HISTORY AND COOKERY 79 



Place the roots in boiling water and boil for about an 

 hour if the roots are young, or for about two hours 

 otherwise. When the roots are cooked, place them in 

 cold water and skin them. They may then be served 

 hot with butter, pepper and salt, or with gravy, or they 

 may be allowed to cool, and then sliced and served in 

 vinegar. 



Instead of being boiled, beetroot may be baked in the 

 oven, and in many ways this method is to be preferred. 

 The time required for baking is about the same as that 

 required for boiling. 



Carrots 



Although it was a valued and carefully cultivated 

 vegetable among the Greeks and Romans, and was 

 described as such by Theophrastus, Pliny and Dios- 

 corides, the carrot as an edible plant seems to have been 

 introduced into England by the Flemings only in the 

 sixteenth century. It very soon attained popularity, and 

 Shakespeare makes 'Dame Quickly describe it as "a 

 good root." 



The garden carrot was originally derived from the 

 wild species, Daucus Carota, which is a native of England. 

 It belongs to the order of umbelliferous plants, and from 

 its concave umbels of fruits has earned the popular name 

 of Bird's-nest. According to Parkinson, ladies in his 

 time were wont to use the graceful foliage of the carrot 

 as a decoration for their hats, in the same way as modern 

 ladies make use of feathers, or even — sad to say — of 

 wings of birds. Its use as a vegetable in England dates 

 from the sixteenth century, and Hanbury, in 1 77 1, 

 wrote that the carrot "is now become, by good culture, 

 a principal plant in the kitchen garden, and is one of the 

 most useful, beneficial, and profitable esculents at our 

 table." He refers to the then novel experiment, " the 



