Mary F. Henderson

“ In fact, let no one hesitate about giving dinners without any wine at all. Proper respect for conscientious scruples about serving wine would forbid a criticism as to the propriety of serving any dinner without it. Such dinners are in quite as good taste, and will be just as well appreciated by sensible people; and it makes very little difference whether people who are not sensible are pleased or not.
If three wines are served, let them be a choice sherry with the soup, claret with the first course after the fish, and Champagne with the roast. ”

“ The reason why cooking in America is, as a rule, so inferior is not because American women are less able and apt than the women of France, and not because the American men do not discuss and appreciate the merits of good cooking and the pleasure of entertaining friends at their own table; it is merely because American women seem possessed with the idea that it is not the fashion to know how to cook ”

“ When you invite a person to a family dinner, do not attempt too much. It is really more elegant to have the dinner appear as if it were an every-day affair than to impress the guest, by an ostentatious variety, that it is quite an especial event to ask a friend to dinner. Many Americans are deterred from entertaining, because they think they can not have company without a vulgar abundance, which is, of course, as expensive and troublesome as it is coarse and unrefined. ”

“ There, men could dine, like gentlemen and Christians, upon all the friandises of the French kitchen, much cheaper and far more wholesomely than at their own tables upon the tough, half-sodden fibres of the national roast and boiled, or on the hazardous resources of hash, gravy soup, and marrow puddings. ”

“ It is preferable to have the dinner a short one than a minute too long. If one rises from a fine dinner wearied and satiated, the memory of the whole occasion must be tinged with this last impression. ”

“ Every one thinks she can make so simple a dish as that of mashed potatoes; but it is the excellence of art to produce good mashed as well as good boiled potatoes. In fact, I believe there is nothing so difficult in cookery as to properly boil a potato.
To mash them, then, first boil them properly. Put into a hot crock basin, which can be placed at the side of the fire, half a cupful or more of cream, a piece of butter the size of an egg, plenty of salt and pepper, and let them get hot. One of the secrets of good mashed potatoes is the mixing of the ingredients all hot. ”

“ The different arrangements of meat-balls and croquettes, with tomato, cream, apple, or brown sauces, are delicious when they are freshly and carefully made.
As there are hundreds of delicious breakfast dishes, which only require a little attention and interest to understand, how unfortunate it must be for a man to have a wife who has nothing for breakfast but an alternation of juiceless beefsteak, greasy and ragged mutton-chops, and swimming hash, with unwholesome hot breads to make up deficiencies! ”

“ What agrees with one is quite unsuccessful with another. Different kinds of diet can only be tested. Children’s little illnesses are often the result of food which, in their case, is unassimilating and indigestible; and it is often better to attempt a change of food than to resort to medicines.
City babies generally thrive poorly with cow’s milk. Some can stand it, however, diluting it with a third water, adding a slight thickening of rice, well boiled and mashed, and also a little sugar. Others thrive well on goat’s milk, when no other kind will answer. ”

“ By frying fish I mean that it is to be immersed in hot lard, beef drippings, or olive-oil. Let there be a little more fat than will cover the fish; otherwise it is liable to stick to the bottom and burn. Do not put in the fish until the fat is tested, and found to be quite hot. If the fat were not hot enough, the fish would absorb some of it, making it greasy and unwholesome. If it is hot enough, the fish will absorb nothing at all.
To prepare fish for frying, dredge them first with flour; then brush them with beaten egg, and roll them in fine or sifted bread, or cracker crumbs. ”

“ If there is a fillet of beef to be baked and served with a mushroom-sauce, have the fillet in the baking-pan already larded, the mushrooms in the basin in which they are to be cooked, at the side; also the piece of lemon and the spoonful of flour ready. The stock will be in the kettle at the back of the stove. By-the-way, in giving a fine dinner, there should always be an extra stock-pot, separate from the soup, at the back of the stove, as it is excellent for boiling the sweet-breads or the macaroni, and making the sauces, etc. ”

“ A roux is a mixture of butter and flour cooked. It is generally added, uncooked, to thicken a sauce or a soup; but the flavor is much better if it is first cooked, and the sauce or soup is added to it. Professional French cooks always manage it in this way. When the butter is first brought to the boiling-point, in a small stew-pan or cup, the sifted flour is sprinkled in, and both are mixed well together over the fire with an egg-whisk, until the flour is well cooked; a part of the sauce or soup is then stirred in until it becomes smooth and thin enough to add to the main sauce or soup. ”

