Principles of cookery

But the rigid economist says that eggs at two cents apiece are too expensive for the family of limited means. Then comes in the art of cooking to show how the eggs may be combined with less costly food ma- terials to make several palatable dishes which may take the place of meats and yet require but little more labor in preparation. First, the two eggs may be combined with one cup of with white sauce ; this may be served with the omelet, or sauce blended with the scrambled egg, or made into a souffle, or served with hard boiled eggs chopped or sliced. The identical quantities might be used in each case. By such combination the cost of the dish is doubled, but it will go at least twice as far and its fuel value is more than trebled. Or, instead of the sauce, we may use one cup of milk thickened with white bread crumbs and well salted and omit the butter or use less. This will reduce both cost and fuel value. The foundation may be again extended and varied. To the two eggs and cup of white sauce may be added cheese two ounces of grated cheese or two ounces of chopped ham. If the ham is of average fatness, the fuel value of the cheese and ham will be about the same. The ham might be more expensive than the cheese were it not that this is a way to turn to good account the smaller bits of meat. By this addition the dish, at two and a half times the cost of the eggs, becomes about five times as efficient in fuel value. This combination may be served in many forms, — serving the cheese may be warmed in the sauce and poured over the eggs hard boiled, poached or made into an omelet, and the ham might be used in the same way. After mixing sauce, cheese, and yolks of raw eggs, Sponge Cake the stiff whites of the egg may be folded in and the mixture baked in one dish or several little ones. All such combinations are naturally eaten with some form of bread, and here again the whole cost is diminished with an increase of fuel value. A summary of these possible combinations may be clearer in tabular form, as follows : Weight. Cost. Cal. 2 eggs 4 oz. 4c. 161 White Sauce : 1 C. milk 8 oz. 2c. 162 Butter 1 oz. 2c. 217 Flour l/2 oz. 51 Cheese 2 oz. 2c. 246 Ham 2 oz. 2c. 207 It would be interesting to trace the history of egg cooking and find who first discovered that eggs cooked in milk, sweetened and flavored, made the palatable compound we know as custard; or who first discovered the delicious sponge cake or "diet bread," as our foremothers called it. All our modern recipes for sponge cake, angel cake, lady-fingers, and sponge drops, are but slight variations from the recipes to be found in old cook books, which call for the weight of the eggs in sugar and half the weight of the eggs in flour. The tendency of the artistic cook is to separate the two parts of the egg, using the yolk to produce certain effects and the white for others. The proportions are about the same in the angel cake as in the sponge cake, but the egg whites only are used. The egg yolks, left from such cakes, are more desirable than the whole egg for many custards and sauces, producing a richer and more creamy effect, since the yolk of egg contains considerable oil.