The present work has no pretensions to be a complete book on Cooking, but is simply a series of papers (which originally appeared in Cassell’s Magazine ) in which the endeavour has been, to impart a certain amount of useful knowledge of the Art of Cooking, by giving recipes at greater length than would be possible in any ordinary Cookery Book. Ordinary Cookery Books, though of the greatest utility, are, like dictionaries, seldom if ever read through. In the present work, which contains all the i

“We had such an awful time of it with Mary Ann!” Probably, never have the domestic trials and difficulties of young housekeepers been summed up in fewer or more expressive words. However, the more we look into the world, the more we find it to be the case that we make our Mary Anns, and not our Mary Anns us. It is a good old saying that the master makes the man; equally true is it that the mistress makes the maid. Let each of our readers pause for an instant, and look round mentally among his re

There is perhaps no word so little understood, or rather so misunderstood, as the word “economy.” Just as there is a vulgar and popular impression that political economists are a hard-hearted, selfish class, so domestic economy is too often regarded as a synonymous term for meanness and want of hospitality. Conversely, too many are apt to confound extravagance with liberality. Economy in regard to money has been defined as “the judicious use of money.” So in cooking economy simply means the judi

The importance of such a subject as the one I have now taken in hand is apt to be much underrated. Many a starving family could be fed from the wasted superabundance which falls, in too many cases, not only from the rich man’s, but the comparatively poor man’s table. There is no extravagance so disastrous as the extravagance of ignorance. It is perhaps as difficult to define precisely where hospitality and comfort end, and extravagance begins, as it is to define where economy ends and meanness b

A few years ago the leading comic journal of the day had the following graphic little sketch:—A middle-aged gentleman, leaving his house-door in the morning, inquires— “What is there for dinner to-day, Mary?” “Cold mutton, sir.” “Then you can tell your mistress that she need not wait dinner for me.” Now, although this sounds exceedingly selfish, yet perhaps the blame is not entirely due to one side only. There can be no doubt that, just as among the lower orders there are hundreds of wives who,

I fear that as a nation taste is not our forte . I wonder, too, if there is any French expression that would fully convey the idea, “Wanted, a good plain cook.” Wanted, a woman who can convert joints of raw meat into some state sufficiently intermediate between blueness and cinders as to render them eatable, and who also can make certain plain puddings, more or less heavy, as the case may be, but who has no more conception of artistic taste than a cabbage, and would be as incapable of making a d

There are, perhaps, few meals that in this country vary more than breakfasts; and, indeed, it is not possible to draw any exact line between the hospitable and heavy Yorkshire breakfasts, including the huge game pie, and draughts of home-brewed strong ale at its finish, and the feeble breakfast consisting of thin dry toast and cup of tea, which with many is the limit of nourishment they can take early in the day. There can, however, be no doubt that a good breakfast is very conducive to good hea

However strange may appear the statement, yet we have no hesitation in saying that one of the greatest steps ever made in economy in giving dinner-parties was the introduction into this country of the dinner à la Russe . It will be our endeavour in the present article both to prove and illustrate this point by contrasting a small dinner-party of thirty or forty years ago with a modern one. As we have already remarked, our observations are intended to apply to those whose status in society may be

The Christmas season is essentially one for parties—Christmas parties—those happy gatherings where old and young meet together for mutual enjoyment, and where the presence of children forms an excuse for grown-up people to enjoy a round game, or look on at feats of legerdemain with as much enjoyment as a middle-aged, grave-faced Frenchman feels when going slowly round on horseback on a roundabout. Perhaps if we were all of us at times more childlike we should be none the worse for it, especially

Perhaps no season in the year is more eagerly welcomed than that of spring—earth’s great annual resurrection from death unto life! How beautiful the first really spring morning! A warm, balmy air, a deep blue sky without a cloud, and bright sun lighting up like diamonds the water-drops on the fresh green grass, o’er which the feathery cobwebs drift for the first time in the year, the very spiders, in their wondrous instinct, preparing to set their houses in order, to welcome to their hearts the

