COOKERY, the art and practice of preparing food mainly by means of heat. The various processes of roasting, toast ing, broiling, boiling, stewing, brewing, baking, grilling, braising, and frying, chemically or mechanically alter the con stituent elements of organic matter and make them more easily digestible. Thus vigorous boiling serves to loosen the fibers of cellulose which constitutes the largest constituent of vegetable food.
The art of cookery was carried to con siderable perfection among the Egpti ans, Persians, and Athenians. Extrava gance and luxury at table were notable features of Roman life under the em pire. Among moderns the Italians were the first to reach a high degree of art in this department. Their cooking, like that of the ancient Romans, is distin guished by a free use of oil. Italian cookery seems to have been transplanted by the princesses of the House of Medici to France, and was carried there to per haps the highest degree of perfection; even yet the skill and resource which the French cook shows in dealing often with very slight materials is a highly creditable feature in the domestic econo my of the nation. British cookery has
been mostly confined to simple, strong, and substantial dishes. Attempts have been made in many places to diffuse a knowledge of cookery more widely among the lower classes. Cooking classes 'have been organized in the public schools and regular cooking schools have met with great success. The philosophy of cook ery has a very limited literature. In the third, sixth, and tenth essays of Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford (1796), "The Chemistry of Cookery," by W. Mattieu Williams (1885); and the Cantor Lectures on "The Scientific Basis of Cookery," by the same author, the subject is treated as a branch of applied science.