Preface
THIS book is not intended as a substitute for the regular cook book. It aims to be simply a practical handybook for the average housekeeper, who cannot afford to waste food which has been left over from her table, and who nevertheless desires to serve the best and most attractive dishes.
In the average small family where there are no servants, or perhaps one servant, setting a table with the very least margin of ampleness means that there will inevitably follow some left-over food. In addition to this, it is sometimes wise deliberately to plan for a remainder (especially where the first-cooking process is a long one, or where the food itself admits of reheating to advantage) in order to spare time and labor to the cook. Therefore, both from necessity and choice, the interested home-maker finds herself facing the problem of how to make the most and best of a left-over food supply. It is for such women that this book has been written.
Many of the finest dishes-dishes over which French chefs have made international reputations -are nothing more than "left-overs" attractively cooked. In every housekeeper's own kitchen there are the same foods, and the same possibilities.
And let it be added that in no branch of housekeeping or of cookery does a woman show to better advantage than in this ability to take the unrelated bits of left-over food and combine them so as to form tempting dishes for another meal.