Helena weekly herald. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1867-1900, 1883-12-20
COOKERY IN AMERICA.
Miss ParIOa Declares 1t Still AbOmi-
nabIe, but Improving.
New York Star.

Miss Maria PaTloa reOpened her school OF
! cookery Monday. About seventy pupils
were present, and she expects to have a
class OF about one hundred, besides her nu-
merOus private and Out-ot-tOWn classes.
| Her FIRST lecture was on that grossly neg
/ lected article in American cOOkery-SOup.
| A part of the time the instructor stood by
the side of a fire kitchen range and gave
/ practical demonstrations. The kinds OF
soups treated on were consomme, bOuillOn,
glaze, cOnsomme a la royale, cOnsOmme
with maccarOni and with rice and julienne
soup. To the Star reporter Miss Parloa
said:
II always try to impress upon my classes
the importance of knowing how to make a
good soup. The ignorance of our people
in this respect results in an enormous waste
of material that might be made available.
How seldom do we see an American house
keeper purchasing or ordering portions from
the necks and legs of animals? And yet
those are the best parts of the whole car
cass for making good soups. If our house
wives paid more attention to making soups
our people would eat more bread, and they
would be healthier and wealthier at the
same time. But no! when woman
most expensive part, and it makes no
difference whether she is the wife of a
millionaire merchant or of day laborer
Our people are naturally very proud, and
nobody wants to he caught doing anything
on cheap scale. l am doing what can
to overcome this feeling, and | am begin
ming with the rich. | know that if the
rich people will take the lead by copy
ing the French in this matter the poorer
classes will follow"
DO you think the American people
are making much progress in the art of
cookery"
"As a general thing the cooking in our
American kitchens is still quite abomin-
able. 1t is simply amazing TO see how
ignorant the majority of our housekeepers
are in this matter. How often will you
find woman who knows how to boil
piece of corned beet, for example? 1t will
come upon the table as tough as leather,
and if You try to cut it with an ordinary
knife you only tear it. And then, in so
simple but important a matter as cooking
rice! Why, have scarcely found single
lady who knows how to do it."
do you attempt anything in the way of
TEACHING your pupils the relative value of
foods-the cereals, for example, as COM
pared with meat and green vegetables?"
Il know the cereals, such as rice, peas,
wheat beans, ETC., contain very large per-
centages of nutriment as compared with
meat and green vegetables, but don't 60
as far as some in insisting upon them as
principal articles of food. I know that
good many scientific men tell us that really
there is very little nutriment in beef as
compared with some other things; but
then it seems to me their theories are
always changing, and until | am much
more strongly convinced / shall stick to
meat. | believe that meat contains stim-
ulating property that very few, if any
other, kinds of food have
From what classes of people do most
of your pupils Gomez"
From the best. l have several private
classes in this city. These are generally
gotten up by young ladies from families
which have brains as we'll as wealth. |
will mention no names, but one of my
classes last year was headed by the daugh
ter of an ex-Secretary of State, and another
by the daughter of one of the wealthiest
merchants of Murray Hill. These young
ladies are generally very intelligent and
make rapid progress. l also have large
evening school in AZ street for people who
have not the time or the means to Join the
private classes"
do you think that the American people
will in time rival the Europeans in the
culinary art?"
"They will surpass them, and at no very
distant period