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Guide to Marketing and Cooking

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Physiology of Taste

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Milk Butter Cheese Eggs Vegetables

Hans Christian Andersen . American Fairy Tales . Grimm's Fairy Tales

Aesop's Fables - Tales with Morals . Mother Goose . Mother Goose in Prose

THE FOURTH DAY

THE Colonel was certainly the most severely critical member of the
company.  Up to the present juncture he had been sparing of
censure, and sparing of praise likewise, but on this day, after
lunch, he broke forth into loud praise of the dish of beef which
appeared in the menu.  After specially commending this dish he went
on--

"It seems to me that the dinner of yesterday and to-day's
lunch bear the cachet of a fresh and admirable school of cookery.
In saying this I don't wish to disparage the traditions which have
governed the preparation of the delicious dishes put before us up
to that date, which I have referred to as the parting of the ways,
the date when the palate of the expert might detect a new hand upon
the keys, a phrase once employed, I believe, with regard to some
man who wrote poetry.  To meet an old friend, or a thoroughly
tested dish, is always pleasant, but old friends die or fall out,
and old favourite dishes may come to pall at last; and for this
reason I hold that the day which brings us a new friend or a new
dish ought to be marked with white chalk."

"And I think some wise man once remarked," said Sir John, "that
the discovery of a dish is vastly more important than the discovery
of a star, for we have already as many stars as we can possibly
require, but we can never have too many dishes."

"I was wondering whether any one would detect the variations I
made yesterday, but I need not have wondered, with such an expert
at table as Colonel Trestrail," said the Marchesa with a laugh.
"Well, the Colonel has found me out; but from the tone of his
remarks I think I may hope for his approval.  At any rate, I'm sure
he won't move a vote of censure."

"If he does, we'll pack him off to town, and sentence him to dine
at his club every day for a month," said Lady Considine.

"What crime has this particular club committed?" said Mrs.
Sinclair in a whisper.

"Vote of censure! Certainly not," said the Colonel, with an angry
ring in his voice.  Mrs. Sinclair did not love him, and had
calculated accurately the carrying power of her whisper.  "That
would be the basest ingratitude.  I must, however, plead guilty to
an attack of curiosity, and therefore I beg you, Marchesa, to let
us into the secret of your latest inspiration."

"Its origin was commonplace enough," said the Marchesa, "but in a
way interesting.  Once upon a time--more years ago than I care to
remember--I was strolling about the Piazza Navona in Rome, and
amusing myself by going from one barrow to another, and turning
over the heaps of rubbish with which they were stocked.  All the
while I was innocently plagiarising that fateful walk of Browning's
round the Riccardi Palace in Florence, the day when he bought for a
lira the Romana homocidiorum.  The world knows what was the outcome
of Browning's purchase, but it will probably never fathom the full
effect of mine.  How do his lines run?"

                                            "These
    I picked the book from.  Five compeers in flank
    Stood left and right of it as tempting more--
    A dog's-eared Spicilegium, the fond tale
    O' the frail one of the Flower, by young Dumas,
    Vulgarised Horace for the use of schools,
    The Life, Death, Miracles of Saint Somebody,
    Saint Somebody Else, his Miracles, Death and Life."