“ From innate coquetry alone the French women appreciate the powers of their dainty table. Cooking is an art they cultivate. Any of the haut monde are proud to originate a new dish, many famous ones doing them credit in bearing their names. ”

“ With much experience in hotel life, where turkeys are ruined by the wholesale, I have never seen a piece of turkey that was fit to eat. Besides being tasteless, they are almost invariably undercooked. First, then, after the turkey is dressed, season it well, sprinkling pepper and salt on the inside; stuff it, and tie it well in shape; either lard the top or lay slices of bacon over it; wet the skin, and sprinkle it well with pepper, salt, and flour. It is well to allow a turkey to remain some time stuffed before cooking. Pour a little boiling water into the bottom of the dripping-pan. ”

“ When some rice is cooked in a steamer with milk, and is still hot, add a little butter, sugar, and one or two eggs. Butter a plain pudding-mold, strew the butter with bread-crumbs, and put in a layer of rice half an inch thick; then a layer of peaches, and continue alternate layers of each until the mold is full. Bake this for about fifteen or twenty minutes in an oven; when done, turn the cake out of the mold, and pour in the bottom of the dish a boiled custard-sauce flavored with wine, or any thing preferred. ”

“ The Southern negro cooks have certainly the best way of cooking spring chickens, and the manner is very simple. Cut them into pieces, dip each piece hastily in water, then sprinkle it with pepper and salt, and roll it in plenty of flour. Have some lard in a sauté pan very hot, in which fry, or rather sauté, the chickens, covering them well, and watching that they may not burn. When done, arrange them on a hot dish; pour out the lard from the spider, if there is more than a tea-spoonful; throw in a cupful or more of milk, or, better, cream thickened with a little flour ”

“ Let the mother or the wife prepare them with her own hands; let her never ask an invalid what he will have to eat, but with thought and ingenuity strive to vary the bill of fare each day, always providing proper nourishment. This is an art in itself which can be delegated to no one. It is worth as much to the suffering and beloved patient as is the medical prescription of the physician. ”

“ Procure a round steak, spread over it a layer of almost any kind of force-meat. An ordinary bread, onion, thyme, or parsley dressing, used to stuff turkeys, is very good. Begin, then, at one end of the steak, and roll it carefully; tie the roll to keep it in shape. Bake it in the oven as you would a turkey, basting very often. Make a gravy of the drippings, adding water, flour, and a little butter mixed; season with pepper and salt, strain, skim off the fat, and pour it around the meat when served. ”

“ Any one who fancies can cook a little pig, not I.
The pig should be three weeks old, well cleaned, and stuffed with a dressing of this proportion: Two large onions, four times the quantity of bread-crumbs, three tea-spoonfuls of chopped sage, two ounces of butter, half a salt-spoonful of pepper, one salt-spoonful of salt, and one egg. Or it may be filled with a veal force-meat stuffing, if preferred; or, it may be stuffed with hot mashed potatoes. Sew it together with a strong thread, trussing its fore legs forward and its hind legs backward. Rub the pig with butter, flour, pepper, and salt. ”

“ If the animal is young and large, and the meat is of clear, bright-red color, and the fat white, the meat is sure to be tender and juicy.
There is no better sauce for a good, juicy roast of beef than the simple juice of the meat. Horse-radish sauce may be served if the beef is not particularly good.
If a sauce is made by adding hot water, flour, pepper, and salt to the contents of the baking-pan after the beef is cooked, do not serve it with a half-inch depth of pure grease on top in the sauce-boat. ”

“ Would you, with a falconer’s voice, lure your faithless tassels back again?{33} Apply to the practical remedy of your wrongs; proceed to the reform of your domestic government, and turn your thoughts to that art which, coming into action every day in the year during the longest life, includes within its circles the whole philosophy of economy and order, the preservation of good health, and the tone of good society—and all peculiarly within your province. ”

“ Chickens are roasted and boiled as are turkeys. In winter there is no better way of cooking chickens than to boil them whole, and pour over them a good caper or pickle sauce just before serving. A large tough chicken is very good managed in this manner. Of course, the chicken should be put into boiling water, which should not stop boiling until the chicken is entirely done. With this management it will retain its flavor, yet the water in which it is boiled should always be saved for soup. It is a valuable addition to any kind of soup. The cut represents a chicken in a bed of rice. ”

