The Colfax chronicle. [volume] (Colfax, Grant Parish, La.) 1877-1981, 1899-12-16
COOKING AS AN ART.
Power for Good In Every
Home.

Home.
In olden times women OF noble birth
and princely heritage did not despise
cooking as an art. In its primary
sense, an art is any acquired skill or
power. The narrow meaning given the
word in modern times has no founda-
ton so far as its derivation can be
traced. In its powerful effect on the
health and physical strength, and thus
upon the entire well being of man, the
art of cooking must be regarded as one
of the most useful of all arts. No wise
person, man or woman, can afford to
despise cooking. Like spinning and
sewing, cooking has always been es-
pecially woman's task. 1t was suited
to her strength and taste for dealing
with minutiae. Wise men and women
have always recognized the immense
power for good or evil that lies in the
food of people and in its preparation.
In primitive times, when war was the
chief business of men, they had no
time to prepare food, and it was then
left exclusively to women. with other
tasks of the household. Even the art
of medicine was practiced in those days
chiefly by women.
Cooking in olden times was an art
for queens to attend to and supervise.
The old rhymes speak of the housewife
ly skill of princesses with skillets and
saucepans, as though it were the most
important part of their business, as.
indeed, it was. No woman in old chiv-
alrous times hid her culinary skill for
fear she would be considered a mental
If she displayed it. Like the queen of
hearts in the nursery tale, she made
her own tarts and bag buildings, super
the preparation of venison pasties and
other substantial dishes.
The art of cooking does not, as some
ambitious young women of to-day seem
to imagine. lie chiefly in preparing or
namental dishes. The woman who
builds pyramid of sugar icing. decor
ated in the most dazzling and elaborate
manner. may know nothing of cook
ing. In its best sense it implies the
knowledge of the most wholesome,
most enticing. as well as the most ex-
peditious, methods of preparing the
best foods of various kinds. There is
failure in every method of cooking
food that requires an undue expendi-
ture of time. 1t is necessary to an at
tractive table that there should be a
variety of food, and it is also neces-
sary to maintain the highest health.
1t is not often possible to spend a con-
siderable amount of. time on one dish
without neglecting others; therefore it
is necessary that we learn to cook ex-
peditiously, or in such a manner as
not TO absorb too much attention dur
ing the time taken. The highest art
of cookery also demands the prepare
ton of food in such a manner that there
shall be the least loss of nutriment.
In cooking meats there is probably less
loss of nutritive parts in broiling and
in roasting than in any other ways of
cooking. This is also the way the prim-
| tive man cooked the fruits of the chase.
and it is the best and most natural
| method of preparing meats. In both
processes, which are analogous, The
meat is or should be subjected to a
fierce heat first on one side and thcn on
the other. This sears over the surface
and forms brown crust on the out
side. The meat is then withdrawn a
| little from the heat and cooked through
more slowly. The difference between
the roast and the broil is in the greater
thickness of the meat in a roast. which
| requires to be more often basted to
keep its surface from hardening OF
| burning in the cooking. We do not
mean baked meat or roast. The oven
| is a modern method, and the objection
to it is the same as the objection to
''panning" a beefsteak, that is, frying
it without grease" in a pan. 1t dries
the meat and does not give as juicy a
steak. The presence of air around the
roast keeps it more moist. The WON
an skilled in cooking must know this
and thousand and one other things
which only an intelligent woman car
know and apply. The common hireline
cannot learn to do the best cooking
n. Y. Tribune.