“If the heat exceed a certain degree, the surface becomes first brown, and then scorched. In consequence of these changes, the muscular fibre becomes opaque, shorter, firmer, and drier; the tendons less opaque, softer, and gluey; the fat is either melted out, or rendered semi-transparent. Animal fluids become more transparent: the albumen is coagulated and separated, and they dissolve gelatine and osmazome.
“Lastly, and what is the most important change, and the immediate object of all cookery, the meat loses the vapid nauseous smell and taste peculiar to its raw state, and it becomes savoury and grateful.
“Heat applied through the intervention of boiling oil, or melted fat, as in FRYING, produces nearly the same changes; as the heat is sufficient to evaporate the water, and to induce a degree of scorching.
“But when water is the medium through which heat is applied—as in BOILING, STEWING, and BAKING, the effects are somewhat different, as the heat never exceeds 212°, which is not sufficient to commence the process of browning or decomposition, and the soluble constituents are removed by being dissolved in the water, forming soup or broth; or, if the direct contact of the water be prevented, they are dissolved in the juices of the meat, and separate in the form of gravy.”
Vide Supplement to Encyclop. Brit. Edin. vol. iv. p. 344, the article “FOOD,” to which we refer our reader as the most scientific paper on the subject we have seen.
[21-*] “Health, beauty, strength, and spirits, and I might add all the faculties of the mind, depend upon the organs of the body; when these are in good order, the thinking part is most alert and active, the contrary when they are disturbed or diseased.”—Dr. Cadogan on Nursing Children, 8vo. 1757, p. 5.
[22-*] “We have some good families in England of the name of Cook or Coke. I know not what they may think; but they may depend upon it, they all originally sprang from real and professional cooks; and they need not be ashamed of their extraction, any more than the Parkers, Butlers, &c.”—Dr. Pegge’s Forme of Cury, p. 162.
[22-†] It is said, there are SEVEN chances against even the most simple dish being presented to the mouth in absolute perfection; for instance, A LEG OF MUTTON.
1st.—The mutton must be good. 2d.—Must have been kept a good time. 3d.—Must be roasted at a good fire. 4th.—By a good cook. 5th.—Who must be in good temper. 6th.—With all this felicitous combination you must have good luck; and, 7th.—Good appetite.—The meat, and the mouths which are to eat it, must be ready for action at the same moment.
[23-*] To guard against “la gourmandise” of the second table, “provide each of your servants with a large pair of spectacles of the highest magnifying power, and never permit them to sit down to any meal without wearing them; they are as necessary, and as useful in a kitchen as pots and kettles: they will make a lark look as large as a FOWL, a goose as big as a SWAN, a leg of mutton as large as a hind quarter of beef; a twopenny loaf as large as a quartern;” and as philosophers assure you that pain even is only imaginary, we may justly believe the same of hunger; and if a servant who eats no more than one pound of food, imagines, by the aid of these glasses, that he has eaten three pounds, his hunger will be as fully satisfied—and the addition to your optician’s account, will soon be overpaid by the subtraction from your butcher’s and baker’s.