"You appear to be cooking without my help to-day," said Mrs. Herbert, smiling, as she looked round and saw what had been done.
"No, ma'am. I have finished all I know," said Mary.
"Then let me tell you a little more. Broiling is a very convenient way of cooking meat, because it is very quick, and it makes meat very tasty and very wholesome. I should like you to understand it, therefore. It is only suitable, however, for small things, such as chops, and steaks, and kidneys, and fish. To-day we will broil a steak."
"The gridiron is greased ready, ma'am," interrupted Mary.
"Quite right. I am glad to see it, Mary. This should always be done. But now notice. This steak, though I call it small, is still cut fairly thick—it is nearly an inch thick. If it were cut in a thin slice, to broil it would make it hard and dry, and we wish it to be brown and well cooked on the outside, and tender and juicy inside. I wonder if you recollect what I said when we first began these lessons in Cookery about making a case on the outside of the meat to keep the goodness inside?"
"I recollect it quite well," said Mary.
"So do I," said Margaret. "We put the leg of mutton into boiling water for five minutes to cook the albumen on the outside of the meat, which is like white of egg, to form a sort of case; and when the case was formed we drew the meat back and let it simmer till it was gently cooked all through."
"Excellent, Margaret. I think my small pupils do me great credit. As in boiling meat we put the meat into boiling water, to harden the albumen, so in broiling meat we put the meat near a fierce heat to harden the albumen; and we turn the meat quickly so that the albumen may be hardened on one side as well as the other. Now you know what we have to do. Shall we begin?"
"Yes, please," answered the little girls, both together.
"You are quite ready? Because when once we have begun to broil we must not try to attend to anything else till we have finished."