Practical gastronomy and culinary dictionary

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Practical Gastronomy and Culinary Dictionary is an 1892 professional reference by Charles Herman Senn, presented here in its third edition. It combines a vast recipe collection (the catalog anchors 896 food records) with a culinary dictionary of French and English terms, historical essays on the history of cookery, biographical sketches of famous chefs, and roughly two hundred specimen menus drawn from real hotels, clubs, and historic banquets. The book positions itself as an oracle of gastronomy meant to serve working cooks, household managers, and hotel professionals rather than casual home cooks. Its scope runs from foundational techniques like stock-making, sauces, and forcemeats through elaborate haute cuisine entrees, fish and game dishes, cold aspic work, pastries, and frozen desserts, before closing with menu theory, wine service notes, and an alphabetical culinary dictionary. Readers will find it as much a professional's compendium and historical document of Victorian-era fine dining as a cookbook, reflecting the classical French culinary system that dominated elite English kitchens of the period. Because it is organized partly as a dictionary and partly as a structured recipe catalog by course and protein, modern readers should approach it as a reference work to browse rather than a linear cookbook to read start to finish.

The book opens with prefatory essays and a historical survey of cookery (section 1) followed by gastronomic philosophy and technique notes (section 3). The bulk of the work is organized as a catalogue of dishes grouped by course and protein: fish and releves, entrees of beef, lamb, mutton, pork, and poultry, then game, vegetables, and salads (sections 5 through 10), followed by an extensive sauce dictionary (sections 11 and 17). Later sections cover fundamental kitchen techniques, forcemeats, stocks, and consommes (sections 13 through 15 and 18), then return to fish, cold service, veal, and more entrees (sections 19 through 26). Dessert and pastry chapters follow (sections 28 through 33), including frozen desserts, cakes, and biscuits. The book then shifts into menu theory and specimen menus from hotels, clubs, and historic banquets (sections 34 through 36), followed by wine service notes and literary quotations (section 37), chef biographies (sections 38 and 39), and finally a full alphabetical culinary dictionary (sections 39 through 42), closing with an index (section 43).