In foreign kitchens

To a Frenchman such a picture is barbarism pure and unadulterated, and a French cook would feel that every theory of the art of eating had been set aside. The fat of beef he considers a gross production quite unfit for any purpose but frying, and to this end he cuts off every scrap. The long bone goes into the soup-pot, and from what Mark Twain calls the outlying district — the long, thin, uneatable strip, a part of all porterhouse steaks — he evolves a ragout or madedish of some sort. This principle runs .through everything. Till the French cook has caught the American spirit of lavishness, and become indifferent as to prices and quantities, his or her business in life is to first extract the utmost possibility from every article on the menu for the day, and then present it in the most attractive form. The huge roasts of England dismay and disgust. A dinner is a question of small portions for each, and the average Frenchman eats less than the Englishman, and both far less than the German, who is the heaviest of feeders. To the American who faces for the first time a French kitchen in Paris, or any of the larger cities of France, the prospect is a discouraging one. Even in the best houses in the new part of Paris it is allowed small space. The old-fashioned New England kitchen, broad, sunny, and spotless, would take in well-nigh a whole modern appartement. The Paris kitchen — and this is written after an inspection of many — is just large enough to allow of limited movement. Often it is unlighted save from another room, and it has absolutely no space for storage of any sort. The chief feature is the great chimney, with the tiled table, or framework, in which from four to six variousshaped openings for the charcoal fire are found. There is no need to think of baking, since the baker sends every form of bread and roll known to his craft ; no demand for a great fire by which a joint might roast, since a joint is not part of a civilized menu. Braising, boiling, stewing, fricasseeing, — anything that deals with moderate quan- titles, — can find perfect preparation on these various openings. Fuel is the heaviest item of family expenditure, and each bit of charcoal must do its utmost. They have even a curious form, invented specially for the pot-au-feu, which requires long, slow simmering; a roll of compressed coal-dust which has been mixed with sawdust and a little tar, and burns steadily and very slowly for hours. There are half a dozen sizes of charcoal, from tiny bits up to the size we know, and a form of kindling called bûches, — inch-long bits of wood dipped in some inflammable preparation and dried. One of these is lighted, and as it blazes up, half a dozen others are ranged carefully about it, a little fine charcoal and some larger bits are laid, and over all goes a black funnel, known as le diable, whose business it is to act as blow-pipe or bellows. This is the simple and ordinary form of French kitchen, and is found even in large houses. Gas is also a good deal used, and with it an oven for browning and baking; while in the English quarter English ranges are often set, the rent being in proportion