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Sallets and Salads: Serenely

Serenely full, the epicure would say, 'Fate cannot harm me, I have dined to-day."

This is the original and more familiar "A Recipe for Salad," as given by the author's daughter, Lady Holland, in her "Memoir"-a recipe that was subsequently placed by the gifted divine in somewhat altered form, slightly abridged, and the quantity of the ingredients in one or two instances slightly changed. In the variant it will be seen that the portions of potato and anchovy were increased and the relative quantities of oil and vinegar were amended.¹ It is a question whether this celebrated recipe, so enthusiastically expressed and so tempting to the uninitiated who would naturally be led astray by the climax of the ode, has done more harm or more good 1 "Two large potatoes, passed through kitchen sieve, Unwonted softness to the salad give.

Of mordant mustard add a single spoon, Distrust the condiment that bites so soon; But deem it not, thou man of herbs, a fault To add a double quantity of salt.

Three times the spoon with oil from Lucca crown, And once with vinegar procured from town.

True flavour needs it, and your poet begs The pounded yellow of two well-boiled eggs; Let onion atoms lurk within the bowl, And, scarce suspected, animate the whole.

And, lastly, on the flavoured compound toss A magic teaspoon of anchovy sauce.

Then though green turtle fail, though venison's tough, And ham and turkey are not boiled enough, Serenely full, the epicure may say, 'Fate cannot harm me, I have dined to-day." in the important interests of salad-making-whether the evil inculcated in the prescription as a whole has not overbalanced the good results of extolling the virtues of salad itself. The niceties of salad-making are so subtle-so little may make or mar-it were unwise to prescribe either eggs or potato to the inexperienced. The anchovy sauce must, perforce, be banished as fatal; while mashed potatoes should always be used with discretion. In corn-salad a little potato assuredly adds to the unctuousness; and where lettuce is inclined to be tough or stringy, it may be advantageously employed. It is likewise eminently useful where the vinegar may have been dealt out too liberally. But with tender, brittle, well-blanched cos or endive, who would think of utilising either egg or potato! And how may mustard be appropriately blended with chicory, water-cresses, or radishes, so rich themselves in pungency? In the employment of condiments one should ever well consider the special greenmeat to be treated, or what Montaigne has termed "the differences of Sallets according to their seasons." Cayenne, tabasco, and garlic are yet more dangerous in unpractised hands, and may readily, like the brass of an orchestra run riot, drown with their dissonance the arpeggio passages and more dulcet notes of the other instruments.