A white roux is made in the same manner, but with the finest flour unbaked, only well dried, and fresh butter merely clarified, mixed by stirring slowly over a still less degree of heat, and never permitting either the flour or butter to take colour. The brown and white roux will keep a few days in a cool place for daily use as required.

This is all the space I can afford to this subject. It is an important elementary process, as the pot-au-feu is to soup making, and forms a key to the composition of many sauces.

English melted butter is regarded as the one sauce of our country, and if well and carefully made, is a very acceptable and wholesome vehicle for various additions, both savoury and sweet as required; while the ingredients are always at hand, and it can be quickly produced when required.

Other sauces, which are distinct varieties of the Veloute', are, for example, Maitre d Hotel, with the addition of a little finely chopped parsley and a little lemon juice; Ravigotte the same, with a little chervil and tarragon besides, etc. For Mayonnaise, Remoulade, and other forms of olive oil and egg mixture as sauce, see pp. 174, 175.

There is one sauce especially appropriate for wild duck, and scarcely less so to well-cured ham, either hot or cold, for which I have never yet met with what appears to me to be an adequate receipt. I refer to that known as Bigarade;

White roux.

English melted butter.

"Maitre d'Hotel," etc.

Bigarade sauce.

I will, therefore, give my own here. The following may be regarded as sufficient for ten or twelve persons to accompany three or four lightly roasted wild ducks, of which, of course, the breast slices are the only portions served. Put about one-third of a pint of well-reduced good brown sauce, which will form indeed a glaze, into a small saucepan for melting near the corner of the fire. Have prepared three Seville oranges, thus - remove the zest of two by scraping or with a bread-grater; add it, together with their pulp and juice passed through a sieve so that no pith or pips are present, to the glaze, and slowly bring to the boiling point, stirring well, and set aside, keeping it hot. Add a pinch of Nepaul pepper, with a small teaspoonful of castor sugar. Then pare very thinly the peel of the third orange, so as to remove with it no pith, in separate portions, which are to be cut into fine long strips like those used for julienne soup, but very much smaller. Put them into cold water in a very small saucepan and let them boil, removing it to stand aside, keeping hot for a few minutes. When ready to serve, pour off the liquid from the strips and add them to the sauce in the first saucepan, stirring well at the corner of the fire, adding a small wineglass of dry Curacoa at the very last, and send up, as well as the birds, very hot. If necessary, it may be passed through a tammy, but if properly made, it will not be so. It should be added that the Seville orange cannot be obtained in this country before the first week of February, and as wild duck is often quite in season six or eight weeks before that time, the best flavoured oranges obtainable must be substituted for the former, but for a true bigarade the Seville is essential.

Author's receipt.

After sauces come garnitures. Respecting these a few hints may be given, for agreeable and even important additions may be made to most small dishes of animal food under this title of "garnish." Whether it be a small filet, braised or roasted, or a portion thereof broiled; a fricandeau, or the choice end of a neck of mutton made square and compact by shortening the bones; or a small loin, or a dish of trimmed neck cutlets, or a choice portion of broiled rump-steak; a tender ox tongue, a couple of sweetbreads, poultry, pigeon, or what not - the garnish should be a matter of consideration. Whether the dish be carved on the family table, as it often may be when its head is interested in the cuisine, or whether it is handed in the presence of guests, the quality and the appearance of the dish greatly depend on the garnish. According to the meat may be added, with a view both to taste and appearance, some of the following - purees of sorrel, spinach, chicory, and other greens, of turnips, and of potatoes plain, in shapes or in croquettes; cut carrots, peas, beans, endive, sprouts, and other green vegetables; onions (see p. 122), small or Spanish, stewed; cucumbers, tomatoes, macaroni in all forms; sometimes a few , sultanas boiled, mushrooms, olives, truffles. In the same way chestnuts are admirable, whole, boiled, or roasted, and as a puree freely served, especially in winter, when vegetables are scarce; serving also as farce for fowls and turkeys. While such vegetables as green peas, French and young broad beans, celery and celeriac, asparagus, seakale, cauliflower, spinach, artichokes, salsify, vegetable marrows, etc., are worth procuring in their best and freshest condition, to prepare with especial care as separate dishes.*

Garnitures in variety.

And here, again, the distinctive principles, already referred to, of French and English cuisine, are illustrated in relation to the cooking of vegetables; and again, let me add, not always to the disadvantage of our own system.

* A hint about boiling asparagus is worthy of mention, since the proper method is rarely followed by English cooks.

Asparagus of the stouter sort, always when of the "giant" variety, should be cut of exactly equal lengths, and boiled standing ends upward in a deep saucepan. Nearly two inches of the heads should be out of the water - the steam sufficing to cook them, as they form the tenderest part of the plant; while the hard stalky part is rendered soft and succulent by the longer boiling which this plan permits. Instead of the orthodox twenty minutes allotted to average asparagus lying horizontally, in the English manner, which half cooks the stalk, and overcooks the head, diminishing its flavour and consistence, a period of thirty to fifty minutes, on the plan recommended, will render fully a third more of the stalk delicious, while the head will be properly cooked by the steam alone. One reason why it is not uncommon to hear the best produce of the fields of Argenteuil insufficiently appreciated here, and our own asparagus preferred, is, that the former is rarely sufficiently cooked at English tables.