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235
The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft
·
George Gissing
194
As
in
so
many
other
of
our
good
points,
we
have
achieved
this
thing
unconsciously.
Your
ordinary
Englishwoman
engaged
in
cooking
probably
has
no
other
thought
than
to
make
the
food
masticable;
but
reflect
on
the
results,
when
the
thing
is
well
done,
and
there
appears
a
culinary
principle.
Nothing
could
be
simpler,
yet
nothing
more
right
and
reasonable.
The
aim
of
English
cooking
is
so
to
deal
with
the
raw
material
of
man's
nourishment
as
to
bring
out,
for
the
healthy
palate,
all
its
natural
juices
and
savours.
And
in
this,
when
the
cook
has
any
measure
of
natural
or
acquired
skill,
we
most
notably
succeed.
Our
beef
is
veritably
beef;
at
its
best,
such
beef
as
can
be
eaten
in
no
other
country
under
the
sun;
our
mutton
is
mutton
in
its
purest
essence--think
of
a
shoulder
of
Southdown
at
the
moment
when
the
first
jet
of
gravy
starts
under
the
carving
knife!
Each
of
our
vegetables
yields
its
separate
and
characteristic
sweetness.
It
never
occurs
to
us
to
disguise
the
genuine
flavour
of
food;
if
such
a
process
be
necessary,
then
something
is
wrong
with
the
food
itself.
Some
wiseacre
scoffed
at
us
as
the
people
with
only
one
sauce.
The
fact
is,
we
have
as
many
sauces
as
we
have
kinds
of
meat;
each,
in
the
process
of
cookery,
yields
its
native
sap,
and
this
is
the
best
of
all
sauces
conceivable.
Only
English
folk
know
what
is
meant
by
gravy;
consequently,
the
English
alone
are
competent
to
speak
on
the
question
of
sauce.
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