The spirit of cookery

The Essence of Fowl as described in books on cookery is a good illustration of the persistence of the prejudice in favour of bones of whatever origin, and is of very little use. The compound essence, into which extract of veal enters, is more suitable. The Essences of Game — pheasant, partridge, woodcock, and snipe — are useful to work up residues. Essence of Ham is always savoury and naturally concentrated, as the meat of the ham has been dried. Essences of Fish are savoury, but have a collateral fishy or hair-oil taste, which makes them repulsive to refined palates. Broiled fish — e.g., John Dory or whiting— gives a more tolerable essence, but it is partaken of only under social constraint, CULINARY ESSENCES, SOY 3’3 Essences may be made of shallots, garlic, sage and onions, truffles, mushrooms (not to be confounded with fléchette) , fine herbs, oranges, anchovies. The essences may be incorporated with butter, which, like most fats, has the power of retaining flavours better than liquids. We thus obtain anchovy butter, ravigote butter, green ravigote butter, Proveneale butter, lobster butter or lobster coral butter, Montpellier butter, crayfish butter, praivn and shrimp butter. In the cases of crayfish and other crustaceans, the flesh itself, not merely the extract, is incorporated as puree with the butter. Soy, soya, Japanese sooju, also called India or China soy, because it came via these countries, is the Japanese name of the plant Dolichos soja, L., and of the extract prepared from the fermented grain of this plant. The grain or bean is (said to be) fermented in (salt) water, and the product is evaporated down to the consistency of a thin sauce, or even of a dark-brown treacly extract. China soy as hitherto obtained in London had a strong taste of brown or black sugar syrup, commonly called dah, and however genuine as regards importation it may have been, it would have been more valuable if it had not been so mixed. According to an old fable, soy is made from beetles, a statement which Londoners improve to black-beetles. This was probably induced by the colour of the soy, which is very much like that of the brown articulated. The so-called China soy formerly sold in London was a thick liquid of agreeable, sweetish, somewhat warm taste. The later importations from Japan consist of a thin brown liquid of agreeable taste, being a salted extractive, which serves any purpose of a mild sauce ; we found it very agreeable with fish. According to Kaempfer, soy was made by the Japanese with meat-juice, and termed by them sooju; but the products sold in London contain no appreciable amount of meat-juice, 3M The Japanese eat the flour of the soy-bean cooked, and call the dish miso. Brillat-Savarin supposed that soy had been the garum of the Romans : ‘ Soy which comes from India, and which is known to be the result of fishes fermented with mushrooms.’ This is followed by a sentence of prurient nonsense on fishes and truffles, with which this author concludes this passage. The latropha Plant and its Products.