A guide to modern cookery / by Mary Harrison ; with a preface by Sir Thomas Dyke Acland.

  • Harrison, Mary.
Date:
1905
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: A guide to modern cookery / by Mary Harrison ; with a preface by Sir Thomas Dyke Acland. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    or science; and so long as it is considered possible that English women can learn cookery in a few weeks, or even months, after they leave school, instead of it forming part of their education while at school, so long will they remain far behind the French, and other nations who have brought cookery to any degree of perfection. It is a popular fallacy, that although what are considered the higher branches of cookery may require some con- siderable practice, plain cookery, as it is called, may be quickly and easily acquired. Such a misapprehension arises from ignorance of the subject. It certainly does not take long to acquire a smattering of any subject, but a thorough knowledge of good plain cookery is by no means easily acquired, and certainly was not considered so by Brillat Savarin, who says : “ Cookery is an art, but to roast requires genius.” To cook well requires experience; and that only comes after much practice. “ Progress,” it has been truly said, “ of the best kind is comparatively slow.” These remarks, however, are not intended to discourage those who, realizing the immense importance of good cookery in sanitary and social reform, have now really but little time io devote to its study. A little knowledge of any useful subject is better than none, so long as it is thorough. A little clear, definite knowledge of even the most simple process of cookery will be found of value. But there should be no building without foundations. “ It is better,” said Mr. Smiles, “ to accomplish perfectly a small quantity of work, than half-do ten times as much.” In studying cookery, begin by obtaining a thorough grasp of the first principles and fundamental operations. Until this is done no satisfactory progress can be made. On the importance of the study of first principles I quote the author of that most interesting work, ‘ Kettner’s Book of the Table,’ but what he calls “ the soul of a cook,” I should be inclined to call reasoning power. Ho says : “ If a man or woman has not the soul of a cook, the most minute recipes will only end in failure. Sganarelle is made to say by Muiitre, ‘ roti, bouilli-mdme chose; ’ and it is a literal verity that there aro persons pretending to be cooks who aro as ignorant as Sganarelle, and who cannot tell what is the essential peculiarity of roasting.