1831.] [ 17 ] 



FKKXCH COOKERY. *^ 



We have seldom seen a good article on cookery ; and we confess that 

 ■we undertake the task " with fear and trembling." Whether we shall 

 " work out our salvp.tion" or not, it must be the special province of the 

 reader to judge. In order to write on the pleasures of the table, a man 

 must be " a diner-out of the first magnitude ;" and that in itself is an 

 acquisition of no mean moment : for be it understood that the dignity of 

 dining-out is conferred only on much the fewer number of those that 

 masticate. 



Various, indeed, are the acquirements, and happy must be the tem- 

 perament, of that man who is formed to be the idol of all good society. 

 In order to be a receiver of dinner himself, it is needful that he should 

 be a giver of dinners to others ; and this imparteth ease, comfort, and 

 all the accessoires which rank, money, and an acquaintance with the 

 best society, can confer and communicate. But, independently of these 

 adventitious aids of fortune, he who wishes to be a choice " Amphy- 

 trion," must be most bounteously endowed, both by art and nature. 

 From art he may teach the theory and practice of procuring and serving 

 a good dinner ; but he must " snatch a grace beyond the reach of art," 

 and comport himself with ease, affability, and good-breeding. 



To the science of a Eeauvilliers, he must add the graces of a Greve, 

 the wit of a Sheridan, and the cai'eless but playful levity of a Hamilton 

 or a Killigrew. Nor is this enough. With the gay he must be thought- 

 less, and with the grave severe. To the one he must needs urge, with 

 all the weight and gravity of argument, the pleasures and advantages of 

 a " piece de resistance ;" while to the other he is bound to enumerate 

 the more ephemeral and spirituel beauties of a vol au vent, or a pate de 

 Creves. 



In the canons of cookery, " one false step" (like the first error of 

 woman) " entirely damns" one's " fame ;" and he who takes salt with 

 his soup, eats with his knife, or " discusses" the leg of a woodcock, 

 must thereafter be prepared to be excluded from all civilized society, 

 in consequence of such capital atrocities against the code gourmand " in 

 that case made and provided." 



Hence the difficulties and dangers with which critics in cookery are 

 beset. It is no easy matter, as our publisher knows, to get " gentlemen 

 at ease" into harness ; and it is still more difficult to enlist those " sol- 

 dats du table," who seldom or ever become " soldais de plume" — com- 

 monly called story-tellers, sometimes led-captains, gentlemen en-tout, 



and anon jack-puddings. 



Of a truth, your fellows who " set the table in a roar" are a most lazy 

 tribe. They live no doubt on the " fat of the land," and, like Savage, 

 they tliink they are not born for the ignoble purpose of ministering to 

 their own necessities. Write they will not, because it is a labour — to 

 beg they are ashamed ; but they are resolved at all hazards to eat and 

 drink. 



Of what purpose to society, however, are their feastings and junket- 



* Code Gourmand ; Paris, 1828 and 1829.-Physiologie du Gofit; Paris, 1829 

 and 1830— Cusinier Rovale; Paris, 1829.— Cuisine IJourgeoise ; Paris, 1809; and 

 24th edition, 1830. 



M.M. AV/r .S'mw—VoL.XII. No. 67. D 