"Well, the choice which lay before me on one particular barrow was
fully as wide, or perhaps wider than that which met the poet's eye,
but after I had espied a little yellow paper-covered book with the
title La Cucina Partenopea, overo il Paradiso dei gastronomi, I
looked no farther.  What infinite possibilities of pleasure might
lie hidden under such a name.  I secured it, together with the
Story of Barlaam and Josaphat, for thirty-five centesimi, and
handed over the coins to the hungry-eyed old man in charge, who
regretted, I am sure, when he saw the eager look upon my face, that
he had not marked the books a lira at least.  I should now be a
rich woman if I had spent all the money I have spent as profitably
as those seven sold.  Besides being a master in the art of cookery,
the author was a moral philosopher as well; and he addresses his
reader in prefatory words which bespeak a profound knowledge of
life.  He writes:  'Though the time of man here on earth is passed
in a never-ending turmoil, which must make him often curse the
moment when he opened his eyes on such a world; though life itself
must often become irksome or even intolerable, nevertheless, by
God's blessing, one supreme consolation remains for this wretched
body of ours.  I allude to that moment when, the forces being spent
and the stomach craving support, the wearied mortal sits down to
face a good dinner.  Here is to be found an effectual balm for the
ills of life:  something to drown all remembrance of our ill-
humours, the worries of business, or even family quarrels.  In
sooth, it is only at table that a man may bid the devil fly away
with Solomon and all his wisdom, and give himself up to an earthly
delight, which is a pleasure and a profit at the same time.'"

"The circumstances under which this precious book was found seem to
suggest a culinary poem on the model of the 'Ring and the Book,"'
said Mrs. Sinclair, "or we might deal with the story in practical
shape by letting every one of us prepare the same dish.  I fancy
the individual renderings of the same recipe would vary quite as
widely as the versions of the unsavoury story set forth in Mr.
Browning's little poem."

"I think we had better have a supplementary day for a trial of the
sort Mrs. Sinclair suggests," said Miss Macdonnell.  "I speak with
the memory of a preparation of liver I tasted yesterday in the
kitchen--one of the dishes which did not appear at dinner."

"That is rather hard on the Colonel," said Van der Roet; "he did
his best, and now, see how hard he is trying to look as if he
didn't know what you are alluding to!"

"I never in all my life--" the Colonel began; but the Marchesa,
fearing a storm, interfered. "I have a lot more to tell you about
my little Neapolitan book," she went on, "and I will begin  by
saying that, for the future, we cannot do better than make free use
of it.  The author opens with an announcement that he means to give
exact quantities for every dish, and then, like a true Neapolitan,
lets quantities go entirely, and adopts the rule-of-thumb system.
And I must say I always find the question of quantities a difficult
one.  Some books give exact measures, each dish being reckoned
enough for four persons, with instructions to increase the measures
in proportion to the additional number of diners but here a rigid
rule is impossible, for a dish which is to serve by itself, as a
supper or a lunch, must necessarily be bigger than one which merely
fills one place in a dinner menu.  Quantities can be given
approximately in many cases, but flavouring must always be a
question of individual taste.  Latitude must be allowed, for all
cooks who can turn out distinguished work will be found to be
endowed with imagination, and these, being artists, will never
consent to follow a rigid rule of quantity.  To put it briefly,
cooks who need to be told everything, will never cook properly,
even if they be told more than everything.  And after all, no one
takes seriously the quantities given by the chef of a millionaire
or a prince; witness the cook of the Prince de Soubise, who
demanded fifty hams for the sauces and garnitures of a single
supper, and when the Prince protested that there could not possibly
be found space for them all on the table, offered to put them all
into a glass bottle no bigger than his thumb.  Some of
Francatelli's quantities are also prodigious, as, for instance,
when to make a simple glaze he calls for three pounds of gravy
beef, the best part of a ham, a knuckle of veal, an old hen, and
two partridges."

  Menu -- Lunch

  Maccheroni al sugillo.  Macaroni with sausage and tomatoes.
  Manzo in insalata.  Beef, pressed and marinated.
  Lingue di vitello all'Italiana.  Calves' tongues.

  Menu -- Dinner.

  Zuppa alla Modanese.  Modenese soup.
  Merluzzo in salamoia.  Cod with sauce piquante.
  Pollastro in istufa di pomidoro.  Stewed chicken with tomatoes.
  Porcelletto farcito alla Corradino.  Stuffed suckling pig.
  Insalata alla Navarino.  Navarino salad.
  Bodino di semolino.  Semolina pudding.
  Frittura di cocozze.  Fried cucumber.