Culture and Cooking; Or, Art in the Kitchen — Reading Companion

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In Category - Recipes

Authors: Owen, Catherine, -1889 Digital Source: Project Gutenberg Gutenberg Release Year: 2009 First Publication Year: Not confirmed

Key Word: Cooking, American Target Reader: Readers of public-domain and historical texts

Book Edition: Project Gutenberg digital edition Book Language: en

Edition facts

Words 40,219

Reading time 175 min

Text sections 5

Culture and Cooking; Or, Art in the Kitchen — Reading Companion can be approached with a clearer sense of reading commitment from its source measurements: 40,219 words, 2 hr 55 min estimated reading time, and 5 detected text sections.

The text analysis averages about 33.2 words per sentence, while the detected sections provide another way to judge how the source is divided.

Project Gutenberg metadata also associates the work with “Cooking, American,” connecting these edition facts with the source record’s subject description.

Source: Project Gutenberg record #29982

Catherine Owen's 1881 book bridges cooking and cultivation, offering precise techniques for bread, pastry, and roasting with a focus on why failures occur. This editorial note examines her conversational voice, structural clarity, and the shift from general principles to specific recipes.

Editorial Edition Score 4.7/5

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Title & short description10 pts
Source metadata20 pts
Text length15 pts
Chapters / structure15 pts
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PRELIMINARY REMARKS 1

Sponge for bread.--One cause of failure.--Why home-made bread often has a hard crust.--On baking.--Ovens.--More reasons why bread may fail to be good.--Light rolls.--Rusks.--Kreuznach horns.--Kringles.--Brioche (Paris Jockey Club recipe).--Soufflée bread.--A novelty 12

Why you fail in making good puff paste.--How to succeed.--How to handle it.--To put fruit pies together so that the syrup does not boil out.--Ornamenting fruit pies.--Rissolettes.--Pastry tablets.--Frangipane tartlets.--Rules for ascertaining the heat of your oven 22

WHAT TO HAVE IN YOUR STORE-ROOM.

Mushroom powder (recipe).--Stock to keep, or glaze (recipe).--Uses of glaze.--Glazing meats, hams, tongues, etc.--Mâitre d'hôtel butter (recipe).--Uses of it.--Ravigotte or Montpellier butter (recipe).--Uses of it.--Roux.--Blanc (recipes).--Uses of both.--Brown flour, its uses 28

Remarks on what to have for luncheons.--English meat pies.--Windsor pie.--Veal and ham pie.--Chicken pie.--Raised pork pie.--(Recipes).--Ornamenting meat pies.--Galantine (recipe).--Fish in jelly.--Jellied oysters.--A new mayonnaise luncheon for small families.--Potted meats (recipes).--Anchovy butter.--A new omelet.--Potato snow.--Lyonnaise potatoes 35

A CHAPTER ON GENERAL MANAGEMENT IN VERY SMALL FAMILIES.

How to have little dinners.--Hints for bills of fare, etc.--Filet de bœuf Chateaubriand (recipe).--What to do with the odds and ends.--Various recipes.--Salads.--Recipes 47

Why you fail.--Panure or bread-crumbs, to prepare.--How to prepare flounders as filets de sole.--Fried oysters.--To clarify dripping for frying.--Remarks.--Pâte à frire à la Carême.--Same, à la Provençale.--Broiling 55

Boiling meat.--Rules for knowing exactly the degrees of boiling.--Vegetables.--Remarks on making soup.--To clear soup.--Why it is not clear.--Coloring pot-au-feu.--Consommé.--_Crême de celeri_, a little known soup.--Recipes 65

Remarks on making and flavoring sauces.--Espagnole or brown sauce as it should be.--How to make fine white sauce 70

Remarks.--Salmi of cold meats.--Bœuf à la jardinière.--Bœuf au gratin.--Pseudo-beefsteak. --Cutlets à la jardinière.--Cromesquis of lamb.--Sauce piquant.--Miroton of beef.--Simple way of warming a joint.--Breakfast dish.--Stuffed beef.--Beef olives.--Chops à la poulette.--Devils.--Mephistophelian sauce.--Fritadella, twenty recipes in one 72

Biscuit glacée at home (recipes).--Iced soufflés (recipes).--Baba and syrups for it (recipe).--Savarin and syrup (recipes).--Bouchées de dames.--How to make Curaçoa.--Maraschino.--Noyeau 84

FRENCH CANDIES AT HOME.

How to make them.--Fondants.--Vanilla.--Almond cream.--Walnut cream.--Tutti frutti.--Various candies dipped in cream.--Chocolate creams.--Fondant panaché.--Punch drops 91

FOR PEOPLE OF VERY SMALL MEANS.

