J You can't have food fit to eat that is kept in a close cupboard, however clean. If you
have but a closet to keep food in, it must have a window and a gentle draft of air to
carry off the odors which else will spoil all the more delicate flavors. For the odors of
food are its finer parts, and in an airless closet these settle and are absorbed by the wood,
the plaster, the milk and butter, the flour and other eatables. Then you have the butter
turning cheesy or frowy, the cream taking a bad taste, the milk souring sooner than it
ought, the very pies, bread, and flour losing their wholesome sweetness. In the store-
room you can't keep salt fish, sour milk, cheese and onions in all their fragrance, and have
anything else nice.
If you would have wholesome food, keep the pantry window down at the top night
and day, except in the coldest weather.
Food of all kinds keeps better on clean dishes, so don't think it too much trouble to
pour the gravy into a fresh bowl and put the slices of meat on a clean plate, and turn the
few spoonfuls of jam into a saucer, instead of leaving it in the smeary compotier, which
is a better name than our awkward "sauce-dish." Reason why: thin smears and daubs of
food spoil soon and help spoil the rest. Especially see that the milk, cream and butter are
put away in clean ware. Milk will keep longer for this precaution. Then everything must
be closely covered with cloth and small plates. It is well to buy different sizes of cheap
ware for covers, and the odd little pottery mugs, bowls and pitchers are very convenient
for holding bits and ends of food too good to throw away. Besides food keeps better in
this ware than in anything else.
Fat of all kinds needs the nicest care to be sweet and wholesome, for nothing takes
odors more rapidly, and if you leave cupfuls of grease, or drippings, to stand open in the
closet, you must expect to find a queer flavor in your fried potatoes, and several different
savors in the plain pie-crust beside the one you wanted. Keep all fat for cooking in a
small stone jar, well covered, try it out once a week into a clean jar and let it cool uncov-
ered in a draft of air. In winter set it out doors to freeze, which refines it remarkably.
At other times keep it tightly covered in the ice-box. Fat that has absorbed a coarse
taste can be purified by freezing and become good again. Keep butter in a small stone
jar, closely covered top and sides, with clean linen cloths, with a large cloth and wooden
FOOD AND DRINK. 49
cover over all. Butter soon loses its best flavor when open, and becomes not much better
than so much suet. As good butter is the keynote of the table, and as poor butter is a very
unwholesome thing to eat at all, you must pay particular attention to its keeping. A plate
of it that has been shut up in a closet with meat, left-over food and close air, is not fit to
enter the stomach of a human being. Keep milk in the purest, coldest air you can find,
with a thin cloth over it. Don't take the warm new milk that hasn't had time to get cold
since the milkman's cart hurried off with it from the cow, and set it away in a tightly
stoppered can, for all milk wants to stand open to the air, that the animal heat and flavors
may pass off thoroughly; if this isn't done, the particles in the milk decompose, giving the
unpleasant odor you will not
Page 40
Presented as published in 1891. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
AI-modernized reading of the original text
J You can't have food fit to eat that is kept in a close cupboard, however clean. If you have but a closet to keep food in, it must have a window and a gentle draft of air to carry off the odors which else will spoil all the more delicate flavors. For the odors of food are its finer parts, and in an airless closet these settle and are absorbed by the wood, the plaster, the milk and butter, the flour and other eatables. Then you have the butter turning cheesy or frowy, the cream taking a bad taste, the milk souring sooner than it ought, the very pies, bread, and flour losing their wholesome sweetness. In the storeroom you can't keep salt fish, sour milk, cheese and onions in all their fragrance, and have anything else nice.
If you would have wholesome food, keep the pantry window down at the top night and day, except in the coldest weather.
Food of all kinds keeps better on clean dishes, so don't think it too much trouble to pour the gravy into a fresh bowl and put the slices of meat on a clean plate, and turn the few spoonfuls of jam into a saucer, instead of leaving it in the smeary compotier, which is a better name than our awkward "sauce-dish." Reason why: thin smears and daubs of food spoil soon and help spoil the rest. Especially see that the milk, cream and butter are put away in clean ware. Milk will keep longer for this precaution. Then everything must be closely covered with cloth and small plates. It is well to buy different sizes of cheap ware for covers, and the odd little pottery mugs, bowls and pitchers are very convenient for holding bits and ends of food too good to throw away. Besides food keeps better in this ware than in anything else.
Fat of all kinds needs the nicest care to be sweet and wholesome, for nothing takes odors more rapidly, and if you leave cupfuls of grease, or drippings, to stand open in the closet, you must expect to find a queer flavor in your fried potatoes, and several different savors in the plain pie-crust beside the one you wanted. Keep all fat for cooking in a small stone jar, well covered, try it out once a week into a clean jar and let it cool uncovered in a draft of air. In winter set it out doors to freeze, which refines it remarkably. At other times keep it tightly covered in the ice-box. Fat that has absorbed a coarse taste can be purified by freezing and become good again. Keep butter in a small stone jar, closely covered top and sides, with clean linen cloths, with a large cloth and wooden
FOOD AND DRINK. 49
cover over all. Butter soon loses its best flavor when open, and becomes not much better than so much suet. As good butter is the keynote of the table, and as poor butter is a very unwholesome thing to eat at all, you must pay particular attention to its keeping. A plate of it that has been shut up in a closet with meat, left-over food and close air, is not fit to enter the stomach of a human being. Keep milk in the purest, coldest air you can find, with a thin cloth over it. Don't take the warm new milk that hasn't had time to get cold since the milkman's cart hurried off with it from the cow, and set it away in a tightly stoppered can, for all milk wants to stand open to the air, that the animal heat and flavors may pass off thoroughly; if this isn't done, the particles in the milk decompose, giving the unpleasant odor you will not