Christine Terhune Herrick

“ Breakfast, the hardest meal of the day to many well people, is doubly difficult to one who must eat it in the same room where she has spent the night—perhaps many nights—of feverish restlessness, that has given her a detestation of the bed, the bedroom, and everything connected therewith, chiefest of all being the disgust with herself, the weary, distraught being with aching limbs, heavy head, and ill-tasting mouth. ”

“ No domestic sight is pleasanter in its way than a tea-table on a cold winter night, spread with a bright cloth and set out with dainty china and shining silver, and with all the cheer-inspiring appurtenances of the tea-tray; with the plate of hot bread, the savory dish of hot meat, and the little relishes that housekeepers know well how to supply. ”

“ Simple cookery, like roasting and boiling, is seldom successful unless one has the best materials to work with. But usually the woman who must economize is wealthier in time than in anything else, and she must make it take the place of money. Above all, she must struggle against the temptation to yield to weariness or discouragement, and to satisfy herself with the custom into which so many of her sisters drift, of cooking tough, inferior pieces of meat in the easiest way, as though they were "prime cuts," and thus endangering the teeth, tempers, and digestions of her family. ”

“ A PLEASANT feature of domestic life which is done away with by the late dinner is the family tea. This meal, always an informal one, used to give play to the housekeeper's fancy in the concoction of dainty dishes with which to render the repast more appetizing to the tired and hungry master of the home. Now, to be sure, she has lunches upon which to expend her culinary ingenuity; but then the person for whom she best loves to cater, her husband, is rarely at home. ”

“ The giving of a breakfast need not be a matter of dread to the hostess who has confidence in her cook and waitress. The menu suggested may be so modified or increased as to make it as simple or as elaborate as preference may dictate. A breakfast is a pleasant style of entertainment, for, while both sexes are admitted, as at dinner, there is not the formality of dress essential at that meal, the men appearing in morning coats, and the women in handsome high-necked and long-sleeved house or calling costumes. ”

“ IN hot weather a comfortable room is essential to the enjoyment of a meal. The salle à manger must be cleared of food, the soiled dishes removed, all crumbs brushed up, and the flies beaten out the moment breakfast is over, if the apartment is to be pleasant at noon. If blinds and doors are kept closed, the room may be deliciously cool and fresh by lunch-time.
With such surroundings, good digestion is much more prone to wait on appetite than in a stuffy, fly-infested room, where neither heat nor light is excluded. ”

“ THERE has been so much written about the giving of dinner-parties that the manager of a small household may well shrink in dismay from the labor that obedience to such rules would lay upon her. When she reads descriptions of tables spread with the most costly glass, silver, and china, of courses consisting of delicacies prepared from intricate directions, and served by three or four trained servants—her heart sinks with dismay, and she gives up then and there the attempt to entertain her friends at dinner. ”

“ FOR a long time there was a felt need for some form of entertainment that would be more general in its character than a dinner or a lunch, less of a full-dress affair than an evening party, and more elaborate than the ordinary kettle-drum or afternoon tea. ”

“ At the first glance it may seem harsh to exact the prompt appearance at the breakfast-table of the girl who has danced until after one o'clock in the morning, and whose head has not touched her pillow until an hour or two later. But the habit of self-indulgence fostered by such concessions, does the girl no good. Is it any harder for her to rise betimes than it is for the weary mother, whose domestic cares forbid her lying in bed? ”

“ The table should always appear at its best at breakfast-time. A colored cloth is economical as well as pretty, for it does not show every spot or splash with the readiness of a white cloth. There is a large variety of these table coverings from which the housekeeper may make her selections, ranging in beauty and price from the plain, comparatively cheap red cloth with light figures to the exquisite pieces of fine damask, gorgeous with embroidery, and with a lace-like border of drawn-work. ”

“ Upon the occasions when a young man escorted his "best girl" to the play or the concert, he took her afterwards, as a natural sequence, to a restaurant, where they partook of some such light refreshment as ice-cream, cake, and coffee, this style of supper being varied sometimes by the introduction of oysters in one form or another. But when a company of young people go to the theatre nowadays, and return afterwards to the house of their chaperon or of some other member of the party, they are usually hungry with the healthy appetite that it is no longer the foolish fashion to conceal. ”

“ Without going as far as one woman, who used to declare she would rather have a piece of china completely smashed than to see it cracked, one may safely say that the good housekeeper never perceives even a trifling breakage in any piece of her table-ware without a real pang at heart. ”

“ Decorated porcelain is cheap nowadays, and makes a table look extremely pretty. Each one of the household should have his own especial oatmeal set, either the bowl, plate, and pitcher, or one of the deep saucers that come for this purpose in dark blue and white ware, with a plate to match, while the cream or milk may be held for common use in one good-sized pitcher, to be served by the mother, or passed to each, as may seem best. Every tea or coffee drinker should have his own cup and saucer, and in his imagination his favorite beverage will taste better from that cup than from any other. ”

“ Casting aside the intimations respecting gossip or scandal as unworthy of notice, and tracing the animus of the other slurs to their source, in the overpowering jealousy on the part of their perpetrators that they are excluded from the select assemblages they affect to condemn, it may be said in refutation of the last charge that there are few women who do not agree in considering a luncheon among the most delightful of their social experiences. An invitation to one is usually hailed with joy, and a woman will undergo a good deal of inconvenience sooner than consent to decline it. ”