Remarks.--What may be made of a soup bone.--Several very economical dishes.--Pot roasts.--Dishes requiring no meat 96

A FEW THINGS IT IS WELL TO REMEMBER 105

ON SOME TABLE PREJUDICES 108

A CHAPTER OF ODDS AND ENDS.

Altering recipes.--How to have tarragon, burnet, etc.--Remarks on obtaining ingredients not in common use.--An impromptu salamander.--Larding needle.--How to have parsley fresh all winter without expense.--On having kitchen conveniences.--Anecdote related by Jules Gouffée.--On servants in America.--A little advice by way of valedictory 111

A FEW PRELIMINARY REMARKS.

ALEXANDRE DUMAS, _père_, after writing five hundred novels, says, "I wish to close my literary career with a book on cooking."

And in the hundred pages or so of preface--or perhaps overture would be the better word, since in it a group of literary men, while contributing recondite recipes, flourish trumpets in every key--to his huge volume he says, "I wish to be read by people of the world, and practiced by people of the art" (_gens de l'art_); and although _I_ wish, like every one who writes, to be read by all the world, I wish to aid the practice, not of the professors of the culinary art, but those whose aspirations point to an enjoyment of the good things of life, but whose means of attaining them are limited.

There is a great deal of talk just now about cooking; in a lesser degree it takes its place as a popular topic with ceramics, modern antiques, and household art. The fact of it being in a mild way fashionable may do a little good to the eating world in general. And it may make it more easy to convince young women of refined proclivities that the art of cooking is not beneath their attention, to know that the Queen of England's daughters--and of course the cream of the London fair--have attended the lectures on the subject delivered at South Kensington, and that a young lady of rank, Sir James Coles's daughter, has been recording angel to the association, is in fact the R. C. C. who edits the "Official Handbook of Cookery."

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Catherine Owen opens her 1881 book with a disclaimer: "This is not a cookery book." Instead, she positions it as a bridge between the cook and her household oracle, aiming to explain why recipes fail. The preface cites Brillat-Savarin and mentions Charlotte Brontë and Margaret Fuller to argue that cooking and cultivation are not antagonistic. Owen's voice is direct and personal, addressing the reader as "you" and drawing on shared frustrations—such as pale, sodden roast meat or bread with a hard crust. She promises not a collection of recipes but a guide to understanding the principles behind them.

A Conversational Teacher

Owen's narrative voice is that of an experienced friend, not a distant expert. She uses rhetorical questions ("Who does not remember...?") and direct address ("Perhaps the cook will tell you...") to create intimacy. Her tone is occasionally wry: she describes the "exasperating old friends" whose vague recipes maddened our mothers. This personal approach extends to her own authority—she admits to introducing French chef recipes but frames them as "good things little known." The voice is confident but not condescending, and she often anticipates the reader's confusion, as when she explains why pepper should be added after cooking: "the flavor of pepper is entirely changed by the parching it undergoes."

From Principle to Practice

The book's structure moves from general principles to specific techniques. The preface establishes the philosophy; then chapters on bread, pastry, and store-room supplies follow. Each section begins with common failures ("Why you fail in making good puff paste") before offering solutions. Owen's explanations are methodical: for roasting, she details the oven temperature, the pan setup, the timing of turning, and the gravy-making process. She warns against common errors, such as putting meat in a cool oven or adding water to a fat pan. This step-by-step approach, grounded in cause and effect, makes the book a practical manual rather than a mere collection of recipes.

Shifts in Pace and Detail

Owen varies her pacing between brisk instructions and reflective asides. In the roasting section, she moves quickly through the steps—"Heat up the oven till it is quite brisk, then put the meat in a pan"—but pauses to explain the science: the surface should be covered with "osma-zone," a glaze that seals in juices. She also digresses into sensory details, such as the "offensive" odor of scorched pepper. These shifts keep the prose from becoming monotonous. The later chapters, which include recipes for mushroom powder and glaze, are more terse, suggesting a deliberate change in pace as the book moves from teaching principles to providing reference material.

Readers will find Owen's approach most useful when they read sequentially, as she builds on earlier concepts. The book rewards attention to her explanations of why methods work, not just how to execute them. Her insistence on precise timing and temperature—and her warnings against common pitfalls—make this a valuable companion to any standard cookbook of the period. For those interested in the history of American domestic advice, Owen's voice offers a rare blend of literary reference and practical kitchen wisdom.

It’s odd how books find us—I came to Catherine Owen’s careful talk of failing bread and wish I’d had her patience then. But her quiet insistence that cooking is just attention lingers, like something remembered. That same thoughtful pace seems to wait inside Chinese recipes — Story, Setting & Ideas, which I keep near my own kitchen, leafing through when the day feels hurried.