The "Weekly Telegraph" cookery book : a common-sense book of instructions on good plain cookery.

Date:
[1890?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The "Weekly Telegraph" cookery book : a common-sense book of instructions on good plain cookery. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

    10/126 page 10
    kind and quantity of the ingredients. It cannot he too much insisted on that “ plain ’’ cookery requires as much care and as much skill as high-class cookery. The roast leg of mutton, done to a turn, with beautifully browned potatoes, is, in its way, as great a culinary triumph as a gigot de moutoii braise a la jardiniere. In this little manual we give directions and recipes for such dishes only as are generally considered to come under the head of plain cookery. Our aim has been to make it suitable for the mistress of the family, the cook, and the teacher of cookery. Not only would we beg our friends to study each recipe carefully before putting it into practice, but also to study the whole plan and method of cookery contained in the book. The two principles which the writer, in her long practical experience, has found to underlie all good work, are thorough- ness, and economy in the use both of time and materials, and she would impress on all who wish to be good cooks that the secret of success lies in the faithful applica- tion of these principles to the business .in hand. We are sure that there is no work so well worthy the earnest attention of the women of our day as the economical and skilful management of our food supplies. It IS to those who are anxiously seeking to promote the cause of good cookery that we commend this little book, in the hope that it may be helpful to them. MARY HOOPER. GOOD PLAIN COOKING. -■ CHAPIEE I. METHODS OF COOKING, ETC.. Roasting. A celebrated writer on cookery has said tl'.at there is so' great an art in roasting well that a cook must be born with a talent for it. However this may be, it is certain that only those persons who are thoroughly painstaking, and in the habit of observing not only the different weights of joints, but their quality, and the length of time they have been kept, can roast well. It is not, as is often supposed, the made dishes which te.st the skill of a cook; Iheu- pre- paration is far easier tlian roaijting a joint. Anybody who sends to table, not once in a way, but every day, a sirloin of beef, or a leg or a shoulder of mutton done to a turn, deserves to be considered a first-rate cook. No hard and fast rules will always apply to roasting; the circumstances of the case must be taken into account. When a groat cook was one day asked How long a turkey would take to roast? ” he replied, “Show me the turkey, the fire, and the cook, and I will tell you. Experience, then, must supplement all rules, but once having grasped the prin- ciples we have laid down, an intelligent an- ])lication of them will soon enable anyone to roast a joint of meat to perfection. There are now in general use three methods of roasting: — First, before an Open Range. Second, in the oven of a Closed Range. Third, in a Gas Oven. As to the first.—Many people consider that meat is best roa.sted before an open fire. This, however, is a matter of opinion and not of fact. One thing is, however, certain, it is by far the most troublesome method, and demands an extravagant ex- penditure of fuel. A large and bright fire must be ready when the meat is put down; and the great art of roasting well by this method is to maintain the fire thus during the whole proce.s!3—small pieces of coal being added from time to time to keep it up. It is always a good plan to use a hast- euer or metal screen, which must be bright, so as to radiate the heat, and to let it stand befoie the fii-e
    digitised image 1
    digitised image 2
    digitised image 3