40 MORE POT-POURRI 



receipts not being exact enough. I had tried them all 

 myself, and with success, with several cooks, but I do 

 not deny they were intended for those who understood 

 cooking sufficiently to refer to more detailed books when 

 they felt themselves to be ignorant. I shall continue to 

 refer to * Dainty Dishes ' (by Lady Harriet St. Clair) as I 

 did before, and without it my receipts are incomplete. 

 Cooks differ very much in how they follow receipts. 

 Some try to do it literally, but without judgment as 

 regards increasing or decreasing quantities according to 

 the number for whom they have to cook. Other cooks 

 accept a receipt with the distinct conviction that their 

 own way is far the best, and naturally then the new 

 receipt does not turn out very satisfactorily. A good 

 many cooks carry out a receipt very well the first time, 

 and then think they know it by heart, and in a high- 

 handed way never look at it again. All this is where the 

 eye and the head of the mistress come in. Without 

 showing it she must know the peculiarities of her own 

 particular cook, and by gentle flattery lead her back into 

 the right way. As my excuse for a certain vagueness 

 in some of the receipts, I give them as they were given to 

 me, for I did not by any means invent them all. Even 

 when they are mine, I instruct the cook, but do not myself 

 cook. 



Some of my nieces scolded me for not putting the 

 receipt for my bread sauce in my last book, saying they 

 so seldom found it really good elsewhere. It is made in 

 every English kitchen, small and big ; and yet how very 

 rarely is it excellent, as it ought to be, and with what 

 horror is it viewed by foreigners ! 



Bread Sauce. It is very important that the bread 

 should be grated from a tin loaf, and allowed to dry in a 

 paper bag for some time before using it. It is absolutely 

 impossible to make good bread sauce with new bread. 



