in order to help fatten them quickly. Welsh hill-farms used goose feathers for bedding, while large goose feathers would be used in the kitchen for sweeping the hearth. Smaller wing feathers would be used for brushing flour or oatmeal while baking. Goose meat was also used in cawl and Michaelmas Goose, or Gwydd Mihangel, is a recipe where the goose is boiled in water with a bowlful of chopped onions, salt and pepper and thickened with oatmeal. The thick fatty broth was popular during cold weather. Goose cawl also formed part of the feast given by a farmer to his tenants when they paid their rents. Vegetables The potato has been a staple vegetable in Wales since its introduction and a number of interesting recipes have developed as a result. Potato Harvest Pudding (Poten Ben Fedi), for example, is a traditional Sunday supper dish made during late September and October, once the potato harvest had been collected and stored Another traditional dish is Roast Potatoes and Bacon (Tatws Rhost a Bacwm), which would be cooked in the pot oven (or ffwrn fach) over the fire until cooked. The combination of potatoes with bacon is a traditional one in Welsh cuisine, where the relative blandness of the potato is counter-balanced by the saltiness and fat of the bacon. If potato was not available, cabbage would take the place of potatoes to give a Bacon and Cabbage dish (Cig Moch a Chabaits), with the cabbage being cooked in the liquor of the bacon or a boiling ham. Although leeks are closely connected with Wales, Freeman notes that there are few recipes specifically made for them. At one time they were the only member of the onion family that grew throughout Wales and thus merited a mention in the Laws of Hywel Dda, together with the cabbage. One notable dish is Pastai Cennin (Leek pasty) which combines leeks with a shortcrust pastry. Cawl is a soup or broth that was an important dish throughout Wales and would traditionally be eaten with a special cawl-spoon. This was made of wood to avoid burning the mouth on the hot broth. Traditionally, the broth of the cawl would be drunk first and the meat and vegetables eaten second. This is similar to the French dish pot-au-feu, which cawl closely resembles. These days cawl is eaten all at once, although the use of a hand-carved wooden cawl