Fresh boiled beef is called beef bouilli by some, but in the French kitchen the term means fresh beef dressed, without absolutely boiling, it being suffered only to simmer till it is done. Indeed, it may be laid down as a general rule, that whether you are dressing beef bouilli, or any other meat, it should never be suffered to go into a boiling gallop, except for a minute or two, for the purpose of throwing up the scum. After the scum is all cleared away, let it simmer till it is done. But you must be careful not to let your meat boil too quickly; for this purpose it should be put over a moderate fire, and the water made gradually hot, or the meat will be hardened, and shrink up as if it were scorched; but by keeping the meat a certain time heating, without boiling, the fibres of the meat dilate, and it not only yields the scum more freely, but the meat is rendered more tender. The advantage of dressing fresh meat in the way practised by the French with regard to fresh beef is twofold. In the first place, meat dressed in this manner affords much more nourishment than it does cooked in the common way, is easy of digestion, and will yield soup of a most excellent quality. (See Soup and Bouilli, and 99.)