“ Charcoal is a bad conductor of heat. The overtoasted surface is nothing more or less than a thin layer of charcoal, which prevents the heat from penetrating through the bread. Neither will butter pass through the hard surface: it will remain on it, and if exposed to heat, to melt it in, it will dissolve, and run over it in the form of rancid oil. This is why buttered toast is so often unwholesome.{68}”
Dixie Biscuit (Mrs. Blair) .
Mix one tea-spoonful of salt into three pints of flour; put one tea-cupful of milk, with two table-spoonfuls of lard, on the fire to warm. ”

“ A fine breakfast dish was of kidneys (5 cents) . Few Americans know how to cook kidneys, and butchers often throw them away; yet in France they are considered a great delicacy.
Their répertoire of cheap dishes was large; so there was always a change for, at least, each day of the week. A crumb of bread was never wasted. All odd morsels were dried in the oven, pounded, and put away in a tin-box, ready for breading cutlets cut from any pieces of mutton or veal, and for many other purposes.
Any pieces of suet or drippings were clarified and put one side, to be used for frying. ”

“ Never use a choice steak for a stew. Stewing is only a good way of cooking an inferior steak. The meat from a soup-bone would make a very good stew.
Put ripe tomatoes (peeled and cut) into a stew-pan; sprinkle over pepper and salt. Let them cook a little to make some juice; put in the pieces of beef, some little pieces of butter mixed with flour, two or three cloves, and no water. Let it stew until the meat is quite done. Then press the tomatoes through a sieve. ”

“ Zest (sugar rubbed on fresh lemon-peel) is an exceedingly delicate flavoring. The vanilla powder boiled in the milk is better than the extract.
It makes a pretty dish to pour this into cups or little molds, and, when cold and solid, to arrange them in a circle or, according to taste, on a platter, with strawberry, grape, or any kind of fruit sauce, or whipped cream poured into the bottom of the dish; or, mold it in a circular form, and pile up any kind of berries in the centre, with or without whipped cream. For an invalid I prefer the other receipt for “a corn-starch pudding.” ”

“ Just before dinner each day, in order to prepare soup, it is only necessary to cut off some of the jelly and heat it. It is very good with nothing additional; but one can have a change of soup each day by adding different flavorings, such as onion, macaroni, vermicelli, tomato, tapioca, spring vegetables (which will make a julienne) , poached eggs, fried bread, asparagus, celery, green pease, etc. I will be explicit about these additions in the receipts. Stock is also valuable for gravies, sauces, and stews, and for boiling many things, such as pigeons, chickens, etc. ”

“ Some fashionable ladies have the reputation of having very fine lunches—chops, chickens, oysters, salads, chocolate, and many other good things being provided; and others, just as fashionable, have nothing but a cup of tea or chocolate, some thin slices of bread and butter, and cold meat; or, if of Teutonic taste, nothing but cheese, crackers, and ale, thus reserving the appetite for dinner. ”

“ When tomatoes are so abundant, it is unpardonable that one should never serve a tomato sauce with a beefsteak, and a score of other meat dishes.
For a chicken or a lobster salad, learn unquestionably the sauce Mayonnaise.
In the thickening of sauces, let it be remembered that butter and flour should be well cooked together before the sauce is added, to prevent the flour from tasting uncooked. In butter sauces, however, only enough butter should be used to cook the flour, the remainder added, cut in pieces, after the sauce is taken from the fire. This preserves its flavor. ”

“ Boiled fowl, with a white sauce, is a favorite English dish, and very nice it is if properly prepared.
Frying.
Frying means cooking by immersion in hot fat, butter, or oil. There is no English word for what is called frying in a{44} spoonful of fat, first on one side, and then on the other. Sauté is the French word, and should be Anglicized. Ordinary cooks, instead of frying, invariably sauté every thing. Almost every article that is usually sautéd is much better and more economical fried; as, for instance, oysters, fish, birds, cutlets, crabs, etc. ”

“ Vanilla Ice-cream.
Beat the yolks of eight eggs with three-quarters of a pound of sugar until very light. Put one and a half pints of rich milk on the fire to scald, highly flavored with the powdered vanilla-bean (say, one heaping table-spoonful) . When the milk is well scalded, stir it into the eggs as soon as it is cool enough not to curdle. Now stir the mixture constantly (the custard pan or pail being set in a vessel of boiling water) until it has slightly thickened. Do not let it remain too long and curdle, or it will be spoiled. ”