The girl's own cookery book

Potatoes soufflés, that is potatoes cut into slices and blown out like balloons, are cooked very much in the same way, but they are cut into slices the eighth of an inch thick. The fat for the second boiling should be very hot, 400 deg. When placed in it the potatoes will inflate and present a most appetising appearance. It is said, I know not with what truth, that this mode of cooking potatoes was discovered accidentally. A cook was frying his potatoes, and when they were almost finished he was called away. He lifted them out of the pan and returned as quickly as possible, but found that his fat was cool. He put it back on the fire and made it hot once more, and on plunging his potatoes into it, was surprised to find that they became inflated and acquired a balloon-like appearance. His new dish was highly appreciated, and all the cooks in the parish besieged him for his secret, but it was some time before the real truth came out. HOW TO COOK FISH. rd^ lSH is expensive, and it is unfortunate that it should AJ/ be so. It requires no care or rearing ; it abounds without any trouble of ours, and all we have to do is to catch it, cook it, and cat it. If ever any people in this world ought to have a good supply of fish it is we English folks who live in a tight little island with the sea all round us, and who have, moreover, learnt more than any other nation how to make the winds and waves obey us, and the sea yield its treasures to us. Yet we have been victimised in this matter, and have not been allowed to make the most of our advantages. We hope, however, that things will soon be made right. People are beginning to see that they have been imposed upon, and fortunately they only need to be thoroughly convinced of an unpleasant fact of this kind in order to make them take steps to remedy the evil. They have gone a little way on the right road, and we trust they will go further, and, as we are looking forward 84 The GirPs Own Cookery Book. to the time when fish will be easily obtained by everybody, we must learn all about it in good time, so that we shall be able to make the most of it when we have it. One reason why fish is valuable is that it furnishes food for the brain. In these days a great many people are overworked. It is quite a rare thing to meet with a person who does just as much work as is good for him, no more and no less ; for we live in an age of e.xtremes, and have either to be out of patience with those about us, because they are idle and do not appreciate the dignity of work, or we are anxious about them because they work beyond their strength. Unfortunately, too, the overworkers are just the individuals who ought to take care of themselves ; they are fathers and breadwinners, who have anxieties and responsibilities which make them weary and old before their time. Girls may not be able to remove care from those they love, but they can help them to bear it by taking pains to prepare food which will supply the strength which is so much needed. Believe me, both energy and the power of endurance depend very much moi'e upon the kind of food we eat than we have yet realised, and the sooner we acknowledge this the better. The Rev. Charles Kingsley once wrote a poem, in which he said — “Men must work, and women must weep.”