Combination.— The union of various ma terials often produces a more palatable food than any one would give alone. Association, custom and appetite have much to do with de ciding whether certain combinations are har monious or otherwise. Saffron, tansy, asafetida, decayed fish powder and hosts of other strange flavorings do not appeal to us, although highly prized by other nations. Pies, supposed to be filled with delectable compounds, but out of which dwarfs sprang and danced, and black birds sang, pleased our ancestors; and surprise is still a pleasant element in cookery. But it is not pleasant to find the biscuit which was sup posed to be sweet with the nutty flavor of the wheat redolent with alkali.
Literature is replete with legends of the ac cidental discovery of the improved flavor found in a bit of the forbidden flesh on the altar, of fish rescued from burning seaweed, of bread made lighter with a portion of left-over dough, and many others which led to new ways of preparing food. The most fanciful legend seems credible when we remember the many times in one's own experience when accident or necessity has led to new combinations. Scien tific proportion, correct measurement, thorough mixing and sufficient judgment to allow for e °total depravity of inanimate things)) are needed to ensure uniform results. So to blend mate rials that they will develop °what ingenious cooks the relish is the fundamental prin ciple of cookery, for °all foods are tasteless till that makes them good?' It is the undesirable combinations of the odors from the different foods in the ovens and kitchens of many hotels and restaurants that makes the unsatisfied boarder long for home cooking.
- The, Belgians, Swiss and Austrians are said to have best acquired the art of retaining in a high degree in each food its full essence, aroma and properties, so that each dish has no odor or flavor from another. It is said one of the Roman epicures had a separate cook and sepa rate kitchen for each dish.
Too much time and thought are given to the making of new combinations merely to gratify the desire to excel one's neighbors in one's luncheon. This causes great nervous strain and physical fatigue, and imposes upon the guests a deal of unnecessary work for their digestive organs in the undoing of these combinations.
Manipulation.-- For the manualpart of cookery, tools • and utensils are needed, which if wisely selected will not oblige one to say with Telemachus, Lend me, I pray you, the sauce pans In which you boiled your beans.— Timodes.
That cook is fortunate who has the strength and endurance needed for the back-and arm aching parts of the work, and still more fortu nate if she possesses the deftness of hand and keen sense perception of the culinary artist; for we cook by the senses of touch, smell and hearing, as truly as by sight and taste. And
those for whom she cooks are happy indeed if she 'knows how to apply heat (see Methods) in the way that food will yield the greatest amount of nutriment in the shape best fitted for the body to assimilate it, as otherwise much food will be wasted in the cooking and wasted in the body.
Decoration.— This is the last step in the manual part of cookery, but an important one, for °the imagination should be fed when we feed the body, they should both sit at the same table?) Those who labor with the larger muscles are usually sufficiently hungry to eat whatever is clean and wholesome; but the non hungry person, or one who works with the small muscles of the hands or eyes, needs the stimulus which the senses of sight, smell and taste send to the stomach, to arouse his sense of hunger. This class of persons increases as civilization advances. There are some foods which if one ate them blindfolded would satisfy the mouth and the stomach would not demur. The nose rebels at Camembert, but the mouth approves. The eye should not be pleased and the tongue offended, but all these agate tenders of the stomach) should agree in ap proval, if we would derive the best effect from our food. The tendency of the modern cook to make superfluity of garnishing conceal both merit and defect in material is to be deplored. Simplicity in design, harmonious blending of color and material, enhancing rather than dis guising the individuality of each dish, with the least expenditure of money and labor, are most to be desired, and make of this indeed a fine art.
To tyke some meat that some one else has bought And then to dress it tolerably, is What any cook can do.
A perfect cook is quite another thing, For there are many admirable arts.
And of all of these he must be thorough master. Who would excel in this. He first must have A smattering of painting and indeed Many the sciences which he must learn Before he's fit to think of cookery.—Nickoatackses Cookery as a Science.— But little thought was given to this aspect of cookery by the ancients; probably more among the Greek than among other nations, for the Greeks wor shipped Hygeia, the goddess of health, anc lived on coarse foods, barley bread, oil and wine. Wheat was called the °marrow of man" and °running, fatigue, hunger and thirst" were their seasonings. Cookery attained a high de gree of development during the Attic Age. The following quotations show that the Greeks understood the qualifications of a cook, and the effect of heat and water on food; and the third hints that our kitchen maids of to-day were not the first cooks who hurried up the fire with oil.