This, then, was my preparation for a life of cooking. Possibly you will think that I took my profession too seriously; possibly you do not hold the same high opinion of the art of cooking that I have always held—there are many so minded. It is a never-failing source of wonder to me that men are so quick to recognize the services of those who feed their minds and so slow to acknowledge the debt they owe to those who feed their bodies. I have never regarded cooking in the light of mere manual labor. Labor, it seems to me, is work that is distasteful and only performed from necessity; a “labor of love” seems to me to be a paradox. Work, on the contrary, may be as keen a source of pleasure as recreation. Work may be the striving of an artist to attain his ideal. The very word “labor” suggests pain and exhaustion. We speak of an author’s “works,” but who would think of referring to them as his “labors”?
I do not believe, as many seem to believe, that any man or woman who can juggle a skillet or wield an egg-beater is a cook. Merely to follow a formula in a cookery book does not make one a cook any more than the compounding of a prescription makes one a physician. Cooking is an art as well as a science. The violinist can not express his personality in the strains of his instrument more fully than can the cook in his cooking. The favorite dishes of a race are characteristic of that race. The Spaniard, like his chili con carne and his tamale, is hot, peppery and economical. The Frenchman, like his many concoctions, is full of spice, imagination and extravagance. The Italian is indolent and averse to exertion, as is evidenced by his macaroni and spaghetti. The Englishman is red and hearty like his roast beef. The German is fat and fair like his sausages. The Russian is odd and interesting like his caviar. The American, like his diet, is cosmopolitan. And as the cooking of a nation or race is characteristic of that nation or race, so the cooking of an individual is characteristic of that individual. Coarse people do not prepare dainty dishes. A cook may strike a discord as surely as a musician.
To be a good cook, a cook worthy of one’s calling, one must have the soul of an artist. One must be clean, self-respecting, industrious, ambitious, earnest, quick to learn and trained to remember. Do other professions require more?
The cook wields a tremendous influence for good or for evil. Over a good dinner the most cynical or the most brutal man must relax into something like human kindness. It is indeed true that
“All human history attests
That happiness for man,—the hungry sinner!—
Since Eve ate apples, much depends on dinner!”
If there be even the feeblest spark of charity in a man’s breast, a good dinner will fan it into flame. A bad dinner, on the other hand, will bring to the surface all that is mean and ignoble in his nature. Indigestion, I surmise, has been the cause of most of the cruelty of men. Viewing history in this light, it is easier to understand the apparently wanton slaughter among barbarians. Fed upon ill-conditioned food, the barbarian is attacked in his most sensitive part—his stomach. He is upset, distrait; his nerves are set upon edge and he knows not what ails him. He grows irritable and quick to anger, and he wrecks his unreasoning and unreasonable spleen upon the first convenient victim. It is to be observed that the science of cookery and the progress of civilization advance together. Well-fed men are slow to wrath and easily appeased. At the height of the Roman civilization the Romans became epicures and ceased to be warriors. War has no charms for the man who is at peace with his own stomach.
It may be urged by some that cooking, in rendering a man unwarlike, does him an ill service because it makes him effeminate. But the same may be said of all the cardinal virtues except, perhaps, bravery. Forbearance, loving kindness, gentleness, faith—all these and many others are essentially feminine virtues. Nay, civilization itself is a feminizing influence. Under our modern civilization, which as far as we know is the highest the world has ever experienced, men are reduced to the condition of dependents. Men no longer rely upon their personal prowess and valor for redress for their injuries or the defense of their natural rights. The law has become the protector of men, just as men were once the protectors of women. And this feminizing influence of civilization is, I take it, a wise provision of Providence for the benefit of cookery. The less men are concerned with battle, murder and sudden death, the more they are concerned with their dinners; and the more solicitous they become for their dinners, the more they desire the safety of the home, the peace of nations and the prosperity of mankind—all things, in short, which help to make possible the Perfect Dinner, perfectly chosen, perfectly cooked and perfectly eaten.
I say “perfectly eaten” because it seems to me that there is an art of eating as well as an art of cooking. It is said that a musician does his best when playing before an appreciative audience; and so the cook is at his best when cooking for an appreciative diner. It is a discouraging thing for an actor to peep out from behind the drop-curtain and see the pit all but empty of spectators; but it is a heart-breaking experience for a cook to peep through the swinging doors of his sanctum sanctorum and to behold the diners distant and indifferent, this one idly chattering and that one buried in a late edition of a newspaper, while his delicious soups, his super-excellent omelets, his heart-warming coffee, his inspiring steaks and his magnificent pâtés grow cold and unpalatable upon the unregarded plates! To see one’s chef-d’œuvres treated as hors-d’œuvres—that is a tragedy of the soul!