“It is almost too hot to eat.” How often do we hear this remark during what is popularly known as the dog days! There is no doubt that as a nation we do not make sufficient allowance for the variations of our climate, and are too apt to feed ourselves and children on almost the same food both in summer and winter. The hotel waiter will give exactly the same answer both in July and December: “Dinner, sir—yes, sir—chops, sir—steak—cutlet,” and he stops, having exhausted the English bill of fare. B

There can be no doubt that the last ten or fifteen years have witnessed, if not a revolution, at any rate a very great change in the domestic habits of the middle classes of this country. Persons nowadays drink wine every day who twenty years back looked upon a glass of port after a Sunday’s early dinner as a rare luxury. There are probably more cases of champagne consumed in a month now than bottles in a week of the time of which we speak. In many households we regret to see brandies-and-sodas

There are perhaps few months that test the cook’s art more than that of August; and not only the cook, but the housekeeper, must exercise some little tact, in order to avoid the waste that too often ensues from heat and thunderstorms. We live in so variable a climate that housekeepers are at times apt to forget that, though in winter a haunch of mutton will hang for a month, and be all the better for it, yet there are occasional days on which meat that has been killed in the early morning is bad

What subject is so suitable for early summer? Who has not at times experienced that strange and almost painful feeling that must exist in the throat in order that the sensation may be worthy of the name of “thirst?” I recollect many years ago either hearing or reading a horrible story of the refinement of cruelty. A prisoner is supposed to have been lowered into a deep dungeon, and to have been left for a whole day without food. Ravenous with hunger, what are his feelings on seeing the dungeon-t

Once again has that season come round in which earth appears to be most lavish in her gifts to men. In our own country may be seen miles of ground on which rich golden grain waves in the autumn sun, waiting for the reaper’s hook, while in the present age, when the iron horse almost annihilates both time and distance, within a few hours’ journey from our shores may be seen that glorious sight where the earth seems reeling with rich purple profusion soon to be converted into the wine that “cheeret

There can be no doubt that we live in an exceedingly variable climate, and for by far the greater part of the year we suffer neither the extreme of heat nor cold. Still we have at times our hot July or August days, when the English summer, which is often described as consisting of three hot days and a thunderstorm, vies with almost any heat that can be met with in the whole continent of Europe. Fortunately for the present season of the year, we are, as a nation, far better prepared to resist the

There is something sacred in the very name of home to every true-born Englishman, and, as we should naturally expect from the hallowing influence of this holy season of the year, home seems doubly sacred on Christmas Day. How many thousand families throughout the land are united but once a year! what efforts, too, do some make, so that on their great annual holiday they may once again find shelter under the old and loving parental wings! But let us this year anticipate the day’s festivities, and

There can be no doubt but that the season of Christmas is especially associated with eating and drinking. The most approved English method of exhibiting “goodwill towards men,” is by asking them to dinner. How many families there are with poor relations, in one respect resembling Christmas itself: they only come but once a year! The hallowing influence of this holy season may be seen in all classes. The haughty relax somewhat of their pride, and have what is called quite a family party—often the

We have discussed the subject of wedding breakfasts, which are so similar to nice little suppers that we were unable, when so doing, to give many practical recipes; but we will endeavour to make amends on the present occasion, and will commence by blowing our own national trumpet, by maintaining that we English, in cooking fish, beat the French as completely as they beat us in the making of entrées. There is ofttimes a connection between wedding breakfasts and fish dinners. It has often happened

My chapter on wedding breakfasts must not consist in simply saying, Don’t have one; though I must in the name of common sense enter my protest against the vulgarity—for it is nothing else—of giving one out of proportion to the means of the giver. Where money is no object, of course the simplest plan is to go to some first-rate confectioner’s, and let them supply the breakfast at so much a head. Where, however, economy is a necessity, much can be done with a little good management to avoid waste.

The sick-room—what echoes does not the very name awaken in the memories of the past! There are few moments in our lives’ history more solemn than those when we have watched by the bedside of one we love, whose life is trembling in the balance, and whose soul and body seem held together by so slight a thread that a breath of wind would part them. What vows have we not vowed, what good resolutions have we not formed, and how chastened have our minds been in these our hours of agony! for of very tr