The French people have a wonderful talent for making good dishes out of nothing, and for using everything to the utmost. Years ago, a writer in Blackwood, speaking of French Home Life, maintained that the nation as a rule was too wise as well as too poor to be extravagant. But then, “ the “ French nation, poor and saving as it is, requires that each dish “ shall be itself, with its full aroma, its full essence, its own “ character. The nation knows, by long experience, that poverty “ does not prevent the exercise of skill ; it sets the latter off “ against the former — it replaces money by intelligence. . . . “ In France, the phrase Good Cookery has a meaning that we do “ not know. It signifies something more than cunning variety, “ skilful handling, and pretty serving-up. The deepest sense of “ the two words lies in the possession by every plat of the “ particular taste which is proper to it.” But, as a French gentle- man said to an old friend of mine, “ En Angleterre on se nourrit bien, mais on ne dine pas.” The motto of the French cook is “ Cuisiniez doucement” — that is, never use a bigger fire than is wanted. The French use wood, which is easily kept down to a low smoulder and easily roused up to activity in five minutes. They know nothing of our fierce coal fires, which alas ! are often kept as ready to roast an ox as to boil a tea-kettle. The French cook, again, boils nothing but the harder vegetables. Our English boiling is well described by the writer in BlacJnvood. ‘ ‘ What we call ‘ boiling ’ is one of the “ most senseless acts to which human intelligence can descend; “it is an inexcusable, unjustifiable, wanton folly. ... To “ boil food, be it meat or be it vegetable, is to extract from it, “ first, its volatile aroma, then its essences and juices, and finally “ its power of nutrition. Aroma, essence, juice, and strength go “ into the hot water, leaving behind them the fibre which they “ have quitted.” In England this liquid is too often looked upon as dirty water, only fit to be thrown down the sink, or at the best ENGLISH AND FRENCH COOKERY 449 “ as hot water stirred with a tallow candle,” which may perhaps be swallowed by the pigs. In France, on the contrary, “ every “ liquid which has received the extracted flavour of a boiled “ substance is looked upon as precious, and is employed again in “ some special form, so as not to waste the properties which it “ has acquired.” If only English cooks would in this follow the example of homely French cooks (not the chefs who come over here) they would cease to be the “ food-spoilers ” which the writer in Blackwood declares that they become after half a lifetime spent in the kitchen — the result of a contemptibly incomplete education in the use and value of the materials they employ.

AI-modernized reading of the original text

The French people have a wonderful talent for making good dishes out of nothing, and for using everything to the utmost. Years ago, a writer in Blackwood, speaking of French Home Life, maintained that the nation as a rule was too wise as well as too poor to be extravagant. But then, “ the “ French nation, poor and saving as it is, requires that each dish “ shall be itself, with its full aroma, its full essence, its own “ character. The nation knows, by long experience, that poverty “ does not prevent the exercise of skill ; it sets the latter off “ against the former — it replaces money by intelligence. . . . “ In France, the phrase Good Cookery has a meaning that we do “ not know. It signifies something more than cunning variety, “ skilful handling, and pretty serving-up. The deepest sense of “ the two words lies in the possession by every plat of the “ particular taste which is proper to it.” But, as a French gentleman said to an old friend of mine, “ En Angleterre on se nourrit bien, mais on ne dine pas.” The motto of the French cook is “ Cuisiniez doucement” — that is, never use a bigger fire than is wanted. The French use wood, which is easily kept down to a low smoulder and easily roused up to activity in five minutes. They know nothing of our fierce coal fires, which alas ! are often kept as ready to roast an ox as to boil a tea-kettle. The French cook, again, boils nothing but the harder vegetables. Our English boiling is well described by the writer in Blackwood. ‘ ‘ What we call ‘ boiling ’ is one of the “ most senseless acts to which human intelligence can descend; “it is an inexcusable, unjustifiable, wanton folly. ... To “ boil food, be it meat or be it vegetable, is to extract from it, “ first, its volatile aroma, then its essences and juices, and finally “ its power of nutrition. Aroma, essence, juice, and strength go “ into the hot water, leaving behind them the fibre which they “ have quitted.” In England this liquid is too often looked upon as dirty water, only fit to be thrown down the sink, or at the best “ as hot water stirred with a tallow candle,” which may perhaps be swallowed by the pigs. In France, on the contrary, “ every “ liquid which has received the extracted flavour of a boiled “ substance is looked upon as precious, and is employed again in “ some special form, so as not to waste the properties which it “ has acquired.” If only English cooks would in this follow the example of homely French cooks (not the chefs who come over here) they would cease to be the “ food-spoilers ” which the writer in Blackwood declares that they become after half a lifetime spent in the kitchen — the result of a contemptibly incomplete education in the use and value of the materials they employ.

Mrs. Roundell's Practical cookery book