By reducing culinary operations to something like a certainty, _invalids_ will no longer be entirely indebted to chance, whether they shall recover and live long, and comfortably, or speedily die of starvation in the midst of plenty.
These rules and orders for the regulation of the business of the kitchen have been extremely beneficial to the Editor's own health and comfort. He hopes they will be equally so to others: they will help those who enjoy health to preserve it; teach those who have delicate and irritable stomachs how to keep them in good temper; and, with a little discretion, enable them to indulge occasionally, not only with impunity, but with advantage, in all those alimentary pleasures which a rational epicure can desire.
There is no question more frequently asked, or which a medical man finds more difficulty in answering, to the satisfaction of himself and his patient, than--_What do you wish me to eat?_
The most judicious choice of aliment will avail nothing, unless the culinary preparation of it be equally judicious. How often is the skill of a pains-taking physician counteracted by want of corresponding attention to the preparation of food; and the poor patient, instead of deriving nourishment, is distressed by indigestion!
PARMENTIER, in his _Code Pharmaceutique_, has given a chapter on the preparation of food: some of the following receipts are offered as an humble attempt to form a sort of _Appendix to the Pharmacopoeia_, and like pharmaceutic prescriptions, they are precisely adjusted by _weight_ and _measure_. The author of a cookery book, first published in 1824, has claimed this act of industry of mine as his own original invention; the only notice I shall take of his pretensions is to say, that the first edition of "_The Cook's Oracle_" appeared in 1817.
By ordering such receipts of the _Cook's Oracle_ as appear adapted to the case, the recovery of the patient and the credit of the physician, as far as relates to the administration of aliment, need no longer depend on the discretion of the cook. For instance: _Mutton Broth_, No. 490, or No. 564; _Toast and Water_, No. 463; _Water Gruel_, No. 572; _Beef Tea_, No. 563; and _Portable Soup_, No. 252. This concentrated _Essence of Meat_ will be found a great acquisition to the comfort of the army, the navy, the traveller, and the invalid. By dissolving half an ounce of it in half a pint of hot water, you have in a few minutes _half a pint of good Broth for three halfpence_. The utility of such accurate and precise directions for preparing food, is to _travellers_ incalculable; for, by translating the receipt, any person may prepare what is desired as perfectly as a good English cook.
