Practical gastronomy : French menus, or the complete menu compiler and register of dishes

Preface

The ever-growing necessity for variety in our menus impels us to glean new ideas and fresh help from every possible source.

The object, therefore, of this culinary handbook is to assist managers, chefs and housekeepers to compile menus of every kind of meal with greater ease, and to enable them to have at their disposal a large and constant variety of seasonable and suitable dishes.

Every course, from hors-d’oeuvre to dessert, has been exhaustively treated ; and the work is compiled so as to give at a glance an almost infinite variety of every possible kind of dish that can be introduced into a menu.

In most cases the requisite mode of cooking, the garniture and style of dressing or dishing up, is briefly described. The book should not, however, be confused with a book of recipes, for its raison d'etre is to enable those who can cook or superintend cooking to draft menus and give each dish its proper French name.

The adoption of French names in menus has become fashionable because most of the typical French dishes are now fully naturalised in the kitchens and on the tables of this country. It therefore becomes the duty of all persons interested in culinary matters to know how to describe them in correct French.

The author can hardly expect that this book will bring about a revolution in the customs of gastronomy, but he does hope that its use will be the means of introducing greater variety into the daily menus, and, if possible, economy in the preparation of dishes. Hence its mission should, if for no other purpose, prove practical and useful to those who avoid ordinary cookery books and fight shy of scientific culinary treatises. If such an aim is achieved the author’s efforts will be amply rewarded.

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