Name: Paper-bag cookery
Author: Nicolas Soyer

I am also indebted to the editor of the Lon- don Daily Chronicle, to Mr. G. R. Sims, Dr. Charles Reinhardt, and Mrs. Alfred Praga, the well-known cookery expert and writer, for permission to reproduce articles which they wrote on my system in that paper. Nicolas Soyer. GENERAL DIRECTIONS I IDO not claim for the paper-bag system of cookery that it can cook everything. It is evident that tea must still be made in the teapot. Generally speaking, we may waive our claim to having mastered the diffi- culty with respect to soups, although I have made beef tea with excellent results. The fol- lowing is a list of articles that may in the meantime be avoided: — Soup (except Beef Tea), Omelette, Scrambled Eggs, Jam (except in small quanti- ties), Scotch Kale, Beans, Cabbage, Cauliflower, Broccoli, Artichokes, Macaroni or kin- dred Italian pastes. The success of the system depends entirely upon how it is carried out. Some people have imagined that all that I urge amounts to a 19 20 SOYER’S PAPER-BAG COOKERY general use of the bag in place of the ordinary saucepan, without any attention to the condi- tions that are essential to good cooking. Good cooking requires time, care, attention to de- tail, taste, and a temperature suited to the particular dish being cooked. While the paper-bag system is labor- and time-saving, as well as affording more nutritive and ap- petizing effects than the present, it does not abrogate any of the rules that apply to effi- cient work at the kitchen-table. A stew must be made up of the ingredients that consti- tute a stew, and proportioned to the number for whom it is required. The same conditions apply to this system. Let me, therefore, go over as minutely as I can — • The Bag. — Specially prepared bags should be used. Without them the method cannot be practiced with assurance of success. The bag should be made of materials that guar- antee its purity. It should be odorless, and its purity a guarantee that nothing injurious can possibly be imparted from it to the food cooked in the bag. SOYER’S PAPER-BAG COOKERY 21 Before using the bags — (1) Select one that “ fits ” the food in- tended to be cooked; (2) Grease slightly the inside of the bag, except in the case of vegetables or when water is added. For beginners it is advisable. Butter, lard or dripping may be used. (3) When the food has been prepared for the bag, place the same on the table and lift the uppermost edge of the bag while you insert the contents. (4) Fold the mouth of the bag two or three times and fasten with a clip.1 It is desirable to fold the corners of the bag so as to secure as near as possible a her- metical closing. It may occasionally happen that a bag may leak, in which event it is not necessary that the food should be emptied and transferred to another bag. Simply put the bag within another. The Oven. — Practically any oven will do. Paper-Bag Cookery is as well suited to a gas stove as it is to a coal oven, an electricity 1 Strong wire paper-clips, obtainable of any sta- tioner, answer the purpose. 22 SOYER’S PAPER-BAG COOKERY cooker or oil stove, always provided the nec- essary heat is secured. The size of the oven makes no difference to the cooking, only to the size of the article.

AI-modernized reading of the original text

I am also indebted to the editor of the London Daily Chronicle, to Mr. G. R. Sims, Dr. Charles Reinhardt, and Mrs. Alfred Praga, the well-known cookery expert and writer, for permission to reproduce articles which they wrote on my system in that paper. Nicolas Soyer. GENERAL DIRECTIONS IDO not claim for the paper-bag system of cookery that it can cook everything. It is evident that tea must still be made in the teapot. Generally speaking, we may waive our claim to having mastered the difficulty with respect to soups, although I have made beef tea with excellent results. The following is a list of articles that may in the meantime be avoided: — Soup (except Beef Tea), Omelette, Scrambled Eggs, Jam (except in small quantities), Scotch Kale, Beans, Cabbage, Cauliflower, Broccoli, Artichokes, Macaroni or kindred Italian pastes. The success of the system depends entirely upon how it is carried out. Some people have imagined that all that I urge amounts to a general use of the bag in place of the ordinary saucepan, without any attention to the conditions that are essential to good cooking. Good cooking requires time, care, attention to detail, taste, and a temperature suited to the particular dish being cooked. While the paper-bag system is labor- and time-saving, as well as affording more nutritive and appetizing effects than the present, it does not abrogate any of the rules that apply to efficient work at the kitchen-table. A stew must be made up of the ingredients that constitute a stew, and proportioned to the number for whom it is required. The same conditions apply to this system. Let me, therefore, go over as minutely as I can — • The Bag. — Specially prepared bags should be used. Without them the method cannot be practiced with assurance of success. The bag should be made of materials that guarantee its purity. It should be odorless, and its purity a guarantee that nothing injurious can possibly be imparted from it to the food cooked in the bag. Before using the bags — (1) Select one that “ fits ” the food intended to be cooked; (2) Grease slightly the inside of the bag, except in the case of vegetables or when water is added. For beginners it is advisable. Butter, lard or dripping may be used. (3) When the food has been prepared for the bag, place the same on the table and lift the uppermost edge of the bag while you insert the contents. (4) Fold the mouth of the bag two or three times and fasten with a clip.1 It is desirable to fold the corners of the bag so as to secure as near as possible a hermetical closing. It may occasionally happen that a bag may leak, in which event it is not necessary that the food should be emptied and transferred to another bag. Simply put the bag within another. The Oven. — Practically any oven will do. Paper-Bag Cookery is as well suited to a gas stove as it is to a coal oven, an electricity 1 Strong wire paper-clips, obtainable of any stationer, answer the purpose. cooker or oil stove, always provided the necessary heat is secured. The size of the oven makes no difference to the cooking, only to the size of the article.