse and cow said they would.

But the Little Red Hen said,

"No, you won't. I will for I did all the work and you would not help!"

And she did.

The Little Red Hen and her chicks enjoyed every bite of the wonderful bread.

And that evening, in a secret place, the Little Red Hen put away enough Wheat seeds for her family and enough to share with others if they cared to grown their own wheat.

As the Little Red Hen was drifting off to sleep, she suddenly thought to herself, how wonderfully wise God's plan was to arrange things so that a very few seeds could feed a great many people year after year without too much hard work. After all, she had recently heard that the seeds on just one small ear of Corn could produce enough Corn to feed everyone on the whole farm year after year.

"Thank You, God, for all the Angels and all the Seeds" she said. She thought to herself next year, perhaps, I will grow Corn as well as Wheat. 

Thinking to herself, "I'm glad I did" she drifted off to sleep, her tummy full of delicious warm bread.

This version of the Little Red Hen is just one of many versions.

Introduction
 

Homemade Piggy Pudding Traditional (Pork)
 

King's Original Piggy Pudding
 

Homemade Piggy Pudding (Beef)
 

Homemade Gigantic Popover
 

Easy Fast Homemade Apple Cobbler
 

Quick Chicken Dumplings
 

Texas Cornbread Treat
 

Eggnog Toast Rescue
 

White Water Wilderness Chili
 

Micki's Hershey Pie to Die For
 

No Fail Easy Drop Biscuits
 

Easy 500 Degree Bird

Little Red Hen
 

Figgy and Piggy Pudding Lyrics
 

More Free Recipes
 
 

Homemade Piggy Pudding Traditional (Pork)
 

King's Original Piggy Pudding
 

Homemade Piggy Pudding (Beef)
 

Homemade Gigantic Popover
 

Easy Fast Homemade Apple Cobbler
 

Quick Chicken Dumplings
 

Texas Cornbread Treat
 

Eggnog Toast Rescue
 

White Water Wilderness Chili
 

Micki's Hershey Pie to Die For
 

No Fail Easy Drop Biscuits
 

Figgy and Piggy Pudding Lyrics