“ In some homes soup each day is considered an expensive [Pg 171] luxury. So it is when fresh meat must be purchased to make it, or even when fresh or canned vegetables have to be bought for it; but when there are bones or trimmings from raw or cooked meats, or vegetables left over—a half-can of tomatoes, a cupful or two of mashed potato, a saucer of pease, or other similar remnants—or when fish and eggs are plentiful, the soup need be but a small item in the expense, and is really economical, as, by blunting the edge of the appetite, it renders the attack upon the next course less vigorous. ”

“ One general principle may be laid down for the following of any woman who thinks of giving a large luncheon—don't undertake too much. If you cannot afford to engage the most difficult dishes from a caterer, be very sure that your cook is equal to preparing them in a satisfactory manner. Better have a few things, and have them well done, than a long menu of indifferently cooked viands. A large luncheon is no light undertaking at the best, except to those who have a practised chef and an expert butler, and a great deal of personal supervision is required to make it a success. ”

“ In summer it is comparatively easy, even in the city, to get a few blossoms every day or two; but in winter, with flowers at exorbitant prices, a single spray, renewed twice a week, is an extravagance which the housewife does not always feel she can afford herself. ”

“ The housekeeper who is compelled by circumstances to practise rigid economy must resolutely set herself to the study of cheap cookery. She may know already how to roast a "rib cut" of beef, how to broil a porterhouse steak, how to broil and fry tender chickens, but all this knowledge is of comparatively little value to her just now. She must learn instead how to braise, how to treat a "pot roast"; she must study stews, perfect herself in the manufacture of minces, hashes, fricassees, croquettes, fritters; she must know what vegetables and meats may be put together in utilizing "left-overs" ”

“ The housewife can hardly have too many doilies. Not only are they useful to put under finger-bowls, and to lay on cake and bread plates, but they are admirable to place under hot dishes, to lay between a scallop-shell and the plate, under pâtés, etc. And when the home mistress has enough of these, she may set to work to provide herself with carving-cloths, corn and biscuit napkins, and the many other pretty pieces of table linen that are always in demand.
There is very seldom a bride who does not receive enough small silver, such as forks and spoons, to supply her own table. ”

“ The good housekeeper enjoys seeing her culinary handiwork appreciated, and she generally reserves any especially tempting bonnes bouches for Sunday, when she knows that those for whom she delights to cater will have the time and inclination to give her cookery its meed of attention. Without cavilling at this, one must at the same time deprecate the amount of additional work that the Sunday dinner often involves upon what should be, both physically and spiritually, a day of rest as well as of refreshment. ”

“ In a private family it may be out of the question to cook a separate breakfast for each one, but a little forethought will enable the housekeeper to so arrange her menu that every one will have at least one dish to his or her taste. ”

“ The custom of having four or five vegetables at dinner appears rather absurd. Where there are only two courses, several kinds may be desired, but as a rule two vegetables, or at the most three, are quite enough. Only a few of these should ever be served in saucers. Even at the tables of people who ought to know better it is nothing unusual to see two or three or more small sauce-plates given to each person. One will contain pease, another tomatoes, another stewed corn, another pickles or jelly. ”

“ Every one who has read "Little Women"—and who has not read it?—will remember Meg and Jo March trudging off to their work on frosty mornings, each carrying the turnover that was to compose her lunch, and gaining comfort for the cold fingers from its warmth. ”

“ His dietary had always been so simple that she was at first puzzled to understand what could be the disturbing cause. After sundry experiments and careful observation, she finally ascertained that the discomfort and bad breath followed any unusual eating of sweets, although it might be only such simple desserts as bread and syrup, bread and jelly, plain cookies, or home-made sponge-cake, or even an infrequent lump of sugar. ”

“ A certain family who possess a delightful country place make their Sunday evening al fresco tea one of the pleasantest spots in the week. No one is present but the family and any guests who may be staying in the house. The pretty, simple meal is served out on the [Pg 262] grassy lawn, which slopes down to the water. When the eating is over, the maid comes out, gathers the dishes into a tray, and carries them back to the house, happy in the thought that there is no supper-table to be cleared and no dining-room to be brushed up. ”

“ After all this, when a table bearing an attractive breakfast is moved to the invalid's elbow, she is usually quite ready to partake of it.
In many cases it is out of the question for the patient to leave her bed, and then the coaxing of the appetite is a more difficult task. The very fact of being in bed seems to render eating almost an impossibility to some people. The woman who complained petulantly that everything she ate in bed tasted of the blanket and pillows, only voiced the sentiments of a multitude of her sisters. Among some women, breakfast in bed is esteemed a luxury ”

“ No one who had once beheld the spectacle could ever forget the fashion in which meals were conducted in a certain home where wealth and every evidence of outward refinement gave promise of better things. The father, a man of business from his sixteenth year, plainly considered eating the duty to be accomplished at the table, and quite ignored such minor considerations as the interchange of thought or observation, or any of the social features usually connected with the operation of dining. ”

“ One advantage at least is possessed by the basement dining-room in summer. In common with the cellar, or with any other partially subterranean chamber, it is cooler than one that is above ground and thus unprotected from the hot air without.
The best method of artificially lighting a dining-room is hard to decide. Nothing is [Pg 8] prettier or pleasanter than candle-light, and it is preferable to gas or lamps in that it does not heat a room perceptibly. But candles are expensive, if enough are used to produce a respectable illumination, and nothing is more dismal than eating by a dim light. ”

“ Here, as everywhere, upon the mother devolves the burden of the family well-being. If her face is cast down and gloomy, its reflection is seen in the countenances of all those about her; while if she is bright and sunny, there is a perceptible rise in the spiritual thermometer. ”