Cookery and domestic economy : containing upwards of one thousand carefully tested recipes, expressed in simple terms suitable for every-day life / by Mrs Somerville.

  • Somerville, Mary, 1780-1872.
Date:
[between 1800 and 1899]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Cookery and domestic economy : containing upwards of one thousand carefully tested recipes, expressed in simple terms suitable for every-day life / by Mrs Somerville. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    In offering the present Volume to the Ladies of Scotland, the Authoress would respectfully solicit attention to the following introductory remarks. Amongst practical house- keepers it has long been matter of complaint, that in most books on Domestic Economy the useful has been so mingled •with the useless—the simple so confused by technicali ties and defaced by Gallicisms—as to render such works well nigh unserviceable. If this charge be true, then we can partly account for the slow progress which the Culinary Art has made, and for the incessant murmurings con- stantly heawi in the family circle. To remove the causes of this comjDlaint, or, at all events, to lessen them as much as possible, has been the special care of the writer of this work. She has studiously avoided cumbrous phraseology, and technical obscurities. All the recipes and directions have been expressed in plain and every-da^ ^rms ; and an attempt has been made to combine the ( .at with the economical, under the conviction that in uiie cuisine, as such, there may be refinement without extravagai >e, and good taste without unnecessary expense. If she has suc- ceeded in this attempt, she humbly hopes that her little work may find its way, not only into the Halls of the rich, but also into the Cottages of the poor. Apart altogether from the character of the works referred to, there have been other causes for tl'ie tardy progress of Domestic Economy in these degenerate days. The finished education of too many of our fair sisters has seldom